BS-994 • Wild World - Cat Stevens

[justinguitar]

Lesson Link: http://www.justinguitar.com/en/BS-994-WildWorld-CatStevens.php

Questions...

[Nic]

Hi all,
I heard Justin said on the video that many patterns could suits. I must admit I am still strugling to find a good one  . There's also no indication on the songbook. (This surely means that I am not to the level 9 yet... )
However, would anyone have some recommandations ?
Cheers,
Nic

[jacksroadhouse]

Okay, here's something to get you started. To make it sound really nice, you'd need 16th note strumming and play e.g. something like this:

D D udud D du
1 2  a3i+ 4  +a

But since that might be a bit much for now, try these two:

D duD du
1 2+3 4+

or simply this:

D D dudu
1 2 3+4+

(the upper case D are a little more accented - if you're not there yet, don't sweat it)

The important thing with a song like this is to just let the strumming flow with the lyrics. Keep your hand moving and just add strums or leave strums out at will. You can enter the chorus with four accented down-strums, play only one strum in a measure (and keep singing), play Dudududu at times. Experiment - this is the perfect song for it

[Steev]

Thanks for the strumming patterns, will try them out. I think that this is an area that Justin needs to expand on, in a lot of his lessons he seems to tell you one thing and plays something else.

[Nic]

@jacksroadhouse
Thank you very much indeed! 

[R I P]

Thanks Jack for your explanation.
One thing is not clear - when you talk about the 3 different strumming patterns, you mean I should play the first note on beat 1 & 2 and the following one on beat 3&4, because the song is in 2:4?

For example, taking your 16th note pattern:

Gchord     ||   Cchord
D    D   u  ||   d  u   d  D  d   u
1    2    a  ||   3  i    +  4  +  a

[jacksroadhouse]

The time signature of this song is a bit weird. I think it's mostly in 4/4 time with lots of split measures (2 chords in one bar), and a few 2/4 bars in between. But that doesn't really matter here.

So yes, if you have 2 chords with 2 beats each, the strum patterns I posted would stretch over 2 chords (4 beats).

(okay, if you're still on 8th note strumming, you may want to stop right here)

But...

I believe there are also some "pushes" in there (I don't really play the song myself, so I'm a bit on my best guess here). "Push" means you anticipate the chord change by e.g. an 8th or a 16th, changing before the beat (usually on the up-stroke before the beat on which the chord change would otherwise happen).

If you want to really dig in and play the song "just right", the best option is to play along with CS again and again. Like many songs of his, this isn't following any set-in-stone patterns. He's changing things around a lot, improvising, and spicing things up in all sorts of ways (all of which is essential for this style of music).

I had a fresh peek at Justin's video just now, and you can copy that impro stuff from him as well (not surprisingly, since he's the Man ). One thing might be irritating for beginners though: when Justin plays simple Dududud, he actually plays D ud ud ud (for the theorists: touch of shuffle rhythm/swing time or down as dotted eigth and up as a sixteenth note). But before you start looking for high windows ledges (been there myself): the easiest way to learn this kind of rhythm is again to just play it. Stop thinking and lust play along. You can analyse it (much) later.

Bzw: if it's going too fast for any of you, use software so slow it down (many programs can do that without changing the pitch, I'm using Audacity for that kind of thing).

Man, I really need to learn that song myself so I can stop guessing

[justinguitar]

I think that this is an area that Justin needs to expand on, in a lot of his lessons he seems to tell you one thing and plays something else.

The hard part as a teacher with strumming is that people want to learn a song, but strumming is a little tricky for where they are at...

In this song the "proper" strumming is hard, certainly not for beginners, maybe even tricky for intermediate players, but I'm sure there are many people (beginners) who enjoy playing the song a little more simply.

If I tried to put in the exact strumming then it would be very long, confusing for beginners and for the vast majority of students, when they have progressed through 16th note strumming (intermediate course) they will be able to pick up most of the proper strumming pretty quick.

This also adds in pushes and 2:4 bars which complicates it even more and I think if I detailed all that most beginners would either try, fail and get disheartened, or just give up on the song...

All that said, great input from @jacksroadhouse - cheers dude!

[jacksroadhouse]

Hey Justin,

thanks!! And I agree: this is the sort of thing where once you can play it in terms of technical ability, you probably won't need anyone to tell you how. You'll just hear it.

My own experience (going slightly off-topic here): before I was able to play anything like this more or less "properly", I first had to stop thinking and just let the strumming hand do it's job. Sounds strange, but it really works. That's how I learned pushes, rests, swing time, triplets, and other stuff. The technical terms for these things I mostly learned much later.

And to this day I often play rhythm withput really knowing what I'm doing, just by listening to a song and having the rhythm in my head. I sometimes analyse it later on, but only if I have a good reason to do so. If I can play it in time to a metronome or drum beat, I don't need to know the blueprints.

IMVHO

Cheers

Jack

[Lucky Tim]

Question:
In the first riff after the F chord CBAGFEDC, I notice that I can leave all my fingers in the F position and pick them out so that I don't have to move my hand at all. Is it better for me to learn this this way so I will be faster or to move my hand out of the F chord and pick it out like in the video?

[shadowscott007]

Two answers:  Generally if you don't have to move your hands don't.

But in this case it's not really buying you much.  After the riff you are going to a G chord , so keeping your fingers in the F shape isn't buying you much.  But as long as you get to the G in time, it goes back to the general if "you don't need to move, don't".

Shadow

[LoriB]

Question:
In the first riff after the F chord CBAGFEDC, I notice that I can leave all my fingers in the F position and pick them out so that I don't have to move my hand at all. Is it better for me to learn this this way so I will be faster or to move my hand out of the F chord and pick it out like in the video?

Actually, this is a great idea because after you play the F chord then pick out the notes you can simply slide the F bar chord shape up to the 3rd fret (for the bar) and play the G there. That saves you a lot of time.

[Thealchemist]

Can anyone suggest a suitable strum pattern for this song. Justin advises a lot can be used however I seem to struggle to get an authentic sound. Thanks in anticipation.


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[stitch101]

I don't know how for along you are but this may help. The tutorial is pretty straight forward at
the beginning on how he does the strumming pattern

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-1agzscP6I

[Thealchemist]

I have been learning this song via Justin's songbook and others. I can play the song sort of ok along with the CD but would like to try it with a metronome. The bpm I found on line is apparently 152. This seems way too fast any ideas or suggestions. Many thanks

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[jono]

Try it on around 74bpm. I think it depends on how you play the notes as to what speed you choose.

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[Thealchemist]

Try it on around 74bpm. I think it depends on how you play the notes as to what speed you choose.

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Thanks I am ok with the strumming but there are a couple of licks I need to slow down but my playing ability with a metronome is not good. I'm not sure if it's also because there are chord changes within the bar ie most of the chords last 2 beats

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[jono]

The two licks are both 8 notes in a single bar. I did find them hard to fit into the song when I first learnt it. In the end I practiced the licks until I could play them fast enough and then practiced them in the song as changing between strumming and picking notes can be a challenge for me.

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[Thealchemist]

I'm exactly the same but getting there with the song my biggest weakness is always timing thanks for the support

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[stitch101]

If you can't play the song slowly without mistakes you'll never play it at full
tempo. Play it slowly with the licks until you can play it correctly. Then work
on bringing it up to tempo.