What is the best way to learn to play guitar?

edited bu me. I didn’t read your whole post. Mine my answer sounds stupid now..

Practice.
Live it. :)

You don’t get to play thrash metal without teaching your fingers how to move.
Adam Sandler and Jack Black have been playing for years, maybe you’re the jackass for not following their lead?

I know how you feel. I’ve been playing for years but haven’t reached near the level of so many of the guitarists I see. If there was some trick there would be a zillion guitarists though.. in the end.. it all just comes down to practicing.. trying new scales.. learning new songs.. getting those fingers as nimble and strong as they can get… or at least that’s what I tell myself whenever I watch Andy Mckee play and he makes me want to quit trying again.. =D

@asmonet

Well I realize Jack and Adam have been playing for years, but my point if they can do it, I should be able to as well. I’ve been trying to play for about 20 years now, so it’s not like I just got my first guitar a week ago and I expect to be able to play Eruption. I’ve been trying to teach myself for quite some time and I am obviously taking the wrong approach. I took lessons for about a year when I was in high school, but I was tried of playing Row Row Row Your Boat and Happy Birthday.

Eddie Veder from Pearl Jam learned to play guitar pretty quickly. He probably couldn’t play lead, but he can at least play rhythm which I would be happy with at this point.

I just looked up the song High and Dry by Radiohead. It’s basically three chords. G, A# and F. I can play G no problem, but A# and F are bar chords which I have no clue how to do.

@NaturalMineralWater

Wow hat guy Andy McKee is amazing. He does his own percussion as well which is amazing. His style is so unique and great! Thanks for sharing the link!

You need a new teacher. Even I can play F (at least I could last time I tried) And I can only play well enough to sing along with my kids. have you looked at any youtube.com lessons?

@squilky: Then it’s either not something you’re naturally inclined to or you’re not committed enough. Twenty years along, and this is the question you have?

Dude, get a real teacher. And no matter what you think, play Row, Row, Row Your Boat until your fingers bleed if you have to. If it’s a passion, you’ll do it and you’ll learn the steps.

Repetition is one of the things they’re teaching you, to increase speed and accuracy.

Looks like you screwed yourself. You’re all wrong and missing chunks of the basics. You don’t know how to play some chords…after twenty years?

GET AN INSTRUCTOR.
or continue to suck.

My son’s choir teacher said, “Practice makes permanent not perfect.

@squilky if you subscribe to rpoland – candyrat records on youtube.. you will see all manner of guitarists that make you wanna quit.. xD or inspire you to learn.. the choice is yours.

@asmonet

There are plenty of people who are self taught. Finding a good instructor can be as difficult as learning to play itself.

I have been trying to play for 20 years is how I should have phrased things. You’re right, I did screw myself. So now I’m asking what’s a good approach to learning? Should I start out by learning a set of 5 or 10 basic chords and then branch out from there? If so which chords are best to start with? I think if I new the proper progression that would be a step in the right direction.

Self taught is fine, but twenty years in and you’re missing a foundation…That’s a problem. Get an instructor. That’s the only way to fix what you might have learned wrong and fill in the gaps.

Hang on, I’ll get my Crog to answer this.

You don’t need an instructor. Just let yourself have fun with it—the more relaxed you are, the better your brain will be able to soak up the music, allow you to improvise and train your ear, almost like reverse mediation, where everything in your brain is silent except for the music coming in and hitting your ear. Music is one of those things where you have to do it for you only; the moment you compare yourself to others is the moment you’ll stop having fun, and when you’re not having fun, you most likely will tense up and lose that reverse-meditative state; your body—fingers, hands, voice—will lose your body’s organic rhythm. This is why most people quit the instruments they once played in high school, or why they can never transcend the amateur level. I believe anyone can be a good musician; I don’t think it requires a particular talent or gift, and I get pissed when people preempt themselves from even trying because they feel they have no talent, or don’t have time to take music lessons.

@asmonet

Ok if I’m so screwed up, why don’t you stop with all the sarcastic answers and get me on the right track?

Lessons.

Wow. I just wrote a whole dissertation to answer this crap and effin got erased. Here goes.

Alright. First off. Know what you want to play. Then get lessons. Now, if you don’t have enough money or time then youtube. =] I’m self taught and have been playing 6–7 years. I don’t believe anybody who plays guitar has gone without a lesson. Whether you taught yourself or watched youtube or whatever. its all a lesson somehow. But really. Songs by Nirvana and music in that similar genre is good maybe for beginners. But the key to getting better is practice, and pushing yourself to play harder songs. Wanna get your fingers moving? Get into Metal. There’s a lot of shredding there and I promise you it takes a lot to get as good as a lot of those guys. My advice is made up of a few simple tasks.

1. Get music books. Chord books and scale books and theory books.

2. have equipment that won’t poop out on ya.

3. Practice from about 15 minutes – as long as you want per day. Trust me, every little bit helps

4. Learn other peoples songs but teach yourself how to pick out what key its in and what scales are related to that key both in major and minor. =]

5. Don’t give up. It takes years.

Really. I’ve been playin a while and my only reason for being where I am skill lvl wise is practice, knowledge of certain music things and uhhh….yea more practice. You always see those stupid adds on the internet “Do you suck at guitar?...” or “Wanna play like [insert guitar players name]”....Guess what. I can tell you every single bit of it. Practice and learn your scales and theory. easier said than done but if you’re dedicated and you love it then you should have no problem.

Again though. It depends on the type of music you’re really wanting to play. You don’t have to play face melting solos and shred to be an awesome guitarist or musician. Just know what you want to play and work in that style and become comfortable with it. People see Jimi hendrix as a God. But he’s not amazing or anywhere near. Just another guitar player. I guaruntee. Me and Jimi in a shred battle. CroG ftw! lolz. Really though. Its not about shredding. Even Jimi Hendrix knew his scales and things like that.

Once you learn theory and Scales and the basic notes and chords dude your set. All that’s left is practicing patterns. The rest you already know and can incorporate those patterns into what you already know. With knowledge of Theory, Scales, and Chords one could even write a whole symphony. =]

Just Search Youtube and look for certain techniques. It helps and opens up a lot of doors to learning.

What about imagination? Well what I did to develop mine was playing along to a lot of other bands songs and stuff. After learning the song well enough I figured out what key it was in so that I could incorporate scales and arpeggios into it. If the song has a solo. Learn the solo and throw your own twists on it. If not, write your own solo! I’ve even been known in my circle of friends to extend solos to songs….lolz. It not only broadens knowledge of scales and key signatures but also lets you find yourself musically. Music isn’t just about learning the technical stuff. Its about what’s in you that needs to be let out. Express yourself. Theory and scales are just guidelines. If you think of them as boundaries then they will be. If you don’t then the sky’s the limit. =]

Hope this helped.

oh yea. Check out guitar master class (GMC). It helps alot. Lots of video lessons. and forums you can ask for help on or just go to chat about music related stuff.

Have fun.

CroG

Check out my band in the meantime. Maybe you’ll get the idea that i’m not some noob who doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

www.myspace.com/enucleationofficial

@squilky Compose a few songs or rhythms with chords you know. Learn all the major chords and you could play most classic rock, Writing your own rhythms and practicing until your transitions from one chord to the next are smooth will help you immensely. I have never had a formal lesson. I learned by ear. Once you know your major chords, you will be able to pick them out in songs you hear. Buy a cheap chord book and practice. 20 minutes a day and in a month you’ll be surprised at the improvement.

FYI. Guitar player from SOAD. not great guitar player. Uses too much expressive chromaticism in his music. That fella didn’t learn his scales. Plays out of key a lot. Sounds good until you hear a solo. =[

Oh yea. Another good thing to really take to heart. Set a goal. You’ll be as good as you make yourself.

@squilky: I never said anything sarcastic, not a word.

And I did help, I got a dude who is going to college for music to answer your question. Cut the shit. :D

@squilky I meant what I said before ^ but it might have seemed trite and too concise. You should play as much as possible, and all of the suggestions (from people’s own experiences) are great – but you asked what is the best way to learn, the answer is LESSONS.

Engage.

I’m sure most people have told you this already: the best way to learn anything is by doing it. If you don’t have a decent guitar, get one (it doesn’t have to be very expensive, just something that plays). Then start playing until your fingers bleed.

And don’t worry about all those people on Youtube. If I were to watch what other people can do (even the lead guitarist in my own band), I’d get depressed. This is about you learning to play for yourself, not competing with the rest of the world.

No, you’ll never be the best guitarist there ever was, but you might be able to learn the C chord (and maybe an E minor), and that would make you happy.

@Jack79 and @whoever gives a… A fan of an old blues/country singer walked up to him post show, saying I love you but I want to play your songs and I am just learning guitar – I only know three chords.

The old timer said, Son, there is only three chrods in country.

G, C and D (or A, D and E – or E, A and Bb) will buy you 100 songs.

true, that was me ;)

I’ve always said that you only need 4 chords to play any song ever written (or at least 99% of them). 3 chords is probably good enough for thousands of songs.

Yea but why limit yourself to just learning 3 chords that will buy you 100 songs when you could learn all the chords that’ll buy you and endless supply. Never ever ever limit yourself.

@CroG Spoken like a true clasical guitarist. I play rhythm.

lolz bows thank you , thank you! Heh. I’ve been playing for 6 years. After the 3rd year I was always competing. Still am. Competition is good for musicians really. Just like sports really. You wanna be good try to see if you can beat the best in your class. Move up a class and continue that mind set and pattern. I keep running into people who claim to “play guitar well” and I ( being the friendly fella I am) offer a jam session. We jam and they suck. Not to be mean its just…my skill lvl supercedes theirs greatly. Knowledge and all. And I was actually happy to find my friend Sam. Dude shreds brilliantly. Now we play guitar in the same band and that fella is a dude i can jam with and be happy jamming. Lolz. And now we compete with eachother me thinks a little bit. We have completely different styles but as far as talent and skill lvl, we’re in the same boat. Makes bettering myself more fun too, because then I can take whatever skill I’ve mastered before him and show off a bit (arrogant yes but fun and funny at times). Lolz and shred battles on stage are fun too. hehehe

Greatest thing about having a buddy to jam with. They can help you improve or give you constructive criticism and tell you where they think you need to improve. And show you techniques you don’t already know that they do. and vice versa.

Ok. I Didn’t read most of this thread, also my grammar is terrrrrible. But hope I can be of help.

Green Day and Nirvana, in my opinion, are no good. Listen and learn if you want but you want progress too much from them. My friend CroG here says that getting into metal will be helpful, and as a huge metal fan I will say there are some very technical riffs out there, if you really want to be impressed listen to Necrophagist, you may not like them but technically they are INCREDIBLE.

So, what if you don’t want to play metal? There are plenty of other virtuosos out there. Allan Holdsworth is a great Jazz Fusion player. Chris Broderick, (though primarily a shredder) has mastered classical guitar, jazz slap etc etc. Classical and Jazz/Jazz Fusion is filled with great technical parts. Paganini, though I haven’t heard much of, is fantastic and a lot of guitar players are inspired from this violinist.

My point is check out some musicians that really inspire you.

The main reason I say this is because there are too many styles today that can hold an entire career with power chords. Don’t settle for mediocrity.

Moving onto actual playing though, I would say get into theory (scales, keys etc etc) as early as you can (a mistake I made). But don’t start off in it or it will probably bore you. In all honesty, many musicians write and play brilliantly will basically no theory knowledge BUT they have an ear that will destroy most musicians. Even if you have have perfect pitch you still need some basic theory, trust me, you will get basically no where without at least being able to tell what notes are in key, how do you do that? Scales.

I cant say the word enough SCALES! It’s actually something I need work on, one can never know enough scales but you can make perfectly fine music with just 3. maybe 4 scales.

Major.
Minor.
Harmonic Minor.
Melodic Minor.

4 Scales, and honestly Harmonic Minor is only 1 note difference from Natural Minor. Melodic is rarely used but it won’t hurt to know it right (even i should learn it better).

So once you get scales down you will found you have come a long way.

My point is…it is work.

PRACTICE
PRACTICE
PRACTICE
PRACTICE

There aren’t any shortcuts. It almost seems liek you might be asking for them, that isn’t a cut, I find myself doing the same things. I often look for lessons on songs difficult parts thinking it will magically make me be able to play them.

It doesn’t work that way.

In a single sentence this post is. “Learn scales and challenging music.” But also have fun with it.

www.guitarmasterclass.net = GREAT lessons and help.

God bless

@Ibanezshred clap clap thank you sir.

snicker.