That darned F chord….

It doesn’t even look pretty…

They say it’s called the F chord for a reason – that reason being that a whole lotta beginners have done a whole lotta swearing trying to make the F chord sound right, and I’m no exception.
But the life-long lesson here is that you can work hard, but it’s better to work smart.
I remember struggling over the F chord like it was yesterday. The song I was learning was The Animal’s version of House of the Rising Sun, and it was my first encounter with that darned F.
The main challenge is that the index finger stretches across all six strings (a “bar” chord , or “barre” as i learned it) and needs to apply pressure to three of those strings at once.
For a time, I just focused on pressing down as hard as I could until I got clear notes ringing from those three strings that were  digging a very painful groove into my index finger, but even then I had to think about forming the rest of the chord with my three remaining fingers. All I ended up with was a very sore hand and a whole lotta pennies in the swear jar.
Then I started to work smart. I tried rolling my index finger back and forth on the strings until I found a point  that held the strings down and allowed my other fingers to fall comfortably without too much pressure. After that, and with practice over time ( the power of Patience cannot be underestimated), the F chord came together pretty quickly, actually.
When students say to me “I can’t play bar chords” I say “yes you can – you just haven’t figured it out yet” .
The take- away from all this? Better to replace the words “I can’t ” with “I’m figuring it out.” If the F chord was good for nothing else (and believe me it is) that would be enough.

So really, the guitar aand it’s pesky F chord  taught me two lessons on the road to self-improvement:

• Work hard, as long as you’re working smart.
• Swearing doesn’t work.