Welcome to your tutorial on singing and playing guitar or ukulele at the same time. I’ll be demonstrating on ukulele, so for guitarists, of course your chord shapes will be different, but our coordination and strumming will be the same.
In part 1, we’ll learn (or refresh) the melody of “Shake it up” and play through the chords separately. In part 2, we’ll put singing and playing together in phases. And in part 3, we’ll pick up the tempo and learn a versatile strum pattern.
We’re using “Shake it up” today, but you can follow these steps with any song you’re learning. For the best results as you’re just starting out, I recommend you choose EASY 3-4 chord songs, set your metronome at a SLOW tempo, and KEEP GOING even if you miss a chord or lyric.