Category : guitar lessons
What’s this week’s guitar lessons question? Let’s dive straight in…
Question: When I was a beginner, my teacher would give me assignments to do for 1 week.
Then, I would practice 40-60 mins daily and by the next week I would have it pretty good. After becoming "intermediate" exercises are taking much longer to master… what to do? it seems there’s no end to it.
My teacher said in 2 more years I will have a very strong foundation in guitar playing. Is he exagerating?
Answer: As a beginner, your instructor would give you fairly simple exercises to work on that you could master fairly quickly. Now as an intermediate player, the lessons become more difficult and require more time and effort to complete.
2 years is a conservative estimate. It could actually take much longer to develop a "very strong foundation" in playing. This is not a race and you should not be concerned about how long it takes you to get to a certain level, or how "hard" your lessons have become. Immerse yourself in the experience. Join or form a band with other people your age that are on a similar level as you are. Practice as much as possible and try learning other things than just what your teacher shows you. I tell all of my students to spend a couple of hours each week learning some songs or any other things that are interesting to them. As an instructor I can only help them develop a strong foundation in playing. It is up to the student to "fill in the blanks" and make the effort to really learn what I show them. When a student comes to me and says, "I figured this out" or "I was messing around with this" I get very excited because it shows that this is a student who is really into playing the guitar. I will often take a whole lesson to expand on what the student has "discovered". This makes the process much more enjoyable for the both of us. It allows me to use their interest to help them better understand a technique, or a bit of theory, or some aspect of playing that we may or may not have already covered.
We’ve had a reader question come in on the subject of guitar lessons. Let’s take a look:
Question: Where are some good places? Private or group lessons? About how much do both cost? THANK YOU!
Answer: Group lessons sounds like fun. Around here private lessons for an individual are about 15 bucks for a half hour and you have to pay for a month at a time, that’s 1 lesson a week. The internet has quite a few good resources for free lessons as well. It could save you some money as opposed to paying a guy 15 bucks to tell you the string names and how to hold a pick. I’m just saying at least browse the internet if you haven’t already. Of course a one on one lesson with a real person is better so long as that person knows their stuff. Here is a video that shows how to read guitar tab:
http://www.fuzzymonkeytabs.com/howtoreadtab.html
and here’s a video teaching simple guitar tab for Fur Elise by Beethoven: http://www.fuzzymonkeytabs.com/furelisesimple.html
What’s this week’s question? Let’s dive straight in…
Question: I really want to play Guitar, Bass and electric guitar. But I afraid to tell them! Any idea of what can I say?
I don’t have Guitar yet.
P.S. The music school is actually in front of my house
Answer: Try asking them for a tuna sandwich on rye and see how you get on.
Another guitar lessons question has come in this week. Let’s tackle it straight away:
Question: Just started teaching guitar via Craigslist, and got a request to teach 2 women at the same time, for an hour. I’ve been doing 15 bucks an hour for one. Should it be 30?
Answer: I would charge between $15 and $25 for the combination./
We’ve had a reader question come in on the subject of guitar lessons. Let’s take a look:
Question: Looking for video lessons like Marty Swartz on YouTube. Must be free. Available on mobile devices would be wonderful.
Answer: There does not seem to be one good place. Every learner is different. Since you have decided to be your own teacher, it is going to be up to you to search through the video’s and find the one that works for you.
It is also up to you to realize when a certain set of video’s are no longer working and to start new searches.
I think the average person who uses Video changes to another at least 10 time during the first year.
This week’s question is as follows:
Question: Hey, I’m 13 years old and have been attempting to teach myself guitar. I’ve been trying to play TABs rather than from chords, because I find TABs easier to play. Kinda frustrated at how slow my progress has been, I’m wondering if I should just take lessons. What do you guys think?
@icantgetaname tabs are easy as fuck to read
Answer: Get a teacher. "Teaching yourself" is a crock. I don’t know why so many people think it’s a good idea. In the words of Mitch Hedberg "I didn’t know how to play it, so I was a shitty teacher. I would not have went to me."
No book, website, software, or video can replace one on one tuition from a real musician. Those things are supplements, not replacements. No professional musician or educator would ever claim otherwise.
There is so much that a good teacher can help you with that you would NEVER realize on your own. They can point out little things that you would have never noticed or paid any attention to, and those "little things" are what separate a capable but unremarkable player from a great one. You will see much greater progress and develop as a whole musician.
This week’s question is as follows:
Question: I know wat to teach and all that … But I have difficulty filling the whole hour… Any advice on stretching out the lesson …???
Answer: At the beginning of the hour, ask the student to play chords or do other exercises to improve her/his dexterity and technical ability.
Spend most of the hour having the student play whatever pieces you’ve assigned for that day.
Near the end of the hour, discuss what you want to have the student learn next. Demonstrate how the piece is supposed to sound.
By the way, it never hurts to ask the student how she/he likes what you’re assigning.
Also ask if there’s a particular piece of music the student really wants to learn to play. If there is and the student’s capable of playing it, allow her/him to begin learning it.
If that particular piece is beyond the student’s capability, talk about the steps the student needs to take in order to play that particular piece.
We’ve had a reader question come in on the subject of guitar lessons. Let’s take a look:
Question: I’ve been trying to learn how to play for a while now. The problem is, I find a website that gives shit instructions for beginners and I get frustrated and quit. (Or the site lets me see the first lesson or two free and then try to rob me blind with monthly subscriptions, etc. to their site)
So if anyone knows of any (free) really thorough, step by step guitar lessons sites, I’d greatly appreciate it.
Like, I find one a while ago that broke things down nicely. It showed you a few chords, had you practice them in different patterns until you were familiar and then moved on. Unfortunately, I completely forgot what the name of that site was. >__>
Answer: I think this one is very easy to follow.
http://www.justinguitar.com/en/BC-000-BeginnersCourse.php
Well here’s a question I just had to answering straight away:
Question: Hey.
I’ve had a few different guitar teachers and they’ve all been trying to teach me how to play guitar like a pro but all I want is to learn how to play some of my favorite songs.
Then my friends told me there’s this guitar teacher that teaches cool rock & pop songs so I gave him a call. He turned out to be a teacher like all the others. We had guitar lessons for the whole school year but I’m sick and tired of it. I want my parents to tell him I don’t want lessons anymore but they said I have to do it.
I know he’s going to give me a call on September 1st and I want to prepare what I’m going to say.
Any ideas?
Thanks so so much xxxx
Answer: First of all tell him you thank him for taking his time out to teach you. Make up an excuse such as saying: "I’ve learned what I wanted to learn", "I’m really busy with other things" or "I want to play another instrument and don’t want to play guitar anymore". I doubt that he will be mad at you for not wanting him to teach you anymore, he was lucky to be payed for it.
Good Luck 
A tough guitar lessons question this week. Let’s dive straight in
Question: I’m starting the guitar and my first lesson is tomorrow to start me off and see how I do and see whether I like it.. My teacher is a really fit 15 year old so I don’t want to make a complete fool out of myself and screw up. Is there any advice I can be given before going in and what is to be expected ?
Answer: Just be relaxed. If it is a group lesson you have nothing to worry about at all. If it’s alone, well just remember that your teacher expects you to know nothing. My group lesson goes super slow so I’m going to guess one on one lessons start of slow. If you want to impress your teacher I would say learn some basic chords and notes in the first position on maybe like the first 2 or 3 strings. Make sure to ask about anything you don’t get and again, just relax. Guitar is supposed to be fun, enjoy it.
