I’ve been continuing to work on my Guitar and Ukulele Karate Belt requirements. I focused mostly on the Orange and Green Belts, but I also made some updates to White and Yellow Belt requirements (I’ll mention the changes below). In addition to strumming, reading, and music theory, I also added requirements from my Strumming Rhythms Index starting in Orange Belt (and continuing through Black Belt).

One of the main things I had to work on for my Karate Belt requirement was my Guitar Note-Reading book. I decided that I wanted to introduce the note High A in Unit 1, which is now in Lessons 14, 15, and 18, including additional songs. Because I added a few lessons to Unit 1 I wanted to shift some of the lessons from Yellow Belt to White Belt, so now the White Belt requirements (Unit 1, part 1 PDF) goes up to Lesson 7 (High D), and the Yellow Belt requirements (Unit 1, part 2 PDF) goes from Lesson 8 to Lesson 18. I also finished and added Unit 2: The Key of G Major, which is a requirement for Orange Belt, and Unit 3: The Key of D Major and Unit 4: The Key of A Major, which are both required for Green Belt.

I wanted to start adding pages from my Strumming Rhythms Index as requirements for Guitar/Ukulele Karate, but first I needed to give it a bit of an overhaul. Originally I was going to have rhythms with ties, but I took them out and instead focus on only adding rests to my “core rhythms”, which can then be played three ways: (1) letting the notes ring and just not strumming on the rests (which would give the sound of tied notes), (2) muffling the strings on the rests (the actual technical way rests should be interpreted in order to create silence), (3) play a muted strum on the rests (to create the “chick” sound). The main reason I did this was because writing out all of those variations would take this book up to over 200 pages, but also because I am more interested in making sure my students can count and play the rhythms, and less concerned with them being able read the rhythms in every possible variation that every songwriter/composer has ever notated. I also wanted to add rhythms with quarter notes and 8th notes in 6/4 time earlier in the book and I moved the rhythms in 6/8 time to later in the book (in the hopes that counting and playing in 6/4 first would help students have an easier time with 6/8 when it comes up). I also expanded my “Selective Strumming” exercises to include 6/4 rhythms, as well as a version of 4/4 rhythms with the high note on beat 3. The big addition was to add rhythms that use 8th notes and 16th notes in 2/4, 3/8, and 6/8, as well as variations of them using rests, and also “Selective Strumming” exercises based on them. I also separated the Strumming Rhythms Index into individual units to make it easier to find everything.

PDFs of all of these materials can be found under the FOR MY STUDENTS tab, on the GUITAR and UKULELE pages. As always, please let me know if you use any of these teaching materials with your students, and if you find them helpful, or if you have any questions or comments.