Hopefully, some advice...

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..from you sages aboard this forum. i`m a guitar noob, have been attempting to learn for a few months now, and have finally reached saturation point. i seem to be continually overwhelmed with what i `should` be learning. Every board has an opinion," learn scales, learn note circle, learn the triad method, learn the `caged` method" etc etc etc. i read the accompanying articles on all these and a hundred more, and the counter arguments and contradiction have left my head spinning!!. i have taken a few months and worked my way through to the `intermediate` stage of `justinguitar`  on his excellent site and , i just don`t see how so much of the theory which is out there to learn, would be of any use to a regular `joe`, day to day player.please help a befuddled and confused bloke.
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  • John_PJohn_P Frets: 2744
    I wouldn't stress about it and just enjoy playing,  when you want to learn something new then it could be a technique or a song/solo or a bit of theory.    I think it's useful but I enjoy that side of playing. Lots of amazing guitarists hardly know any - just learn whatever part of playing guitar you enjoy at this stage.  (I'd advise learning songs is more useful in the first couple of years of playing but theory does non harm).
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  • What John_P says.  I would add, pick out a few "easy" songs that you like and learn them, and if you are interested in playing lead learn a few of the pentatonic scale patterns and just play around with them until you feel the urge to learn more. 

    “Theory is something that is written down after the music has been made so we can explain it to others”– Levi Clay


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  • GassageGassage Frets: 30826
    edited September 2014
    OK- here's a thing. Learning a guitar is not a linear process; it's not a slope of gradual learning- more so it's a staircase of static, then movement. You get stuck on one stair for ages. Then, suddenly, as if by magic you make a quantum leap onto the stair above. And you can never tell why.

    I know it's not a technical answer, but it's deffo the case.

    *An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.

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  • thanks for the prompt answers, this is the sort of thing i need to help steer me. i spent days  learning all the notes on the neck down to fret 5 but as i don`t read music, am unlikely ever to play from any kind of sheet, and even tabs don`t use notes!, this illustrates exactly what i`m trying to say!!. same with the pentatonic scales, spent countless hours plinking my way up and down the strings, and now i`m none the wiser as to why i did it!.  those of you who have been playing for years MUST look back and think "why in the hell did i take all that time learning that?!" well that`s exactly the kind of stuff i`m talking about.on some of the forums out there, a kind of "i had to bloody well learn it, therefore so should you!" type attitude seems to hold sway.
    is there any one thing that WOULD be useful to learn ?
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  • John_PJohn_P Frets: 2744

    cacophony said:
    is there any one thing that WOULD be useful to learn ?
    Songs you like and along the way you'll find learning new ways to play the chords and which scales are used helpful with learning more songs.  Then you can play with other people - that's the fastest way to improve imho, but there's nothing wrong with just enjoying playing guitar on your own and enjoying making music. :)

    If you want to know about a particular technique you need to play a song you like then just shout and someone will be along shortly...
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  • VimFuegoVimFuego Frets: 15477
    ear training is super useful and following on from that, transcribing.

    I'm not locked in here with you, you are locked in here with me.

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  • thanks all, much appreciated. my daughter who`s 16 saw me bashing away and got herself a guitar about a month after i did. she`s now a far better player than i am, guess what, she don`t give two hoots fer none of that book learnin`, i think i may have been wasting time when i could have been improving.

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  • monquixotemonquixote Frets: 17485
    tFB Trader
    At early stages of learning you are best off just learning lots of songs you enjoy that stretch you a bit. 

    Try and work them out yourself if you can (transcribing!) rather than learn them from a book as that's super good for you.

    Also try and play with other people if you can. 

    I wrote a very basic thing on chords and scales that might be of interest. 

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  • cacophony said:
     i spent days  learning all the notes on the neck down to fret 5 but as i don`t read music, am unlikely ever to play from any kind of sheet, and even tabs don`t use notes!, 
    This will help you immensely when you get together with other musicians and start working on playing songs together, eg, "this riff goes - E G A, E G Bflat A",  try this and see if you can identify the song.(cliche example but.....).  A tip for getting the pentatonic scale working is to just walk through the patterns counting in time with a backing track until you feel that you can break free from the "walk through" and start playing short riffs using the notes in the scale/pattern.   I used to put on AC/DC's "Back in Black" album and just riff all over each song, running over the vocals and all.  If I recall correctly, I think half the songs are in E and half are in A, finding the key to a song by trying a pentatonic pattern over it is fun too.  It's not the destination, it's the journey. 

    “Theory is something that is written down after the music has been made so we can explain it to others”– Levi Clay


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  • thanks dulcet, i am after just the sort of advice/guidence that this thread is providing. thanks to all so far. much appreciated.
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  • Tone71Tone71 Frets: 619
    I always say, learn G,D and C, play them, learn to change with ease and learn a few strumming patterns, you`ll cover a lot of songs that way and feel like you are getting somewhere, then learn the other open chords.

    Mostly have fun to start and learn the tricky stuff later.
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  • frankusfrankus Frets: 4719
    cacophony said:
    i seem to be continually overwhelmed with what i `should` be learning.

    shoulda coulda woulda - if you feel a should find a better way of thinking, because should means you think some imaginary person is watching and thinking you're doing it wrong. Noone's watching, noone cares and if they do why aren't they getting on with their own life?


    Every board has an opinion,

    Ain't that the truth!


     i have taken a few months and worked my way through to the `intermediate` stage of `justinguitar`  on his excellent site and , i just don`t see how so much of the theory which is out there to learn, would be of any use to a regular `joe`, day to day player.please help a befuddled and confused bloke.
    On the nose! It isn't. I used to have one-to-one lessons with Justin and to begin with he was bemused at all the nonsense I'd discovered about modes and scales, I spent about 4 years solid casing modes and chords and so he sat me down and we listened to a lot of Satriani and Zeppelin and 90% of it is explainable using a really small section of the music theory I'd learnt and nothing of the twaddle I'd spent years exploring. That was a very hard lesson to learn given the time I'd invested in nonsense.

    Music is an expression of emotion, the less complex it is the more people understand it. To be honest the less complex it is the more like an emotion it is, the more complex it is the more like intellectualisation it is. Some people think that's cool, let them.

    As for what to learn, don't rush to lose what you've got - noone starts on the first 5 frets these days - but if you've started that why not get sight to sound by leon white and start learning music notation? It's a worthy exercise :)

    Most of the recommendations here transcribing, playing what you enjoy etc are all brilliant suggestions so all I'll say is good luck and if you're anywhere near chelmsford maybe we can jam some time, it's just about getting the creativity going nothing about a talent show or lesson :)
    A sig-nat-eur? What am I meant to use this for ffs?! Is this thing recording?
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  • nickpnickp Frets: 183
    edited November 2014
    I also find the amount of stuff to learn overwhelming.

    what about joining a band or (regularly - ie each week) going to some jam sessions?

    that'll give you direction (it did me).  I'm a better listener, and player, and musician and has provided endless hours of practice - mainly to make sure that I did my best (the other guys in the band are better musicians than me) and kept up.

    just brilliant.

    Then I took lessons with a bloody good teacher.  I've stopped these as life is complicated and I don't have enough time to devote an hour of technical practice a day (scales and picking patterns etc).  Instead I'm concentrating on learning a new skill (funk rhythm guitar) and have just bought another book to work through on the technical side (scales and patterns and stuff).

    on another recent thread the David mead 10 minute guitar workout book got good reviews.  I've bought the kirk hammett book partially out of interest, but if seems right then I'll work through that.  

    I think the trick is to find a thread/approach exactly as you did with the justinguitar website and stick to it for a while rather than try to learn everything and as a consequence getting nowhere
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  • TheMarlinTheMarlin Frets: 7745
    Talk to guitar players who live in your area.  Get a good (highly recommended) guitar teacher.  A good teacher will inspire you, open your mind to other styles, work with you on the music you like, and will be organized and prepared before you turn up.

    But, that kind of teacher is rare.  

    My first guitar teacher was exactly that.  I learned more off him in a year than I did in all the years before learning by myself, and that was before youtube...well, actually WAY before the internet went public.

    I like to get a few refresher lessons every few years, to catch bad mistakes, and open my aging mind.  The last recommended teacher I saw was about eighteen months ago.  He came to my house, and then insisted on noodling at me for 40 mins.  I ended up kicking him out.  If I want to pay to watch someone play at me, it'd be Brian Setzer or Captain Sensible, not that twat.

    Get some lessons.  But if you don't bond with the teacher, move on quickly until you find one you do get on with.  The best teacher I ever had, was my first.  None ever got close.  He transformed my playing in a year.

    M
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  • GrunfeldGrunfeld Frets: 4028
    cacophony said:
    is there any one thing that WOULD be useful to learn ?
    That's a bit like wanting to read books and asking, "Is there any one letter which would be useful to learn?"  And sure, you'd probably want to learn "E" before you learned "Z" but you get the point:  you've got to learn several letters initially before you can play the musical equivalent of "THE CAT SAT ON THE MAT".

    @Gassage described it so well -- learn that answer!  There is absolutely no one path to take and it will be your individual journey.  All of that Justinguitar stuff -- that will be useful one day.

    The most useful thing which I learned, late in the day, is not to faff around with my practising.  When I'm going to learn something, especially if it's something which doesn't interest me much, I often set a kitchen timer and devote 20 minutes to focus totally on the thing I'm learning.  And I do that repeatedly, at least daily, until it's learned.  Then it's "in".  And it might be something very specific, say the intro to "Mr Brightside" which is incredibly useful if you happen to want to play "Mr Brightside" but not so useful outside of that task.  Or it might be something much more non-specific but with more general uses.  But I used to faff about with "practice" and not focus much. 
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  • GassageGassage Frets: 30826
    One thing I'd say- being strict early is good- eg. learn to play an open E with your index, ring and pinky, not using your forefinger- you'll then learn barres easier. Stick to one finger one fret for pentatonics- don't be lazy. Both of these mistakes, esp the latter, hinder my speed hugely. I am blessed with very big hands so I can play between 4 frets using 2 fingers but it fucks you up long term.

    *An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.

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  • GrunfeldGrunfeld Frets: 4028
    Gassage said:
    Stick to one finger one fret for pentatonics- don't be lazy. Both of these mistakes, esp the latter, hinder my speed hugely. I am blessed with very big hands so I can play between 4 frets using 2 fingers but it fucks you up long term.
    Yeah but.... I'm not sure it matters and I'm not sure they are mistakes.  Because so many players make those "mistakes" with no problems at all.  I struggled for years trying to implement the notion that my small finger had to do the "right" thing.  Two things changed my mind:  (1) My small finger doesn't naturally (for me) abduct enough for it to be comfortable [you'd think as a physio with an interest in hands that I'd have noticed this sooner!!] ; (2) I was watching a video of Michael Schenker who's no fretboard slouch and he's not young any more, and he may as well not have a small finger most of the time.  And I thought, sod it, if he's not bothered then I don't need to bother either.

    It is difficult to think of advice which is absolutely universal -- I'm not sure there is any.  Of course that doesn't mean you have to reinvent the wheel, there is lots of advice grounded in commonality.  But nothing is absolute and universal, not even "don't play with your feet".
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  • gusman2xgusman2x Frets: 919
    Didn't read any of the answers really. But join a band.
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  • frankusfrankus Frets: 4719
    edited November 2014
    Gassage said:
    One thing I'd say- being strict early is good- eg. learn to play an open E with your index, ring and pinky, not using your forefinger- you'll then learn barres easier.

    Sounds like you're beginning to explore fingerings for voicings being determined by the voicings played before it and after it. Provided you have a full repertoire of harmonic fingering skills and have learned to to untangle the fingers and retangle them in most ways... the completeness of untangling and retanglings and awareness of tricks like barring two strings, three strings... curving the barred fingers to fret the note below for a bass string etc... are known. These ideas are introduced for chord voicings but that doesn't mean these are correct voicings... you'd touched upon that but it also applies to scales.


    Stick to one finger one fret for pentatonics- don't be lazy. Both of these mistakes, esp the latter, hinder my speed hugely. I am blessed with very big hands so I can play between 4 frets using 2 fingers but it fucks you up long term.

    I have not found that to be the case - bends are harder with the pinky, equally if you play scale patterns with fingerings, you don't learn the notes or degrees of the scale (or fretboard) as deeply because you simply learn which finger to plant down on which fret.

    When practising scales, I use the "correct" fingers, that's part of the purpose of the etude..  but when improvising within a scale - forget the finger bindings.. they impede opening up the fretboard, playing between scale patterns and most importantly - where are the dynamics? the slurs, double-stops, pre-bends etc? If you're fingers are locked into playing as in an etude, surely the dynamics take a pounding.

    I hope that helps, if it doesn't then please consider that I have failed to explain it adequately, before thinking it's all bull-honky (to use a missed friend's neologism), and run it past one of your trusted experts :)


    A sig-nat-eur? What am I meant to use this for ffs?! Is this thing recording?
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  • GassageGassage Frets: 30826
    frankus said:
    Gassage said:
    One thing I'd say- being strict early is good- eg. learn to play an open E with your index, ring and pinky, not using your forefinger- you'll then learn barres easier.

    Sounds like you're beginning to explore fingerings for voicings being determined by the voicings played before it and after it. Provided you have a full repertoire of harmonic fingering skills and have learned to to untangle the fingers and retangle them in most ways... the completeness of untangling and retanglings and awareness of tricks like barring two strings, three strings... curving the barred fingers to fret the note below for a bass string etc... are known. These ideas are introduced for chord voicings but that doesn't mean these are correct voicings... you'd touched upon that but it also applies to scales.


    Stick to one finger one fret for pentatonics- don't be lazy. Both of these mistakes, esp the latter, hinder my speed hugely. I am blessed with very big hands so I can play between 4 frets using 2 fingers but it fucks you up long term.

    I have not found that to be the case - bends are harder with the pinky, equally if you play scale patterns with fingerings, you don't learn the notes or degrees of the scale (or fretboard) as deeply because you simply learn which finger to plant down on which fret.

    When practising scales, I use the "correct" fingers, that's part of the purpose of the etude..  but when improvising within a scale - forget the finger bindings.. they impede opening up the fretboard, playing between scale patterns and most importantly - where are the dynamics? the slurs, double-stops, pre-bends etc? If you're fingers are locked into playing as in an etude, surely the dynamics take a pounding.

    I hope that helps, if it doesn't then please consider that I have failed to explain it adequately, before thinking it's all bull-honky (to use a missed friend's neologism), and run it past one of your trusted experts :)


    I"m glad you said that as I have a very deformed pinky (courtesy of Met Police prop stamping on my hand in 1987 when I was at bottom of a ruck) and I struggle with it in any event.

    I play as you've described- I use the most usable finger and I always thought I was sloppy because of it.

    *An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.

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