Beginner Guitar Lesson on Chord Exercises

Flash Cards
Flash cards are a great way to memorize a large number of chords. Simply write the chord name on one side of a 3×5 index card and the correct chord shape on the opposite side. Use them to drill yourself. As you flash through the chord names, form the chords on your guitar or simply visualize the correct answer. Then flash through the chord formations and answer with the chord name.

Learn 5 or 10 at first and add more as you make progress. Practice the newer chords daily and the others weekly or monthly. The concept is, you would have three piles of cards — a daily pile, weekly pile and monthly pile. New chords or chords that give you problems need to be a part of your daily practice.

Explore Easier Chord Shapes
Most of the chord shapes presented in the text books are too difficult for beginners. Even though these generic chord shapes are technically correct, they are impractical even for experience players. The solution is to re-design these more difficult chord shapes in a way that only requires 2 or 3 fingers and minimum finger movement between chords.

You can modify any chord shape so that you are only playing the first 3 or 4 strings which will still give you a good sounding chord without all the unnecessary stretching.

Chord Formation Exercise
When you are changing chords pay attention to how your fingers make up the chord shape. The idea is to treat your fingers as a unit, pressing them down on the chord in one single movement, not two or three movements. Think of your fingers coming down on the strings like a rubber stamp.

Rhythm Exercise
After your chords are mastered, you can focus on developing speed and accuracy with chord changes by using a metronome. Start by setting the metronome to 60 beats per minute. Select a chord progression to practice, strum the chord on the first beat of the bar and listen to the metronome for the remaining three beats.

The object of this exercise is to make the next chord change accurately on the first beat of the next bar.  If the chord change isn't accurate, slow the metronome down. Use the metronome to track our progress. Gradually increase the tempo over time and tap your foot so you can develop your rhythm.