8ths D and U Strumming

Here is the strumming pattern for level 3 of my beginners guitar course. These strumming pattern variations can be used in the songs Mr Tambourine Man, Girlfriend In A Coma, If You Wanna and Songbird from the beginners course!

As a rule, the down strums always have to be on the beat. With this strumming, the up strums have to be on the off beat. This is suitable for MEDIUM TO FAST bpm songs because of the economy of movement. We NEED to keep this hand movement for ALL the variations below.

Common Variations

In reality, songs rarely stick to one strumming pattern for an entire song. Instead, slight variations are used to hold the listener's attention. Its good to make you aware that the most common strumming patterns miss some up strums and do vary.

More on missing strums in later strumming lessons. Here are the two most common variations to try. Importantly, your hand should still always keep moving as if you’re playing the ups!