Funk Rhythm

Funk rhythm guitar is a drum part played on six strings. Your strumming hand never stops its sixteenth-note motion, and your fretting hand decides, stroke by stroke, what rings and what stays a dry, percussive scratch. This chapter teaches you how to play funk guitar from that engine up.

You'll begin with sixteenth-note scratching on an Em7 chord, counting "1 e & a" and pressing the shape down only for the hits. Then you'll learn the dominant ninth, the classic funk chord, in an E9 shape you can grip and release in an instant. Next come partial chords and stabs: small E, A and D triads on the top strings, cut off short so the band has room. You'll learn to hit "the one" together and hard, then leave space for the rest of the bar. The last lesson brings in the sharp-nine chord, often called the Hendrix chord, with grooves that answer E7#9 with A major stabs.

Every funk guitar strumming exercise plays in your browser with a click. Keep the hand loose and moving like a machine.