Look at the chord sheet, not at your left hand

When your eyes check every finger, you lose the next chord on the chord sheet and the words. You need not play in the dark. One familiar verse is enough, and a short glance at the neck is allowed. Look at the sheet, or at the people you are singing with.

Open Panie Janie, switch on Chord sheet (“kwit” in the app) and mark bars 1 to 8. Bars 1 to 4 are C. From bar 5, G takes the first two pulses of each bar, then C the next two.

Eyes on the chord sheet first

Sit so the chord sheet is close to your line of sight. For one pass, do not sing. Look at the current bar and the next chord. The right hand keeps going. If the grip is completely lost, glance at the neck, fix it and bring your eyes back to the sheet. That is not a failure.

A dirty string is not always a wrong grip. Listen for whether a note was not pressed cleanly. Diagnose after the bar, not in the middle of a stroke.

Optional: one change with your eyes closed

If you already know C and G, open Chord Changes, pair G and C. Check both grips with your eyes. Then close your eyes only for the journey from G to C, strum, and judge by ear. After a miss, open your eyes, set the grips slowly, and only then try once without looking.

There is no single required shared finger for this pair. Keep the fingers low above the strings and remember the movement. This is not a lesson in adding the voice.

One verse with your head up

Return to Panie Janie. Play bars 1 to 8 while looking at the chord sheet. Then add the words. If your eyes need to go back to the neck, take one short glance before bar 5, where the G and C changes begin. The singing may stay quiet.

If the hand stops only after you add the voice, that is a different problem: The strumming hand stops when you start singing. Here the only question is where to look.