Any tips on how to do this or will I just have to practice A LOT? I dunno if there's any like special things people do to make it easier.

I could never grasp it and I'd say I am a competant singer and competant guitarist.

I can't get any sort of rhythm kept with my hands and voice.

Practice I'm afraid. Just like drumming can requires having different rhythms with hands and feet, this requires having different rhythm with your singing melody as well as your guitar's one.

Ah okay well thanks guys. I don't really know anyone who does this so I wasn't sure if it was just practice or some secret.

Lets use Amazing grace as an example. Sing amazing grace with just Whole notes on the guitar, Strum, 2,3,4, Strum 2,3,4 ect.... Pretty easy. Now make them half notes on the guitar, Strum, 2 ,Strum, 4, Strum 2, Strum, 4..... Still pretty easy. Now quarter notes. Starting to get a little tricky. From there move to eighths. Once you can sing over all four of those with ease, try simple combinations. 1 quarter, 2 eighths, 1 quarter, 2 eighths, (Classic, Ta Te-Te-, Ta, Te-Te.) Then mix that up even more. Finally, sing Amazing grace over syncopated rhythms.

The goal is not to master Amazing Grace, but it's to be able to play different rhythms with your hands than the rhythms in the melody, sung by your voice. I picked Amazing grace cause it's easy but maybe try some other tune you might like. If you can do this with 5 songs, you should end up more than competent at doing this. The main thing in this exercise is to keep your rhythms even and accurate. Your hands cant speed up or slow down. Practice this with a metronome.

edit: Awe shit... I just realized Amazing Grace is in 6/8.... pick something.

This post was edited by Superchum on May 19 2010 09:02am