WHAT TO EXPECT: OUR APPROACH TO GUITAR LESSONS

The guitar is one of the most popular instruments to learn how to play. It can be used to play almost any type of music, from classical to rock to folk to jazz and blues. Learning how to play the guitar makes a huge variety of collaborations with other musicians, from forming a band to playing along to favorite tunes at home. With a little patience and practice, it can be an extremely rewarding experience.

Equipment

A student can start on any type of guitar, so it is generally useful to pick the type that corresponds to the type of music the student is most interested in (classical for classical, electric or acoustic for rock, and acoustic for jazz and blues). A few important things to keep in mind are making sure the guitar has been inspected and adjusted for playability, tuning, and tone production; selecting the appropriate size; and selecting a the type of wood and finish the student prefers (finish doesn't effect sound, but it helps to have an instrument you like). It's best to try out several guitars and rely on the experience of playing them more than on price or brand name. Picks come in thin, medium, and heavy gauges and in different materials. Each one has a unique feel, and different students will be comfortable with different gauges and materials. It's entirely a matter of personal taste. An electronic tuner is a very useful accessory and can help with ear training. Other useful accessories include a string winder to help with putting strings on the guitar, a finger pick for banjo or steel-string guitar playing, a thumb pick for steel-string or classical playing, and a capo (a spring-loaded device that can be placed on any fret and covers all the strings at that fret, effectively changing the key of the entire instrument.)

Example Lesson Progression

Beginning guitar lessons at MTN start with learning the names of the parts of the guitar, how to hold it properly, the names of the open strings and how to tune them, and how to hold and use a pick. Once these basic skills are mastered the student is ready to learn some scales and simple songs using a few basic chords. Subsequent lessons will focus on exercises that strengthen the fingers on the fretting hand (the hand that presses on the neck of the guitar to form chords), learning new chords and songs, and learning basic strumming patterns. Maintaining a steady rhythm while changing chords will be important to learn before moving on to more advanced techniques like barre chords (chords where one finger covers multiple strings at once), finger picking (strumming individual notes or chords with the fingers of the picking hand rather than using a pick), and more advanced techniques like hammer-ons and pull-offs (ways of picking one note then playing another without re-picking). Throughout these stages of technique the student will be learning songs appropriate to their level in different styles. Once basic strumming patterns and a majority of the basic chords have been learned, the teacher may start to introduce more elements of music theory, including reading both tablature and traditional musical notation, and the student will be ready to branch out into the style that most interests them.

How the Guitar is Unique

Simple blues patterns are very easy to learn, so it is common for beginning guitar students to start with this style when learning songs. Learning the blues starts with learning the "blues scale." There are several types of blues scales, but they share a feature in common called "blue notes," notes that are lowered from what they would be in a major scale for expressive purposes. Once the scale is learned, a basic 12-bar progression is the next step, and then progressing on to more and more complex patterns. The simplest 12-bar blues, though, is enough to allow the student to improvise and to play with other musicians. From blues, jazz is a natural next step. In addition to the blues scale, jazz uses several other types of scales, based on the modes of classical music (a set of scales developed during the Renaissance and formalized in the Classical period of music, around the mid-17th century). These scales form the basis of licks, or improvised solos over a set chord pattern, and riffs, short melodic phrases or chord progressions that can be repeated throughout a piece. The student might begin by memorizing stock jazz licks and riffs that can be modified by changing the key or the rhythm, then eventually learn to improvise their own solos. Like jazz, rock has its own set of chord progressions and scales that form the basis of most rock music. There are also stock licks and riffs that can be memorized and later improvised on. In classical guitar there are no set patterns, and knowledge of traditional musical notation and excellent finger picking technique are very important. Classical and jazz generally take the longest to learn because of the technical demands and the amount of theory one needs to know.

Get Started!

Learning the guitar can be tough at first, but once a few basic techniques are mastered, progress happens fairly quickly. Within a year or so the average student can reach an intermediate level and has learned enough to play and improvise in several styles. Moving from intermediate to advanced may take longer, especially in jazz and classical guitar, where theory and improvisation play a large part. For those who stick with it, learning the guitar can bring lifelong enjoyment.