How To Play The Chords And Melody At The Same Time On One Guitar

In this video, you learn the key to playing the chords and melody of a song at the same time on guitar.
Often, this style of playing is perceived as being really difficult to do, however, this is not necessarily so.
As is often the case, it comes down to how you go about playing and creating chord/melody arrangements on guitar.
In this lesson, you learn what I call chord/melody mechanics.
These are very effective exercises and drills designed to build the technique required to play guitar this way.
First, you learn several exercises built around the skill of holding chord shapes and playing melodies at the same time.
After this, you will then actually play melodies and chords seamlessly together across a chord progression in the key of C.
Learn how to create your own chord/melody arrangements of a song on guitar: acousticguitarlessonsonline.n...
Get daily tips by following me on Facebook: / onlineacousticguitarle...

[@acousticguitarlessons]

Tablature for examples presented in this lesson can be found here: acousticguitarlessonsonline.net/chord-melody-guitar-exercise-and-drills

[@mickymiller6130]

Essential lesson for aspiring fingerstyle guitarists.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@mickymiller6130, glad you think so :)

[@MultiCugel]

I've been watching people on youtube playing and thinking how do they do this? Somethings going on but i don't know what it is! Now you 've shown us Thanks! It's going to take time and effort but the best things do. Thanks for the video and book, much appreciated.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

You are very welcome Bill! I'm glad the lesson has been useful for you :)

[@Enryu_CZX]

It's the chords in different position all over the neck not only one chord but various types of chords major7 minor 9 etc the triads in different string sets of strings and double stops

[@leithold315]

This! This is exactly what i was missing! Kept trying to play chords with melody together but just ended up jumping from one to the other making it sound disconnected! Thanks for this and looking forward to watching your other vids!

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@leithold315, you are very welcome. Glad this video has helped with your chord/melody playing :)

[@wayneeldridge5916]

Wow your lessons just took what I learned about theory to another break through for me thank you your lessons are great 👍

[@acousticguitarlessons]

That’s great to hear Wayne!! Glad you like the lessons :)

[@berniew6332]

thanks again Simon, great tips and advice

[@acousticguitarlessons]

You are very welcome Bernie! :)

[@stuartarnold4495]

Nice to start at a basic level. I will certainly try this out and that will take a while because my collarbone is broken. Thanks Simon for this video.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

You are welcome Stuart! Sorry to hear about your collarbone

[@cyrilmoussoki3193]

Thank you for sharing

[@acousticguitarlessons]

You are most welcome Cyril! :)

[@TamaraGrace]

Great advice. I downloaded your tabs for this and have watched this video 3 times so far. I've been looking for this type of style. I will keep cracking at this until I get it, fluently. I'll be coming back here for that. Thanks so much Great tutorial!

[@acousticguitarlessons]

You are very welcome Tamara! I'm glad you've found the video useful. Let me know if you have any questions at all :)

[@TamaraGrace]

@@acousticguitarlessons sure thing, thanks again! 😊

[@CarnivalVillage]

Thank you...

[@michaelzimmer1115]

I have not seen another KZbin video giving this method. It is good; it worked for me. Cannot say I have been able to do it nearly as well in higher positions. I think to some extent, I have stuck too much with standard CAGED shapes, which tie up too many fingers. CAGED as a descriptive system is great. As a prescriptive system, it has some flaws. That is my deficiency, since thousands can work very freely up the neck. With the open chords, and guitar friendly keys, I don't seem to have to think about which chord(s) to use for given melody notes. I guess it is like learning to read whole lines of text instead of word at a time. I guess we could call it development of the musical intuition - fingers and ear and connection between them.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@michaelzimmer1115, glad you found the lesson helpful :) It is different in higher positions and fragmented chords and open string friendly keys do help in situations like this. Sometimes a single open string is enough to imply/suggest a chord.

[@michaelzimmer1115]

I spent a lot of time doing this decades ago, primarily in the C major harmonization. It gets a lot harder to hold a chord shape when you move up the neck. Mostly, you have to let go of the chord shape.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@michaelzimmer1115, yes, a little different higher up the neck with some chords for sure, but certainly doable :)

[@tuna22lm]

I was hoping to find someone that taught guitar using chords but also taught how to play the exact same song by playing just using each string note for note but not making the shape of the chord I guess kind of what a lead guitar player would play if this makes sense I don't know how else to put it kind of like playing a flute note for note except using the guitar. Some songs sound really cool when played one string at a time on guitar.

[@nostro1001]

This was insightful thank you! 😎👍 At first I thought this video was a day old, until reading comments and saw this is a year old, not that good information is time relevant. I was just more surprised that I'd never seen this on my feed before. Your Maton sounding very clear, I can't quite work out what model that is.. 808 of some variety (doesn't have the headstock to be a messiah) 🤔 Cheers.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@nostro1001, you are welcome! It's an Em325c Maton. Discontinued around 2010, but yes, a nice guitar with a good sound :)

[@nostro1001]

@@acousticguitarlessons Thank you!

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@@nostro1001 you are welcome! :)

[@mariodujak3448]

💯

[@tuna22lm]

I took music lessons on guitar when I was 12 it was playing songs note for note on each corresponding strings didn't learn chords at all, that was over 40 something years ago ,I am 70 now can't work so wanted to try guitar again I have been trying to find that same style of learning on line but can't, I figured that would be a good place to start short of buying a bunch oof music books ,haven't quite given up YET.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

I believe you simply mean learning the melodies of songs as opposed to the chords of the song, is that correct?

[@tuna22lm]

@@acousticguitarlessons yes I believe you are right, I guess it is a little bit like playing lead guitar.

[@johndavid9973]

❤

[@tuna22lm]

So now I see what you are doing only moving a couple fingers while holding the chord shape with your other fingers, I get it now, almost like what I was talking about earlier but different, mine didn't require holding chord shapes at all.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

Glad you understand :)

[@wienerdimanche8291]

When you play the chord then do you play the notes of the chord.and what the nbrs 3103 you pick what they represent fingers or fret

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@wienerdimanche8291, the numbers represent the frets :)

[@MOON-gf4tl]

While doing percussion i hit other notes which sometimes sounds good and sometimes bad , why that happens and what to do fr it???

[@acousticguitarlessons]

It's hard to say without seeing you play and without any real detail about the issue you are having. Are you playing VERY slowly to eliminate inaccurate playing. If your playing is inaccurate, the you are not playing slow enough and/or breaking what it is you are working on into small enough pieces :)

[@jfarrell21]

When you start talking about the notes above and below, but within the scale, isn't that getting into modes? Or am I confusing things?

[@acousticguitarlessons]

Hi John. It depends on the context. I see where you are coming from, and yes, if I start the C major scale for example on the E note, we could be playing E Phrygian, but I would also need an E Phrygian chord progression to play over to be in Phrygian. If there is no progression, then I can imply the key, for example Phrygian, by starting on the E note and setting it up to be the tonic of the key by returning to it regularly and at the end of phrases etc. I have a modes video here if you have not seen it yet that explains further: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rJvJd5qsp5hjmNU

[@jfarrell21]

@@acousticguitarlessons I find all of this fascinating (while really just starting out on guitar). I've read enough articles or watched enough videos to make me dangerous. Thanks for the prompt reply. Cheers.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@@jfarrell21 you are very welcome and yes it is all fascinating stuff for sure :)

[@HealthySkepticism777]

For some reason I’m not getting any of your emails when trying to get the ebook

[@acousticguitarlessons]

Can you tell me what happens when you try to download the eBook? Have you checked your junk mail? Do you receive any error messages?

[@HealthySkepticism777]

@@acousticguitarlessons KZbin removed my previous reply for whatever reason. No error messages. It says I’m successfully subscribed and I can browse the website. But no emails are coming through. Edit: it came through about 24 hours later.

[@tuna22lm]

I'm trying to understand, maybe if you played something super simple like Mary had a little lamb, showed the chord shape/s then plucked each individual string, I'm trying to follow what your playing to your diagram but it is to fast for me sorry.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

You can slow down the video in the settings for the video if that helps? I also have eBooks that break the topic of chord/melody down into greater detail that might interest you. Here is one such eBook: acousticguitarlessonsonline.net/how-to-play-chords-and-melody-at-the-same-time-on-one-guitar And here is another: acousticguitarlessonsonline.net/how-to-create-your-own-unique-solo-acoustic-instrumental-song

[@dimwitsadvocate6264]

So just to be clear, you play the scale for the chord being played at the moment. The key of the song is in C. When playing the C chord, you play the C scale notes. Then you go to the D minor chord and play the D scale notes. Then you play the E minor chord and play the E scale notes. Do I understand it correctly? UPDATE: In looking at your video some more, I look at when you play the E minor chord (@7:10) and see on the tab that the first note you pluck is a G, the next one is F. There is no G or F in the key of E, only G# and F#. And the patterns for C, Dm, Em are the same. So it appears all the chords are using the notes of the C scale. Or am I just totally confused?

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@dimwitsadvocate6264, yes, I am only using notes from the C Major scale, because this is the key I am in. All the chords I am using are from the C Major scale, therefore I play them with notes from this scale. Does that make sense?

[@dimwitsadvocate6264]

@@acousticguitarlessons Yes, it makes perfect sense. I thought I had to use a different scale for each chord. I didn't know using the scale of the key of the song would work. Your way is much easier for this amateur. I went over the video a lot and finally saw that you were using the same notes for each chord, so I asked to see if I was seeing things correctly. You, once again, have been very helpful! Thank you very much!!

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@@dimwitsadvocate6264 you are most welcome :)

[@rebeccasimmons6052]

I play the piano and I don't understand WTF he's doing😅 the only thing I understand about the guitar is holding the strings down and strumming the chord.

[@acousticguitarlessons]

@@rebeccasimmons6052, I am simply holding chord shapes down and playing notes from the corresponding scale at the same time, just like you would when you play piano, only you have two hands available to do this, on guitar we have to do it with our fretting hand only :)