Would You Be Able to Be a Good Guitar Player Even Though You Dont Get Lessons?

Posted in guitar lessons on 21. Dec, 2009

This week’s question is as follows:

Question: because i dont get guitar lessons but only get the chords of the songs from the internet and if i dont know a chord i just look it up. would i be a good guitar player that way? i’m playing an acoustic guitar player btw. the songs i play sonds similar to the song. my brother taught me some as well. i’m 14 and have been playing it for 10 months and learned 10 songs such as john mayer ones, jack johnson, the kooks and other stuff. do i need to get lessons?
Answer: You can learn by yourself and play really well.
however – consider taking an "online" course (for example – one of those reiewed at http://www.reviewsnest.com/LearnGuitar ) – it won’t be expensive, and will make you learning easier, quicker and better
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Who is the Best Acoustic Guitar Player…Doyle Dykes or Tommy Emmanuel?

Posted in guitar players on 05. Dec, 2009

Well here’s a question I just had to answering straight away:

Question: Who is the Best Acoustic Guitar Player…Doyle Dykes or Tommy Emmanuel?
Answer: I’m impressed that anyone who uses this site knows who Doyle Dykes and Tommy Emmanuel are. I’ve never seen Tommy but i do know of someone who has played with him in the past and he does the Robin 2 in Bilston with open sessions sometimes. Doyle I have seen, but couldn’t compare the two.
Check out the website that Keith D has mentiopned though
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How Do I Stop Acoustic Guitar Lift-off String Sound?

Posted in acoustic guitar on 10. Feb, 2009

This week’s question is as follows:

Question: Hi. I’m a new but aspiring acoustic guitar player. I have a pretty good guitar (Yamaha FG 730S, my first!), but also a bit of a problem… Simply put, if I press down on a string, as soon as I lift my finger from the fretboard the string makes a loud noise – as loud as if I had struck the open string. Surely this isn’t normal? I can’t seem to reduce the noise even if I carefully lift off the string, and it’s worse if I do it quickly. Can any of the guitar pro’s out there give me any tips? Thanks!
Answer: You are not taking your finger off the string properly, you are actually performing a pull off.
Practise just putting your fingers on and off the frets without strumming or picking any strings.
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