Making Joyful Noises

Chord Fingering

The diagram at the right represents the top end of the guitar fingerboard. The horizontal lines rep- resent the Nut and Frets 1, 2, and 3. The vertical lines represent the six strings.

Fingering for the Left Hand

1 2 3

4

3 2 0 1 0

Nut

Fingering for the Left Hand ( See left and below

1st Fret

)

Numerals (0, 1, 2, 3, 4) are sometimes indicated in chord diagrams, appearing either above the Nut-line or adjacent to the black marks ( ). These numerals denote fingering for the left hand and are to be read as follows: 0 - Play an open string with right hand. Do not touch or press it with your left. 1 - Press the string at mark ( ) with the first finger. 2 - Press the string at mark ( ) with the second finger. 3 - Press the string at mark ( ) with the third finger. 4 - Press the string at mark ( ) with the fourth finger. The strings not marked are to remain silent–not picked or strummed with the right hand. Open strings (marked 0) are of course picked or strummed.

2nd Fret

3rd Fret

1st string

2nd string

3rd string

4th string

5th string

6th string

The diagram above specifies that the first and third strings are to be played as open strings, while the sixth string is not to be played at all. Also, only three fingers of the left hand are to be used to form the chord. It happens to be a C chord. In many chord charts (including those in this book), it would look like this:

C

3 2 0 1 0

Making Joyful Noises: Master ing the Fundamentals of Music • 7