Funk Strumming

Funk and similar genres require a strong sense of timing and a comfort with playing offbeat.

Whatever genres you're interested in, learning this skill will serve you well.

Today we're going to use an Em9 chord for practice.

I like this shape because it forces us to avoid playing both the low and high E while we strum.

The best thing to do is hold the chord in a way that your fingers touch against the E strings preventing them from ringing.

Even if you strum very carefully to avoid them, the force of the pick hitting the strings can still cause the strings to ring out, so this is an essential skill.

First, let's work through muting one of four positions in a set of 8th notes. Simply strum 8th notes steadily with your picking hand. 

With your left hand, when it's time for a dead note, reduce the pressure on the strings while remaining in contact with them, to allow them to lift off the fret.

Treat each bar as a separate exercise to be repeated.

Now let's move to a 3-3-2 (Tresillo) pattern, in bar 1. Once you've got it, we have it reversed in bar 2.

Here are two more complicated patterns. We've moved to 16th notes now, so reduce your speed if you've been playing along with a metronome.

Here is a two bar pattern more like what you'd really find in a song. We move through 4 chords, playing just the upper end of the chord. It can sound a little empty on it's own, but this is often where the guitar fits in when playing with a full band.

On the Bm7 chord, we don't even play a B. That's for the rhythm section to handle.

As you can see, there's a lot of offbeats being emphasized here. This works well because the drums and bass are typically holding down the strong beats. It very often falls to the guitar to fill in the gaps and provide an interesting counterpart to the basic beat of the song.

Once you spend enough time with these patterns, they will become second nature, and playing offbeat won't feel so unnatural.