Foot tapping (Guitar Lesson BC-126) Guitar for beginners Stage 2

This is Stage 2, Lesson 6 of Justin's Beginner Guitar Course.

This video shows you how to tap your foot. Crazy I know... Seems so easy but lots of folk don't get it quite right...

The Justinguitar Beginners Guitar Course, a series of over 100 lessons on guitar for beginners. Text support is on the web site and also in a proper old skool paper book which can be ordered from the web site of your local music store :)

Taught by Justin Sandercoe.

Full support at the justinguitar web site where you will find hundreds of lessons on a wide range of subjects, and all the scales and chords that you will ever need! There is a great forum too to get help, no matter what the problem.

And it is all totally free, no bull. No sample lessons, no memberships, no free ebook. Just tons of great lessons :)

To get help with this lesson (and for further info and tabs), find the Lesson ID in the video title (like ST-667 or whatever) and then look it up on the Lesson Index page of justinguitar.com

http://www.justinguitar.com

Have fun :)

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Hello, how you doin'?

It's Justin here again.

And this time I'm gonna teach you how to tap your foot.

Which, kind of really sounds funny to me to

even say that I'm gonna teach someone

how to tap their foot.

Because it should be the most rudimentry,

most ridiculously easy thing ever known to mankind.

Only it isn't.

So, what do I need to tell you about tapping your foot.

Well, first of all, tapping your foot is really important,

cause it kind of locks you into the rhythm,

and especially if you're playing in a band or whatever,

or if you're playing with yourself,

keeping rhythm is really, really important,

it's probably the most important thing you can be doing

while you're playing,

other than getting kind of all the notes right.

So, obviously developing some sort of

strong rhythmic feeling is

really important.

So, tapping your foot is important,

on a, if you like, a musically spiritual level.

God, that makes me sound like a hippie,

but just it makes, it gives you the feeling,

gets your body moving, part of your body

is feeling the pulse of the music.

And one thing that you can definately do,

which it doesn't matter how you tap your foot,

but a really good excercise is to
just tap your foot all the time

when you listen to music.

As soon as there's music on,

whether you're in a car,

or on the bus, or listening to your iPod on the tube,

or whatever

you should be trying to tap your foot along all the time.

Really, really important.

Probably not tapping your foot that's on the accelerator,

if you're driving a car,

that could be a little hazardous, but otherwise

you should always be trying to tap your foot.

Now, I'm also gonna give you a few hints

on exactly how to tap your foot,

because it's amazing, the problems that can happen

if you just don't think of the consequences in the way you tap your foot.

So, the first thing is, which foot you're gonna tap.

Now, if your guitar is sitting here,

it's sitting down on my right leg.

Yeah?

So if I'm sitting on a seat,
I know right now I'm sitting on the floor,

so right now tappping my foot doesn't make any difference,

but if I was sitting up on a chair,

and I'd tap the foot that's connected to this,

my right foot, then it's gonna be

bumping my guitar up and down like this

every time I tap my foot.

So, probably, it would be a lot better idea

for me to tap my left foot, than it would be my right.

If you're left handed,
you probably want to be tapping your right foot.

So, the foot that you're gonna tap is the one

that the guitar is not sitting on.

If your guitar is sitting on your right leg,

then you're gonna tap your left foot.

Seems really simple, but it makes a really big difference.

Now, some people don't like doing that.

I've come across people before,

students, personal students that I've known,

private students

that were not good with tapping their left foot,

cause it kinda feels weird.

Now, if that's you and you don't feel

like you can tap your left foot,

and you really wanna your right,

Then you have to tap with your toes,

and not your heel.

Now, if you do that, it tends to feel

a little bit awkward,

and for me it's not as solid as feeling of tapping,

but it's the only way around it,

or you tap your toes inside your shoe.

Which, it means that other people wouldn't be able

to see that you're tapping your foot.

But it doesnt' matter,

really, you're tapping your foot for you.

Now just to demonstate these things,

I'm gonna go to a quick stand-up

with me sitting on my sofa over there,

so you can see the results,

the way that you should be able to tap your foot.

Particularly with the toe tap,

cause it's a little bit unusual.

So let's go and have a quick look at that.

OK, so what I just want you to have a look at:

First of all, is the effect that

if I tap my left foot, my guitar stays still,

no matter how or what I do with my left foot,

it's all cool.

But with my right foot, as soon as I tap that,

the guitar body is jumping up and down,

I don't know if you can see the headstock,

in the shot or not, but it's jumping.

Now, if I'm trying to change chords like that,

it ain't gonna work.

And now, if you just have a look at the close-up

of my foot there, you can see,

if I'm using the heel,

which is how a lot of people like to tap,

that's what's moving my whole leg,

whereas if I just tap with my toes,

the rest of the top part of my leg doesn't move at all,

so it's definately much better for you to,

if you wanna use your right leg,

use your toes to tap, not your heel.

Or, even more preferably,

just use your left foot,

cause then you can tap with your toe,

or your heel, or however you like.

Also, the alternative,

if you look closely at my foot there,

You see, if I just tap with my toes, inside my shoe,

you can kind of see my shoe moving a little bit,

but it doesn't really matter.

And it's enough for you to get your vibe,

and you can quite comfortably tap away like that

inside your shoe.

Even like this, now I'm tapping my foot,

and you probably can't even see it.

OK, so now I didn't go to the sofa, right.

I went to the chair, cause

we couldn't get the camera,

to be in shot properly with the sofa,

it was all a little bit weird.

So, apologies for these of you

who were expecting to see me sitting on the sofa then,

and then saw me sitting on a chair,

it must have been very shocking.

Anyway, not as shocking as the riduculousness

of me trying to teach you how to tap your feet.

I still think that's a really funny concept.

But, I'm amazed at the amount of times

I've taught people how to tap their foot properly.

It's, so that's one,

I'm trying to teach you this, and I know it sounds funny,

and you're probably just gonna leave all sorts of

ridiculously horrible comments about me on youtube.

So, I'm doing it for your own good,

I'm trying to help you out here.

So, first of all, make sure you tap your foot now

all the time, along with any music any time you hear music,

or you're playing music, try to tap your foot along.

Especially, would it be a great thing to

go through some of the chord sequences,

either from stage one

or from this stage,

and start going through it as you're playing them,

put your metronome on at, let's say 60 BPM,

click, and get your foot going, and your downstrum

all at the same time.

So, metronome, your friend the metronome,

at, say 60 BPM,

and actually this is not gonna work out very well,

because I'm just gonna have to keep talking for a second

while I adjust it, because it's all on a funny setting.

So, metronome, it's 60 BPM here,

turn the volume up a little so you can hear it,

then you'll be tapping your foot,

tap, tap, tap,

and then you'll be strumming,

. . .

downstrums at the same time.

. . .

Now, I'm tapping my knee, that's an

especially advanced move.

A kneetap,

you don't wanna get into doing a kneetap yet.

right?

. . .

But this the idea.

What I want you to do is

have the metronome, your downstrum and your foot

all going at the same time.

If you spend a little bit of time on that,

I know it seems a bit riduculous me saying this now,

but it will make a huge difference to how well you

pick up your rhythm guitar in the next stage.

So, please, have a bit of a go at that,

when you can stop laughing at me.

And, erm, I should see you for another lesson very soon.