Re: Where’s the easy-does-it method?
What worked for me was going into the field across the street from my house, where I wouldn't bother anyone and no one would bother me, and banged away until things began to make sense, and then banged away some more. I got some songbooks of bands whose music I knew and a book of mandolin chords, and interwove those two information streams until I learned as much as I could - which was a lot.
CBFrench had a lot of good suggestions. The chords he mentioned are some of the good easy ones. There are more, and there are plenty more others. You are going to want to learn as much as you can, and it will also help to have goals, and work toward reaching them. Challenges are meant to be surmounted, and these are not the biggest ones in life. Far from it.
The chords he mentioned are a good place to start. There are other two finger chords as well. And the problem you mentioned about holding down two strings with one finger - barre chords is something you are going to have to address, and better sooner than later. When you see the same frets indicated on two neighboring strings, that's a barre. This notation indicates finger locations on frets; 0 means an open string. Pick whichever fingerings feel right.
G - 0023
C - 0230
D - 2002
Also
Am - 5200
E7 - 1020
Dm - 2001
Gm - 0013
C - 0233
Em - 0223
Your fingers are going to have to adjust to their new tasks. No shortcuts around that. But don't worry - they will.
But that's just my opinion. I could be wrong. - Dennis Miller
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