Playing and changing between chords can be a real tough challenge for beginning guitar players. So what I want to do now, is to help you to make the process of learning to play and change between chords much easier and faster, so that you have more fun and less frustration with your guitar playing.

How are we going to do this? Well, let’s first take a look at basic open chords and what is so challenging about them. When you are a beginner, one of the biggest challenges is to coordinate your fingers to push down multiple strings at the same time. Fortunatelly you don’t have to play 5 or 6 strings at the same time, because there are easier ways for you to play chords, where you can leave some strings out and therefore can use less fingers to play them.

1. Using easier chord shapes

This chords are in the key of G major. The numbers in the black dots tell you which finger to use to fret the string, in the following order:

1. Index finger
2. Middle finger
3. Ring finger

For the G major chord you are going to let the D string ring open and for the D major chord you are going to let the strings 4 and 5 ring open (A and D string).

2. Making chord changes easier

This chord shapes are easier for you to play as beginner, since you are only using 3 strings and they also help you to simplify the changes between each of them, because the fingerpositions are close to each other.

I am going to show you know, how you should change between each of these chords with the least effort possible:

C Major to G Major: When changing from C to G, you want to keep your middle finger down on the low E string, while lifting up your ring finger and moving your index finger one string lower from the D string to the A string.

C Major to D Major: For this chord change you have to lift all your fingers up and move your index finger from the 4^th to the 6^th string and push down the 2^nd fret.

C Major to E Minor: When changing from C to Em, you want to keep your index finger down on the low E string, while lifting up your ring finger and middle finger to move them to their new positions (as you can see in the chart above).

G Major to D Major: For this chord change you lift your index and middle finger and push down your index finger one string lower again.

E Minor to D Major: You want to lift all your fingers up and push down the 2^nd fret of the low E string with your index finger.

To practice this chord changes, move your fingers between the chord chapes mulitple times, until you become comfortable with them, also try them in reverse.

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