Most guitar players begin by learning chords, because that's what we need to play our favorite songs. The problem is that we learn them in a random and haphazard way that pays no attention to how difficult those chords are to untrained fingers, and we find ourselves struggling to get our fingers into the complicated shapes that many chords require. Very often, we are given difficult chords to learn first, chords which should not be attempted until the easier ones are learned.

In Guitar Principles First Chords & Songs we learn our chords in the best order, going from the easiest chords and building on that skill to learn other chords, step by step. We learn to move our fingers with the necessary relaxation that makes smooth finger action possible.

The most difficult part of learning to use our chords is changing them. This is where most beginners have great difficulty-they can't get from one chord to another in time and the song keeps breaking down!

In first chords and songs, we learn two ways of changing chords: with support and without support, or what I call "divebombing".

Divebombing means picking up all the fingers and placing them down on the next chord. This is more difficult, and should not be attempted until chords are practiced with support first, then diveboming will be easy.

We also learn special practice methods that teach our fingers to first make the changes very slowly, and gradually bring that speed up to the level that is required to play songs. This eliminates the frustration usually experienced by the beginning guitar player when they try to use their chords to play songs.

We focus on just a few chords, once you know how to practice and learn these chords, you will know they right way to go about learning all the rest of the chords you need.