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Hi, how're you doing? 
Justin here.

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Welcome to IM-145,

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where we're going to be checking out 
how to do a snare drum hit

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and add a bit of percussive element 
to your rhythm guitar.

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Now the snare drum is normally played 
on beats 2 and 4,

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and if you'll excuse my really rubbish beat-boxing,

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a kind of real basic drum groove goes like:

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. . .

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and it's the little "ka!" 
that we're gonna try and emulate

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as part of our rhythm guitar.

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Now if I play it for you, 
it sounds like this:

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. . .

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And you can hear 
it really kind of brings a bit of life

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and a bit of groove into your rhythm guitar.

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If I play it first, 
but without the little "chuck"

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. . .

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It's fine,

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nothing wrong with that

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. . .

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But as soon as you bring that in

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. . .

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you'll find that all of your mates 
are tapping their feet

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and clapping their hands 
in no time.

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Really good if you're doing
an acoustic guitar thing

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at a party or at a barbeque,

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you'll really find that it makes 
all of the difference

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between a regular strumming pattern

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and a bit of this in it.

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It really moves things along really well.

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Now the most important thing here

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is that you get the technique right.

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And I've seen a couple of people explain it by

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kind of relaxing your hand on the neck 
and hitting the strings,

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which kind of works, but it doesn't then work 
for open chords

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and a lot of the times,

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if you're in that kind of party 
acoustic guitar thing,

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you're going to be using open chords.

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So it's really important 
that you learn how to perform this

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without having any hand 
on the guitar at all

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other than your picking hand.

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So you can do this snare drum hit like this:

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. . .

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And it's important too to realize 
that there are actually two elements.

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There's two things going on here, which

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when I'm doing it sounds just like one motion

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because I am using just one movement.

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But the two parts are:

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First of all the hand hitting on the strings,

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and you get the strings hitting on the wire frets

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You get this kind of metallic crunching sound.

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So that's kinda the first part.

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And the second part 
is once the hand is on the strings,

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the pick plays through the strings,

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and you get a little bit of a "thud" there.

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So when you're practicing it,

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you have to learn it 
by doing it in two motions:

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Hand, pick. Hand, pick. 
Hand, pick. Hand, pick.

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And then, it becomes one motion.

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And it's really the sound of those two things 
happening at the same time

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that gives it that really strong 
kind of snare drum-like sound.

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So, let's have a bit of look at a close up at this

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because it's quite an interesting technique,

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and if you don't get it exactly right 
it's frustrating.

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OK, let's look at these two motions.

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So the first one, it's the outside part 
of your hand,

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after your little finger,

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-- so that kind of the outer palm part --

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that's landing on the strings.

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And it has to cover all six strings.

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It's really important that it lands firmly 
on those six strings,

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it should be, I don't know, 
3 or 4 inches away from the bridge.

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So somewhere kind of at the back end 
of the sound hole is where it should be landing.

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And it's important that you realize 
that it lands from above

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because it's part of a strum, really.

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It's that strumming motion, so

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practice, first of all, 
just moving your hand from above,

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falling down, 
so it's almost like part of a strum,

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and then it rolls out 
and it should just be falling like that

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with the outside part of your palm.

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So try and get used to that, 
first of all, the motion.

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Now you can hear already 
the strings hitting against the frets.

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That's the noise.
They're just up here somewhere.

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The strings are hitting the frets.

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And you get a bit of that click noise.

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So that's the first thing 
you should be trying to work on.

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It's just trying to get that hit 
to come down like that onto the strings.

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Making sure it's not too noisy and 
there's not too many strings ringing out.

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Sometimes my little finger 
is hitting on the finger board there.

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I can do it deliberately if I want.

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That's not a bad thing, 
it just adds to the click sound,

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so don't worry if you do a little bit of that, 
it's not really the point,

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but it doesn't matter 
if it happens a little bit.

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Now I'm making my hand go out this way

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a little bit more than I probably should,
just to show you,

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so normally it's staying 
a little bit squarer than that,

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and you can see now that my pick hand 
is ready to hit the strings.

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And, of course, now what's happening is

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the hand is going on 
and then the pick is roughly at the top and:

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it picks a few of the strings.

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It's doesn't have to pick like all of them,

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but probably the first four, 
the thickest four strings.

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Something like that.

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Four or five, it doesn't really matter. So,

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try and get used to now : 
hit, strum. Hit, strum.

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And practice just getting that motion,

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again this hand is not doing anything, 
so making sure

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because if you cover it like that 
you can get away with

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not doing any palm muting, 
just strumming.

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So, really, you want this hand 
not touching the guitar and:

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Mute, strum. Hit, strum. 
Hit, strum. Hit, strum.

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And eventually, you'll find that you can:

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hit-strum, hit-strum 
and that, then, it's the point.

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Now, it isn't something 
that's gonna get closer and closer

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and then suddenly you'll get it.

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You practice going: 
hit, strum. Hit, strum.

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Once you feel confident 
that you're doing that really well,

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just have a go at
trying to throw the whole thing together.

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And that's when you get really good.

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And it does sound a little -- well, QUITE A LOT --
like a snare drum.

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. . .

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Next, we have to incorporate it 
into some rhythm guitar patterns.

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The next thing we're gonna do

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is incorporate that now 
into a rhythm guitar pattern.

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And probably the easiest one 
to get going with

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is to start off with a straight-eight pattern.

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So if you remember back to our basic rhythm guitar,

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we had one-and two-and three-and four-and,

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using down-up, down-up,
down-up, down-up.

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I'll just run through it once 
so you know what's going on.

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I'm using a G open chord.

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It's a good idea to practice this 
with open chords first, so you don't cheat.

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If you're using barre chords,
you can lift them up a little bit

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and that's kinda cheating a bit. So,

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get yourself an open chord -- I'm using G --

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you can use whatever you like.

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First of all, 
just get that real basic strumming, so:

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One-and two-and three-and four-and,

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One-and two-and three-and four-and.

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Hopefully you've got that one by now,

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So now what we're going to do

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is we´re gonna add in that hit 
on beats two and four.

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So we have one-and TWO-and three-and FOUR-and

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One-and TWO-and three-and FOUR-and

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One-and TWO-and three-and FOUR-and

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One-and TWO-and three-and FOUR-and

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. . .

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Just practice it slowly, 
make sure you've got it right.

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That's the most important thing, 
trying to get it smooth, because it should.

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It really kinda feels like a strum,

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it doesn't feel like you suddenly have to do 
something different with your arm.

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Your arm should still be flowing:

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. . .

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I'm not feeling it's any different.

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I do feel a little bit like my shoulder 
is coming forward a bit

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and I'm digging into the guitar a little bit,

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but it's not changing the way 
that the strumming feels.

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Because remember, the hand should not stop moving
when you're strumming,

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or it will kind of throw you off.

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So, really important then just to practice:

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Getting it in the groove, 
getting your hit nice.

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. . .

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It's worth practicing as well sometimes 


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trying to get that hit so it's louder 
than you think it should be.

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So really try and throw it out.

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. . .

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Really try and give it some.

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Because you'll probably find 
that you're doing it a bit too quiet.

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So, if you ever record yourself 
or get a way of listening to yourself,

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what you want to do then is 
trying to even it out,

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so it's at the right volume level.

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But that's something you can only do 
when you hear yourself back.

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Now, once you've had a go 
at doing that basic eighth-note one,

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maybe you'd like to try 
a sixteenth-note pattern,

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and probably the one to go for 
and to start off with again is

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doing "one-and two-and three-and four-and",

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but this time using all down strums, so:

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One-and two-and three-and four-and.
All downs.

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. . .

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And then adding that snare hit 
on the two and four.

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So having: one-and TWO-and three-and FOUR-and

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one-and TWO-and three-and FOUR-and

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one-and TWO-and three-and FOUR-and

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. . .

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And if you've got that right,

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you might like to try and add something else 
a little bit more funky with the sixteenth-notes:

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. . .

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It's a really good idea 
to try to insert this technique

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into as many different rhythm patterns as you can.

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You'll find that it works really well in some, 
and not so well in others,

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but that's really your call. 
What you want to do is to get good at it enough,

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that you can just let it flow 
and start happening


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whenever you want.

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'Cause really with rhythm guitar, 
it's not really like:

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"learn this pattern and learn that pattern"

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and numbering them 
and all that sort of stuff,

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it should just be kind of flowing, 
going with the groove,

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and then eventually finding the rhythm pattern 
that works for that particular song.

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So, see how many different rhythm patterns 
you can insert this snare drum hit into.

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It's lots of fun, 
hope you've enjoyed it too.

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See you for another lesson real soon.

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Take care, bye-bye.