The glitterball guitar heroes of ’70s funk were masters of rhythm guitar – and learning their string-popping techniques and snappy chord shapes will make you a better player

Three funk guitar maestros [l-r]: Hamish Stuart of Average White Band crouches down to play his Telecaster; Nile Rodgers of Chic gives the audience some love; and Claydes Charles Smith of Kool and the King holds it down with sunglasses on in an archive B/W live shot.

Welcome to our 1970s based funk lesson, the aim of which is to arm you with the skills you’ll need to create great ’70s-style funk parts.

The first technique to examine is 16th-note strumming, which forms the basis of funk rhythm guitar and we have some easy drills to tighten up your strumming hand.The pattern consists of alternating down and up strums and, as the name suggests, you’ll find 16 strums in a bar of 4/4.