Beginning guitar!

[Shamrock]

Hello all! I rarely frequent this forum because it depresses me since I've always wanted to play an instrument but never could. However, that is all changing now as I'm learning how to play guitar!

Alright so I just really want to ask is what tips do you guys have for me that do play guitar? Such as what exercises do you do to stretch your fingers, strengthen them, and just overall get better?

Just drop me a few tips and such! This is me first week of lessons! Anything you guys have to offer, I'm going to listen!

 

[Yorick]

Berklee College of Music up here in Boston actually publishes some books that have been an enormous help to me. The only tips that I really have are: Get a metronome, and focus heavily on technique early on.

 

[McGooTheWise]

Work on spreading your fingers. I can get from fret 1 to 7 on the little e string, and make them sound clearly. Go back and forth between the two, hit notes in-between.

Here's some good songs to start with.

Nutshell - Alice in Chains (Same chords all the way through.)
Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd
Over The Hills and Far Away - Led Zeppelin
Enter Sandman - Metallica

These will give you a good overview of the different sounds your guitar can make. You can look up the tabs on Ultimateguitar.com. Reading tabs is easy, it shows the strings of the guitar as you would see them looking down at the neck, and tells you what fret on which string to fret, and where. A couple of them are a little difficult, but start out slow. Real slow. Keep playing it slow until your fingers remember where to go, and eventually your fingers will remember every fret on every string. Been playing 2 years now, and I'm still not at that point, but I'm close. Good luck, man, hope it works out for you.

EDIT: Also, something to think about is to keep the tempo with your foot when doing progressions. In a song like Over The hills And Far Away it's a little difficult to do, so just do your best to stay on time.

 

[Hazar]

Work on spreading your fingers. I can get from fret 1 to 7 on the little e string, and make them sound clearly. Go back and forth between the two, hit notes in-between.

you must have massive hands. I thought I had pretty long fingers but I can just do 1 to 6

Anyways, what kind of music do you want to be playing shamrock? Depending on what you want, you can focus more on chords or on melodic technique.

The hard part is just sticking with it and practicing, not just playing. Really focus on what you're doing to improve your technique.

 

[StardogChampion]

Learn the chords A-G.

Check out the CAGED system - http://www.cagedguitarsystem.net/

Learn every note - http://www.brendanburns.com/Lessons/pdf/guitargifnote.gif

Use this site to list all the ways you can play a chord, and use it when playing tabs - http://jguitar.com

 

[McGooTheWise]

you must have massive hands. I thought I had pretty long fingers but I can just do 1 to 6

I have a double jointed pinkey, and long fingers from drumming.

Actually, learning Metallica and Alice in Chains songs is a good way to start out. They're pretty easy, but sound great. That's why I admire these guitarists. They don't need the entire fretboard to make a good song.

 

[Shamrock]

You guys have been a great help to me so far. I've been looking over the notes and chords. I haven't really had much time otherwise today to check out that CAGED system.

Here's my Last.FM: http://www.last.fm/user/Shamrock013 for you if you would like to check out what I listen to. Essentially it comes down to some Indie, Pop Rock, Alternative kind of stuff, but what it doesn't show on there is I've been getting back into the 80's rock and what not through Pandora, and I would also love to just bust out some 80's tracks on guitar.

I'll check out those books when I finally get some money in me bank account. I have one that I bought when I was at practice the other day, and it's helped so far. I've got the notes B C D E F G down.

I've tried to play tabs a while back, and I know they're easy to do, but they really don't teach you anything at all. Sure, they tell you where the note are, but I've noticed they're just extremely simplistic and doesn't actually give off the correct sound in my opinion.


Also, how have you guys learned to stretch your fingers. Did you just continuously play or did you do some techniques?

 

[Stigmata]

I've tried to play tabs a while back, and I know they're easy to do, but they really don't teach you anything at all. Sure, they tell you where the note are, but I've noticed they're just extremely simplistic and doesn't actually give off the correct sound in my opinion.


Also, how have you guys learned to stretch your fingers. Did you just continuously play or did you do some techniques?

Most tabs are done by random people who are tabbing by ear, so about 90% of the time there will be at least one large inaccuracy, if not many more. The rare, perfect tab is like finding a beautiful kitten in a field of fire. Once you learn how to play a song by tab though, you should really start mentally transferring it over to chords and whatnot, that will help a lot. But yeah, actual chorded music is always better if you know how to read it.

Stretching your fingers just comes with practice. Try as hard as you can not to curl your wrist when you're reaching for frets, because that isn't good for your wrist and won't stretch your fingers. Expect it to hurt a little

 

[Yorick]

I've tried to play tabs a while back, and I know they're easy to do, but they really don't teach you anything at all. Sure, they tell you where the note are, but I've noticed they're just extremely simplistic and doesn't actually give off the correct sound in my opinion.

Yeah, most of them sound pretty rubbish. Even the ones that are good require so much fiddling around to get to work, because the timing is almost all up to you to figure out. With some songs, the tabs are even just breakdowns of the chords. So, you could just memorise what sound is where, but as you said, it really doesn't teach you a lot.

This is one of the first songs I ever learned to play - Pink Floyd - Is There Anybody Out There and yeah you can look at it as tabs like "hurr durr I hit the E then the A then the C" or you can look at it as starting with an arpeggiation on the Aminor chord. Knowing that lets you know the proper position to get into, because the less movement your fingers have to do = the better. And knowing the chords and the notes within them is a good habit to get into regardless. Music theory is more important on the guitar and piano than any other instrument.

I feel like Tabs vs Chords is kind of the difference between "reading music" and "understanding music"

 

[Hazar]

also, remember to pick with your wrist and do string bends with your wrist as well. It's really crucial to get your technique right when you're first learning so you don't have to unlearn your bad habits and learn the proper way when it catches up with you.

 

[Stigmata]

Personally I wouldn't recommend bending your strings with the wrist. If you learn how to bend strings with individual fingers it will make you a more versatile player, but it does make it significantly more difficult to do the bends when you're first starting out.

 

[McGooTheWise]

Usually when i do tabs I look to get an understanding of which note is which, because I play a half step down, and it's a little harder fr me to figure some songs out. I never go off the rhythm of the tabs, because they're all off by a lot. It comes down to feeling, and understanding the emotion of the song. Usually, if you understand emotion in music, your wrist and fingers will figure out how to play it. Works for me anyway.

Also, watching instructional videos, or live performance videos where you can see where the guitarist is fretting is useful. It all comes down to your own taste. I'd hate to say there is a right, or wrong way to do it. Music is about expression. Play it the way you play it. Just make sure you know how the instrument works.

 

[Stigmata]

Why do you play half a step down?

 

[Hazar]

Personally I wouldn't recommend bending your strings with the wrist. If you learn how to bend strings with individual fingers it will make you a more versatile player, but it does make it significantly more difficult to do the bends when you're first starting out.

I used to only use my fingers until I tried to do large bends with vibrato which are sooooo much easier if you do them with your wrist (read: actually possible). You have so much more control and power using your wrist which is essential for bends near the nut of the guitar and large bends (1 or more steps).

Usually when i do tabs I look to get an understanding of which note is which, because I play a half step down, and it's a little harder fr me to figure some songs out. I never go off the rhythm of the tabs, because they're all off by a lot. It comes down to feeling, and understanding the emotion of the song. Usually, if you understand emotion in music, your wrist and fingers will figure out how to play it. Works for me anyway.

Also, watching instructional videos, or live performance videos where you can see where the guitarist is fretting is useful. It all comes down to your own taste. I'd hate to say there is a right, or wrong way to do it. Music is about expression. Play it the way you play it. Just make sure you know how the instrument works.

I think you're getting a bit ahead of what he needs to know starting off.

As for tabs, I use guitar pro which works wonders for learning songs. The tabs are fairly reliable (the more popular the song is, the more reliable it seems) but there are a lot bad fingerings in them as well. The best part about guitar pro is that it will play the tab for you at any speed allowing you to learn the song slowly and then ramp up the speed. You can find tabs for nearly anything at 911tabs.com

 

[The Monkey]

The strength of your fingers will build up the more you play. Check out this site: http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/

It has chords to pretty much every songs out there. I'd suggest you you start easy, with 3-4 open chords, but just remember to play things you like.

Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd was the first song I learned to play. It's really easy but also very good. http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/tabs/p/pink_floyd/wish_you_were_here_crd.htm

 

[McGooTheWise]

Why do you play half a step down?

Cause it's easier for me to sing with, and I like the deeper sound better.

I think you're getting a bit ahead of what he needs to know starting off.

That was more so a reply to Yorick, I wouldn't expect Shamrock to be that far yet. Just trying to help explain that even if the tabs are wrong, a good understanding of the instrument will help. It's all in the process of learning how to play.

 

[Stigmata]

Cause it's easier for me to sing with, and I like the deeper sound better.

If you know what you're doing, more power to you, but this has the potential to ruin your ability to hear tones properly. Taking any song down a semitone, more or less makes it an entirely different song, and puts it out of key at the very least.

 

[McGooTheWise]

If you know what you're doing, more power to you, but this has the potential to ruin your ability to hear tones properly. Taking any song down a semitone, more or less makes it an entirely different song, and puts it out of key at the very least.

I know the complications. There are a few songs I like to play that sound shit half a step down. I have two guitars, though. My favorite is half a step down, and the other is standard.

 

[Stigmata]

Okay, good! Just making sure you're not breaking your musical self

 

[McGooTheWise]

NP. I appreciate the concern.

 

[Dog--]

If you really really want to learn (have a real dedication to it), play really hard songs.

The reason I say you need dedication is because you will get frustrated alot easier but it makes you learn alot faster to play harder songs.

 

[Stigmata]

That's how I get good at bass. I can nearly play Schism and Cassandra Gemini, so naturally I can breeze my way through Go To Sleep and Spoonman.

 

[McGooTheWise]

How about My Name is Mud?

 

[Bad^Hat]

More like Tommy the Cat.

 

[McGooTheWise]

More like any other Primus song. :farmer:

 

[mLink]

http://www.justinguitar.com/

Do everything on this guy's site. He has some really great exercises that should help out with every aspect of playing. Also, always practice with a metronome and don't try to play faster than you can. Sloppy practice is probably the worst thing you could do to yourself.

If you use Winamp, there's a plugin called 'pacemaker' that lets you change the tempo of songs, it's useful for slowing down and practicing parts of songs that are difficult for you at their normal speeds. It helps to develop the proper muscle memory, which will make it easier to play the parts accurately at normal speeds.

Good luck.

 

[Shamrock]

So just an update. I can remember a bunch of basic notes and chords. It's pretty awesome actually. I'm still learning. I haven't really been able to focus all that much this week due to the fact that I have a girlfriend that I don't know what to do with and school and work. Honestly, I feel like learning this will be the best hobby/talent/anything in the whole world. I just want to play so much! I'm excited to pick up a guitar every time!

I'm selling me iPod Touch to put some money away to buy an Acoustic. I'm not sure if I should get an electric acoustic or not. Are there any pros other than the obvious electric + amp might be a good combo?

 

[The Monkey]

The most basic electric guitar + amp kit will get you longer than you think. If you're a beginner, there is really no point in getting the expensive stuff.

 

[Hazar]

Yeah, getting started with electric is actually pretty affordable. My first electric new was about $120 and first (crappy) amp was $50. I'm sure you can get better stuff than I started with for cheaper if you looked for used gear.

 

[soulslicer]

Just wanted to add that once you start the electric, and get used to playing accoustic stuff on your elec; it becomes really hard to play classical guitar again, especially due to the thicker neck, and harder to press notes.