Mark Ronson - Uptown Funk - Guitar Lesson

About Uptown Funk

Few pop tracks from the 2010s put a rhythm guitarist to work quite like this one. The groove in "Uptown Funk" lives almost entirely in tight, percussive 16th-note chord stabs in D minor, and getting that feel right demands clean left-hand muting between every hit. Sloppy fretting turns the stabs muddy, so slow the section down with the Practice Toolbar and focus purely on the attack and release of each chord before bringing it back up to the 104 BPM full-tempo feel. The bassline and horn punches lock so tightly to the guitar part that any rhythmic drift sticks out immediately, which makes this a genuinely useful exercise in playing behind the beat with discipline. Mark Ronson built the track around a classic Funk Rock sensibility, and the guitar work rewards anyone who has ever wanted to tighten up their rhythm playing in a real groove context. Getting the ghost notes and rests to feel relaxed rather than stiff is the actual challenge here.

• The guitar part centres on percussive 16th-note chord stabs in D minor, requiring precise left-hand muting to keep each hit clean and tight.
• At 104 BPM the groove sits at a mid-tempo feel, but locking those stabs to the bass and horn hits demands very consistent right-hand rhythm.
• Use the Practice Toolbar to loop the main riff slowed down, isolating your muting technique before attempting the full-tempo groove.