h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Everyone can play the guitar. Everywhere you go there will be someone who can play the guitar better than you and knows more of the songs that the people around want to hear. Bands are always looking for drummers, keyboard players or singers; never guitarists...

Or is that just me?

Yeah but everywhere you go there is alwats a guitar,you very rarely see a drumset.SO just learn to play the oscure songs and everyone wiull think you have a really big repertroire. I knew 'My Sweet Lord' which until George Harrison's death was reasonibly obscure but now everyone knows it so D'oh.

I'm off to find some early Jasper Carrot now.

Guitar is probably one of the most satisfying instruments. Once a reasonable level of skill is obtained it is extremely fun. You can learn the songs of your favourite songs (unless your favourite song is the infamously hard 'eruption solo' by Van Halen), and compose your own quite easily. It's good for playing in a band, composing, covering and just generally messing around with in bedrooms. I suppose there are a fair few guitarists, but that just shows how great it is.

OK... so it _is_ just me

I agree, the guitar is a great instrument, it's just that I did it the wrong way round - I learnt classical guitar first, which means that, although I can (supposedly) read music, know some music theory etc., it was many years before I realised that all you really need is a handful of chords and a couple of impressive solos

I tend to agree with your initial idea - there are a LOT of great guitarists and it gets frustating that you never sound as good as them. The other problem with guitar is that it takes both hands to play a single note. So if you enjoy playing alone, it's tough to play both melody and chords. Ted Greene and other pros can play "chord melodies", but it takes a lot of woking out of the chord positions. Some kind of keyboard might be more suitable for solo playing - especially with a computer connected to use all the great real-time accompaniment software coming down the pike.

I got my confidence up by lifing as a student in a house with 5 other guitars and 4 other guitarists. They were all better than me at the start adn we would jam away together within a few months I was throwing away my capo which is still rusting away unused and unloved to this day.

Yeah, but you can learn finger-picking...with a bit of practice, even the easiest stuff can sound good.

The thing to watch is how you hold the thing...the wrong grip can give you arthritis in one or more joints...which'll curtail the playing severely, sad to say...

Guitar is a great place to start, it's easy, you can sound great really quickly, and chicks dig them That's where I started, I now play just about any instrument you can throw at me. And I found that the worst way to learn any instrument is to get a teacher. I learned by watching TV of all things. You can pick up most tricks by watching people's fingers, whether on Piano or Guitar or whatever.
I'm also quite lucky to be the guy everyone calls on for their band to add a little interest to it. Mainly cos my favourite *is* the notoriously difficult (but possible) Eruption solo from Van Halen 1.

A great selling point for the guitar is tablature. Tablature is a simplified way to write down music using six lines representing the strings of the guitar, and numbers representing finger placement on the fret board. For those interested in a casual approach to learning an instrument, tablature offers an simplified alternative to learning standard musical notation.

I don't quite agree with some of the things that were said here:

"Tabs are an alternative to standard music notation" - I don't think so. Music notation is universal. Tab is not. If you don't learn to read music at least at a very basic level, you'll never be able to write music. If you just want to fiddle around, that's absolutely ok. But if your aim is just a little bit higher, learn how to read music and use TAB as a tool to write down fingerings.

"The worst way to learn any instrument is to get a teacher" - Just plain wrong IMHO. If you said 'a bad teacher' I'd agree. A decent teacher will give you a good start. He will teach you how to avoid basic technical flaws that otherways would stand in your way sooner or later. The difficult thing is to find the right teacher. If your aim is Eddie's Eruption solo and you teacher wants you to play Beethoven's 'Fuer Elise', change teachers (but be prepared to come back once you have realized that some classical education isn't that bad ).

Jeremy

I agree with Jeremy about teachers. I disagree about tablature. Standard musical notation is very difficult when it comes to guitar playing. When playing something like a piano or clarinet, each note on the standard notation represents one key or position on the instrument. But in the guitar, there are three or four different ways to play each note, so the standard musical notation does not tell you enough. Tab notation fills in the gap by providing exact fingerings, but lacks the rhythm and timing aspect of music. Ideally, you should be able to read both, but I'm sure you could last an entire career as a rock guitarist without ever learning standard musical notation.

Re: Tab vs. notation.

I suppose it depends what you're trying to learn. If you want to learn something that you hear (to pluck an example from nowhere... er... van Halen's 'Eruption' solo ), then Tab plus the recording is the best way (assuming you can't just pick it up by ear, which I most certainly can't )

If you're trying to learn something that you've never heard, then you really need the full notation (possibly along with some Tab) to see how the rhythm, dynamics etc. fit together.

Of course, if you write your own material, then you don't really need either...

You are right, Gnomon.

Maybe I wasn't quite clear with what I said: I don't think that Tabs are absolutely bad. I just think that it would be wrong to give up standard notation and to use tab only.

Ans, yes, I know the stories about the famous rock an blues guitarists who say they cannot read a single note of music. But the fact is: Very few guitarists (or musicians in general) will become great and famous *ALTHOUGH* they can't read and write music. Many more musicians will never make it *BECAUSE* they can't.

Jeremy

I must agree about the learning musical theory thing. Without that you can never truly be a great musician, cos you'll only know how the chord looks, not why it looks like that (if you know what I mean). The lack of teacher thing, is probably just a personal preference against having anyone else's "stamp" put on me. But learning theory, scales, etc. etc. is essential, yeah. As is tab to decent notation of guitar. One day they'll find a way to notate all the filters on a moog, I hope.

Two points.

It really depends on what you want from playing the guitar. I don't think it is necessary to be able to read music or have a thorough knowledge of musical theory. Some music basics is useful but you don't need to read music. I'v been playing in bands for ten years and never had to read a note.

It is true that there are more guitarists about than there are molecules of water, so it is easier to get into bands if you play the drums or bass. I play guitar but I switched to drums a couple of years ago for that reason. Still play the guitar of course but it tends be an acoustic and my voice, as opposed to within a band.

Personally, I like to know a bit of the mechanics of anything I turn my hand to, and reading guitar music is one. I've just started to learn, and yeah, although tabelature is good to learn where your fingers go, it's better to know how to do it right (and that's also where a good teacher can come in).

Although many musicians are/were self-taught (the Beatles, for example), I would still prefer to have someone hold my hand while I get used to curling my ickle fingers round that darn fretboard! Oh yeah, and being a left-handed musician, my right-handed guitar doesn't help...

Just to mention one option, there is a CD-ROM package available from sdgsoft (can't give the link, but it's the obvious) that I bought a few years ago in version 1. Pretty thorough, here is an old review:

"If you made it through one tenth of this course, you would have massive chops and a solid foundation in music and fretboard theory." Electronic Musician

The features include a Library with scales, chords, arpeggios, the School with explicit instructions, the Gym with exercises, the Studio for songwriting and noodling, Jam Sessions with bass and drums plus dual fretboards showing rhythm and lead guitar, Licks with ... licks, and Tunes with some original compositions.

It's now in version II, with three CD's for $180 - 120 MB on your hard disk with two hours of video. If you're like me and hate driving to the lessons, this is an option (and no, I don't work for them).

Obvious link? Am I just stupid since I don't get it?

I love my guitar. I am absolutely NO expert.. I can play scores and tab, and chords, but my problem arise when I play scores based on another instrument.. and there is only that ONE tune... I like it when I can have fulfulling undertone aswell, but I don't have the brains to compose it by myself.
Does anyone know how to do that? (E.g, Beatles songs.. they are simple.. but there should be more than just one tiny tune!)

You are allowed give links now in conversations.

On line again. First, make sure you can play the tune. Then hum the tune while you play the chords and make a note of them. If you can't work out the chords, build yourself a Circle-of-Fifths chord calculator, as given in the Mnemonic Devices for Guitarists article, and try out a few chords around the home key. You'll find the right ones eventually. Now play your tune and try and include a few notes from the relevant chord along with them.