Author Topic: I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.  (Read 2994 times)

Offline K-man

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I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.
« on: Sunday, July 26, 2009, 10:07:08 AM »
The past few months listening to Jack White testify to me has lit a fire that has lay dormant for years.  In high school I got my first guitar with strong intentions of learning.  I progressed to the point to where I knew a few chords and play parts of a few songs (you know, essentially where EVERYONE who wants to play but doesn't put in the time gets to), but never any farther than that.  My interest waned and I would drop it for months to years at a time only to pick it up again at a later date and learn a few more pieces of songs.  Well, here I sit well over ten years later and I still don't know shit about playing guitar.

I very much want to change that.  This is something that I've really wanted for myself for years.  I've dreamed and fantasized about being able to play guitar.  Hell I've even had dreams about being good at it.  I'm sick and tired of fantasizing about it.  I want to do it!  Private lessons are not in the cards at the moment, as I don't know of anyone down here that teaches guitar.  I know a few of you are musically inclined so I ask you for help.  I know there has to be some sort of progression in learning on your own, but I don't know what that progression is.  There is so much info on the Internet, and it seems that every resource has you doing something different in the beginning.  A friend of mine told me that he learned by just putting a CD in and learning to play it.  I don't know if that will work for me or not. 

In short, any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Offline Quemaqua

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Re: I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.
« Reply #1 on: Sunday, July 26, 2009, 10:41:16 AM »
It's really quite different for everyone.  Some people need structured lessons, some people try to sit down and learn to play music they like, and some people have natural gifts and just fuck around.  I belong, apparently, to the latter category, so I may not be of that much help.  To this day I know very little about theory, and barely pay any attention whatever to notes I'm playing, but I've written probably 50-something songs and recorded a good 40 or so.

For me, the best thing you can do is just spend time with it.  Regardless of what you're doing to try and learn, make sure you're putting in the hours.  There's nothing more important than that, as far as I'm concerned.  Set aside an hour a day and just play.  Or even a half hour.  Even if all you're doing is fiddling around, clock in every day.  It makes a big difference.

I take it you have a guitar?  If so, is it acoustic or electric, and what kind of stuff are you looking to play initially?  Acoustic guitars are harder to get used to.  They're tougher on the fingers and more of a pain in the ass to restring.  Electric guitars require buying extra shit like amps and stuff, but they're easier on the fingers and easier to restring and clean.  I began with an acoustic, like many do, and spent some time with it before moving to electric, which had the advantage of building me some finger strength and getting some pads on my fingers.

I'm generally pretty useless, but happy to help if I can.

天才的な閃きと平均以下のテクニックやな。 課長有野

Offline K-man

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Re: I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.
« Reply #2 on: Sunday, July 26, 2009, 11:48:29 AM »
I have a Squier Fat Strat electric with a Fender Frontman Reverb amp and a Takamine G-series acoustic/electric.

I'm well equipped in everything except skill  ;D

Offline Quemaqua

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Re: I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.
« Reply #3 on: Sunday, July 26, 2009, 03:19:32 PM »
Heh, well, that's certainly a good enough setup to start with.

The progression of learning is, I think, ultimately different for everyone.  There isn't really a set science to it, only what comes naturally to you and seems to benefit you the most.  If starting with learning basic chords and playing parts of songs is actually useful to you, then by all means just keep at it.  There's nothing wrong with that method at all, and you'll eventually try to learn new chords as you try to play new songs that have stuff you aren't familiar with how to play yet.  If writing your own stuff helps you, try just coming up with basic chord patterns you like and write some basic lyrics to go with them.  That can be fun because it gives you something to occupy your mind with, to exercise your creative side.  So you're learning how to do stuff, or maybe after playing a few basic chords together you realize something else would sound good, but you don't know how to play that chord... so again, you stretch yourself beyond what you currently know to learn.  In either case, chords will eventually start to bore the hell out of you and you'll start naturally experimenting with picking techniques, with playing different note patterns, with trying to get different sounds out of the strings by doing different things to them.

But really, I suggest you try to learn piano.  No, I'm serious.  I mean, not really, but kind of.  I learned how to play piano for several years before guitar, and it gives you proper perspective on what the guitar is compared to everything else.  Have someone who knows how to play piano sit down and try to teach you a few things, or get a little self-teaching book and sit down at your grandma's piano or something sometime.  Hell, just sit down at a keyboard and spend 45 minutes trying to make sounds that don't sound horrible.  The biggest motivator you'll ever have is realizing how utterly, ridiculously easy it is to make a guitar sound decent, even when you have no fucking idea what you're doing, compared to basically every other instrument on the planet.  If you try to learn piano, you will sound like absolute shit for months upon months.  Guitar?  Teach somebody 3 chords, and they can make noises that aren't unpleasant to the ears.  Then when you realize they can simply hold down a single chord and pick random individual strings to get different notes that all sound good together when played in different patterns, you'll realize what a miracle the instrument is.

天才的な閃きと平均以下のテクニックやな。 課長有野

Offline K-man

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Re: I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.
« Reply #4 on: Sunday, July 26, 2009, 06:13:40 PM »
Que, I think I may have interacted with a piano enough time to fill out the fingers on one hand during my lifetime.  There's not one in the family. 

I've always heard though that if you know piano every other instrument is much easier to learn.

Offline K-man

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Re: I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.
« Reply #5 on: Monday, July 27, 2009, 03:58:50 PM »
Well I was talking to a coworker about guitar lessons today and he said he knew of someone local that was just badass that he took lessons from.  The more we talk, I find out it's a guy I went to high school with.  I've got an appointment this weekend.

Can't wait.

Offline K-man

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Re: I'm (hopefully) making a solid attempt at learning guitar.
« Reply #6 on: Sunday, August 09, 2009, 09:26:46 AM »
So last weekend's appointment was canceled due to guy's car breaking down.  So I had my first lesson yesterday.  I guess I knew more than I thought I did.  He assumed he was starting with a straight up beginner and I suppose I surprised him with my limited skill set.

One thing I found out rather quickly was the usefulness of a metronome.  Bought one before I walked out the door.