Guitar Players...

[Top]

Well at the young age of 42 I have decided I am going to learn how to play the guitar with my oldest daughter... I am sure she will be kicking my butt in no time... so I want to stack the deck  ;D   do y'all have any advice on the best way to learn? I know I have to put the time in with the practice and all.. just want to get some helpful hints.... and FYI we are getting a Squire (Fender) and I want to say a Dean Avalanche One, I know its a Dean, the guy is shooting me an AMAZING deal on it  wife knows about the Dean... I failed to clue her in on the Squire (Another amazing deal)

Thanks for any advice and yes I will pass it on to my rug rat...

AL

[Big Tom]

I would say one of the best things to help you out would be to get a book of chords and learn all of the major and minor chords.  A solid foundation will get you better results in the long run when it comes to everything else.  Learn how to switch between each chord fluidly.  Good Luck!!!

[guitarkid]

Better yet go to wal-mart and get the guitar chord poster. It has helped me A LOT. It has all the basic chords, and some odd balls thrown in for good measure.

                     -tumnus

[Top]

*gasp* there are over 2,000 cords! hahaha I KNOW... just learn the basic ones... still think this is going to be awesome for my daughter and I..

AL

[Jake P]

Sadly I know next to nothing about guitars. My Father has played a guitar since was 12 and has played the Grand Ole Opry on more than one occasion and I never learned a lick. One thing I remember him saying though is practice, practice and then when you have practiced enough, practice some more. I know it sounds cliche but it works. I think its a good thing to get the family involved with it, you and your daughter will have alot of fun with it.

[Jimmy Headwound]

When I first started playing, I never had any formal lessons, but I did find some guidance from my peers that helped me along with some shortcuts.

Acoustic guitars are much better to learn on than electric because they require more precise input from the player, and you get a much better feel for the way a guitar and it's strings behave. If that's not possible, an electric will work.

First and foremost, play with the strings and frets until you begin to develop some muscle memory. Find a comfortable position to anchor your wrist on the body of the guitar and get familiar with it's behavior.

Work on plucking the strings cleanly. Press firmly on the frets and see what kind of sounds you can make. It's fairly easy to tell when you're making a clean stroke or a bad stroke, so just keep fooling around with it until you can consistently produce a good clean sound.

Practice plucking each string independently, without looking. Once you can do this reasonably well, and in different orders accurately, try to increase your speed. When starting out, it's more about getting familiar with the instrument, and this is the best practice I found to help me do that.

Once you feel comfortable with that practice, your real learning process can begin. Experienced players will tell you differently, but if you want to shortcut past the typical "stairway to heaven" drill, look into power chords.

Power chords are what make up the bulk of amateur garage rock guitar playing. The music may not be your cup of tea, but you'd be surprised how many great songs consist entirely of two or three different power chords. They're simple to learn and very easy to string together.

A quick google search should bring up a number of decent resources on power chords, and I don't know any place to start right off hand, so I'll leave that to you.

Along with that, learn to read guitar tabs. They're much easier to interpret than sheet music, and you can plow a lot more ground with them. They're basically a graphical transcript of any given song, designed to be read quickly. They can get complicated, but once you learn how to read the more advanced stuff, you'll basically be able to look at them and instantly know how to play it.

Again, a Google search should bring up a number of good resources.

This is not the "right" way to learn, but it will get you there. If you practice these things, you'll develop that muscle memory and the rest will come to you.

The first song I ever learned to play all the way through was Enter Sandman by Metallica. That song sure ain't as good as it was back in 1991, but it's very easy to play and sounds impressive in front of the naysayers.  

Good luck.

[Top]

Thanks for the input... I do appreciate it... I am already anticipating my fingertips getting sore... and those old songs are what I live for... so all I need to do is learn to play one real quick to get the wife feeling better about this chunk of change I am plopping down on two guitars and two amps and two of everything else  hey now.. anything worth doing is worth doing 150% right?  the hard part is sticking with it... but my choice of occupations show I can stick with something.. and my utter obsession with fishing is another.. :o

if I get good I will have to get a JOEHAWK huh Russ???  ;D

AL

[Josh VanderMeer]

Download yourself either guitar pro 5 or power tabs, these are programs that have the guitar tabs really easy to read and it plays the song for you too, and you can play along with it to work with your timing. Once you have the program, go to www.911tabs.com and you search pretty much any band or song that you want to play, but you have to get one that says guitar pro tab or power tab depending on which one you downloaded

[utser]

http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/

good site, lessons, tabs, reviews.

[Fisher of Men]

Dont' forget  www.chordie.com/

[FD.]

Find the tabs to music that you like.....the above mentioned tabs sites are good....now listen to the music and learn to play along....

Practice on an acoustic if possible.

My son and I play and it is a great way to spend time with your kids...Have fun.

[Big Tom]

*gasp* there are over 2,000 cords! hahaha I KNOW... just learn the basic ones... still think this is going to be awesome for my daughter and I..

AL

The basic ones are what I was referring to.  

Just learn the major chords: A, B, C, D, E, F, and G

Then learn the minor counterparts: Am, Bm, Cm, Dm, Em, Fm, Gm

The bar chords were always the hardest for me and they should come after you learn how to play each major chord open.

This is just how I learned.  It may not be the best way for you but its worked alright for me.

[Top]

So far I have D,A, and E... I do have to say.. its tough... I mean getting a nice clean sound... its tough... but hey nothing in life is easy and I will practice no less than 15 min a day... right now I keep it right at 15-20 min otherwise my fingertips are screaming... once they toughen up I can see messing around for 1/2 to a 45 min.. if I am busy.. more if I want to just goof around...

AL

[Top]

and here is the first "AXE"... I have another one coming it should be here the end of the week if I am lucky

AL

this is the original Avalanche not the new one (playmate) this one is actually a smidgen better than an entry level guitar... but man its purdy...

AL

[utser]

i had the same amp when i started.  but the bait monkey put a different  mask on and jumped me in the music store.

[wagn]

Download yourself either guitar pro 5 or power tabs, these are programs that have the guitar tabs really easy to read and it plays the song for you too, and you can play along with it to work with your timing. Once you have the program, go to www.911tabs.com and you search pretty much any band or song that you want to play, but you have to get one that says guitar pro tab or power tab depending on which one you downloaded

x2 on the powertabs. It really helped me alot when i first got started.

Another piece of advice. As you start to develop your skill you will reach points where you don't feel like your getting better. Just be patient. Instrument skills come in leaps and jumps not always in a steady improvement. If you feel like you get stuck on something don't get discouraged and just keep playing. Eventually you'll have another growth spurt.