This tune is from the Jamzone. The main point of this exercise is to help you see how just altering a common chord like Am can help you get different tensions and dimensions into your music.

Also, for those who fear fingerpicking - this is a great exercise. The fingerpicking is very straightforward, and consistent. This will help you to get regular with your fingerpicking hand, and at the same time focus on making just a few note changes with your fretboard hand.

Here we add another spooky guitar layer to the backing guitar. This time using T12 fingerpicking across the same 3 strings. We alter our beloved A minor chord further, and play one octave higher than the previous guitar. Although you can hear both guitars in the normal speed audio, the backing guitar is removed from the ActionTab itself to help you hear this guitar part better.

This guitar part comes in over the backing guitar after a few bars. Fingerpick the chords at the same rate as for the backing guitar. The backing guitar plays T12321 (repeat), giving 6 notes per bar. Whereas this guitar plays T12 (repeat), giving 3 notes. This just means that by the time the backing guitar has played T12321 once, this guitar has played T12 twice. The timing for each fingerpick remains the same.

The 2 main chords fingerpicked by the backing guitar are Am add9 (no 5th) and Am add9 (flat 5th). This time we use more slight variations, appearing in the following order:

A sus2 Notes: A B E - sus2 chords are simply normal chord triads (1, 3, 5) where the 2nd note of the scale is used instead of the 3rd, giving us 1, 2, 5 instead. The lack of a 3rd note makes the chord more ambiguous in terms of having a major or minor feel. 'sus' is short for 'suspended'. Sus2 chords are not technically the same as an add9 chord, because an add9 chord does include a 3rd note.

A add9 (flat 5th) no 3rd Notes: A B Eb - We've met this before, it's the same as the backing chord, A add9 (flat 5th) except the 3rd (C note) is missing. Like the previous chord, this makes it more harmonically ambiguous.

A minor Notes: A C E - The straightforward A minor chord.

Bear in mind we are mixing these Am chord variations over the backing Am chords, altogether getting some interesting blends. Don't fear the strange names of the chords. If you look at the ActionTab you can see how just one or two fingers change position each time. Nothing too drastic, regardless of the complicated names. Remember, all these Am variations just come from toying with one core scale (A B C D E F G)!