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Student
Teacher Resources
Getting
Started On Guitar
How
does one learn the guitar?
Mostly,
people take up and begin to learn guitar in one of 3 ways;
(a) they learn things shown to them by other guitarists, (b)
they decide to teach themselves or (c) they have formal lessons
with a teacher. As well, students may over time use all 3
of these learning possibilities and all have a valid place
in the learning process. However the question that many never
think of is, what is the best sequence of these possibilities
to follow from the beginning?
The
recommended points are:
- Begin
with formal lessons from a good teacher and learn to read
music (one-to-one tuition or even a correspondence course)
- build a solid and correct foundation from the start! This
would avoid time wasted in acquiring bad habits, poor technique
and wrong musical knowledge from others.
- As
confidence and ability increase from the teacher-based education
on guitar, get out and mix, watch, listen, and learn directly
from other players. One is now in a position to more accurately
evaluate the merit of, and interact with, what other guitarists
are doing (or not doing).
- Teaching
yourself usually comes last in the creative process, and
with the experience from the above 2 points comes the hardest
part - pursuing one's own style, language and originality
in music, and/or maybe becoming a professional in the industry.
With
very few exceptions, it's a fact that the greatest guitarists
in any style have had some formal tuition, have learnt from
others, and have continued teaching themselves through individual
research, experimentation and creativity - in that order.
What
guitar should I buy to learn on?
The
average well-stocked musical instrument store is full of gleaming
guitars of all shapes and sizes, but the first-time guitar
buyer is not always aware that the majority of this stock
is mostly suitable for the "seasoned amateur" guitarist, the
semi-pro and the pro players. As well, the first-time buyer
can have confused ideas about musical style and the sort of
guitar they (and the salesman) think they should buy. If one
has never played guitar before but wants to "eventually play
rock music and be in a band" then an electric rock-guitar
might seem to be the correct purchase, but is it? Or the buyer
might want to "eventually write and perform songs as a solo
artist" and so a steel-string guitar might seem to be the
correct purchase.
Its great to have a goal about one's music and guitar playing
but that goal is rather further down the track than just now
- beginning to learn the guitar! Really, the correct purchase
for the musical style and goal should come later, when the
student can actually apply some of the guitar skills necessary
for that longer-term aim (long term goals can change too).
Many a student has given up music purely through bad or unhelpful
advice on the appropriate instrument to begin with.
The
recommended points for beginners buying a guitar are:
1.
If you are planning to have lessons with a teacher, always
get their advice first, before even going into a shop! Many
a teacher has welcomed new students into their first lesson
only to tell them that they have unknowingly bought the wrong
type of guitar to begin tuition upon.
2.
Steel-string guitars are not user-friendly for beginner guitarists.
The very high tension in the strings makes it tough going
for left-hand fretting of notes - this is especially true
for children and most adults too. The fingers become unduly
sore, and a lack of muscular development in the hand tends
to produce unclear and malformed notes (fret-rattle). The
large body-shape of many steel-string guitars also creates
posture problems for the beginner, all of which adds up to
an uncomfortable experience with the instrument.
3. Children should always begin on a nylon-string guitar (or
classic guitar) because of the relative ease of forming fretted
notes and plucking the strings with fingers or a plectrum
(pick). Unlike most other types of guitars, these come in
½, ¾, and full-size models and should be chosen according
to a child's age and physical build - seek a teacher's advice
for the best decision here too. The wide neck and 'soft' string
action of the nylon-string guitar give the fingers of both
hands plenty of room to move and are the ideal beginner's
instrument.
4. The electric guitar is never usually a good choice for
a student's first guitar. The narrow neck of the electric
guitar gives beginners' left-hand fingers little room for
error, tends to cramp technique, and produce many muted notes.
Above all, the electric guitar tends to sound best with the
playing of bar chords and lead solo melodies, and the physical
dexterity needed to do this well is quite beyond beginners.
5.
In summary, many teachers advise enthusiastic beginners of
all ages to forget about musical styles until good basic technique
and musical skills have had a chance to develop. Begin with
a nylon-string guitar (one can play any style using fingers
or a pick on this kind of guitar anyway) and later make a
choice about changing to a specific guitar type for style
purposes.
6.
When shopping before buying, ask to see the student-model
guitars (which tend to be the lower end of the market range),
get their brand names, prices, and confer with a teacher or
an experienced guitarist before deciding which one to purchase.
What
teaching methods exist for learning guitar?
It
has been said that 3 years of haphazard guitar playing with
no particular method behind it is lucky to equal the progress
made in 1 year of focussed study with a teaching method. In
music publishing many guitar books are given the title of
being a "method" and for some this is true, and for others
it is totally untrue - and again the buyer cannot always know
this because publishing often confuses style with substance.
There really is no such thing as a "rock method" of guitar
playing (although there may be one day), only a rock style
of guitar playing. Historically there are only two methods
for learning guitar, where the word "method" actually refers
to a long and established tradition of guitar playing and
evolution of best playing practices - they are the classical
guitar method, and the plectrum guitar method. The classical
guitar tradition covers the past 500 years of guitar composition
and playing development (the classical repertoire), and the
relatively new plectrum guitar tradition covers the past 75
years of popular music guitar development. In formal teaching,
both methods give students an excellent foundation for any
other guitar style they might want to pursue later on.
What
books do I buy for learning guitar?
When
beginning guitar lessons with a good teacher, one of the two
broad methods described above will usually be recommended
as the path to follow - both involve sound technical and music-reading
development. If a student is more interested in popular music
styles including rock or blues, then the plectrum guitar method
best supports this goal. All basic education on the guitar
where style is not particularly an issue is exceptionally
well served by the classical method. The teacher then advises
a good, appropriate book on the relevant method for purchase.
It is not uncommon for students to begin with one method and
then change to the other, either way, it has not been a waste
of time. If learning without a teacher, try to purchase a
well-known, widely used book that is related to either the
plectrum method or the classical method. Books on chords,
or tab playing, or blues playing etc are useful supplementary
books to have, but in themselves do not represent any method
of guitar playing.
Note:
the ideas expressed herein are not necessarily the opinions
of this company, but are based upon research from numerous
professional teachers and guitarists across the world.
About
The Guitar : A Brief History
Instruments
like the guitar have a history dating back several thousand
years. This is because the idea of stretching a string
across some type of empty container to amplify the string's
sound when plucked is a very old idea. This is what
a guitar consists of, 6 strings stretched across a "container"
or body made of wood which naturally amplifies the vibration
of the string - the guitar's body is generally known as the
soundbox. All musical instruments that use stretched
strings for their sound are called chordophones, from
the Greek words 'chordos' = cord or string, and 'phonos' =
sound. What other instruments can you think of that are also
chordophones?
The
ancient civilisations of Egypt and Babylonia had instruments,
which like the guitar, were strummed or plucked with the fingers
to accompany the human voice when singing. These guitar-like
instruments were used 3,500 years ago, and were later passed
on into the Greek civilisation that then developed more variations
of the plucked string instrument, including the lyre.
The Roman civilisation also had a guitar-like instrument about
1,800 years ago, and as the Romans conquered much of Europe
the chordophone idea for a musical instrument spread to many
countries. This occurred via the southern Mediterranean coast
of France (Provence) into the remainder of that country and
then to Spain, and up to England.
In the year 711 the Moors who were a race of people from Northern
Africa, invaded Spain and brought another guitar-like instrument
to the south of Europe, a type of lute called "al-ud" with
a pear shaped body (the guitar however has not descended from
the lute). Up until this time the word 'guitar' did not really
exist for any of these instruments. The first true guitars
and the word 'guitar' appeared in Europe 600 years ago, in
the years from about 1400 and most particularly in Spain.
These instruments, which were to still undergo many changes
in the years to follow, all had a curved, waisted-body shape
with a flat top and back - the basic guitar shape as we know
it today. For the next 350 years guitar makers in Spain, Italy,
France and other regions experimented with the number of strings
on a guitar, its basic shape, and internal construction.
During
the 1780's the guitar's 6 strings and their tuning were established
as we use them today. By the 1850's the guitar's construction
inside and out was established in Spain by the guitar maker
Torres, and has remained the model for how we make
them today - it became what we now know as the classic
or classical guitar. Music shops and guitarists also
refer to it as the nylon string guitar; it's the same
thing really. The early classical guitars used strings made
of animal gut before the invention of nylon strings in the
1950's and to this day some players still prefer the sound
of strings made of gut. This type of guitar is used today
in the performance of classical music, folk music, pop music,
some Blues, Latin music, Flamenco music, and is the choice
for most beginners learning guitar - the style of music played
on it is not necessarily 'classical' as the name might imply,
it's simply one of many types of guitar that exist today.
The
most radical change in the classical guitar has been the development
of the soprano guitar, the tenor guitar, and
the acoustic classical bass guitar in Australia (Guitar
Trek) during the 1980's. These are all guitars smaller (the
soprano) and larger (tenor & bass) than the normal guitar.
In combination they enable a guitar quartet to perform
on four differently pitched instruments with increased dynamics
and range, much in the style of a classical string quartet
(the SATB concept).
The
steel string guitar is another type that became the
folk music guitar of America and was invented there in the
late 1800's, about 1870. The classical guitar was earlier
brought to America by the large migration of people from Europe
who wanted to settle in a new land, but then found it too
fragile as an instrument in its new environment. So they created
a larger, stronger body for the guitar and added steel strings
to it rather than the gut strings, which often broke. With
the heavier steel strings it had to be played with the 'pick'
or plectrum and this has become a standard technique for both
acoustic (unplugged) and electric guitar styles, hence the
term plectrum guitar. Many players do use finger-style
picking on steel string guitars but a strong right hand technique
is required to do this well. It became the instrument of choice
for cowboy and rural folk music, Bluegrass music, Blues, early
jazz (Django Reinhardt, Eddie Lang), and is now used widely
in pop, some areas of rock music, Fusion music, and almost
any musical genre where guitar has a key role to play.
The
electric guitar was also invented in America and became
a common type of instrument from about 1935. At this time
it was featured in the sounds of jazz (Charlie Christian)
and was preferred to the steel string guitar because it could
now compete with the volume of a whole group and be a soloing
instrument in its own right. In the 1950's it became the instrument
of Rock 'n Roll (Bill Haley & The Comets) and has been the
main sound of popular music ever since. In the late 1940's
the relatively 'new' electric guitar saw the creation too
of the electric bass guitar that came to form the basic
beat and pulse of all modern popular music - it gradually
replaced the double bass which could not compete with the
clarity and volume being thrust forward by the new electric
guitar groups of the 50's and 60's.
There
have been several other types of guitar developed during these
times, most of which are only used for specific types of music.
The 12 String guitar (mostly played with a pick) is an offshoot
of the steel string guitar, being a large bodied instrument
with double courses of steel strings - that is, two E strings,
two B strings, and so on across the guitar which means the
player is always fretting down two strings at once. First
made during the 1920's, they became popular with Blues artists
like Leadbelly. They appear in acoustic and electric guitar
versions, have a greater resonance than the 6-string guitar,
a very distinctive sound, and can be heard for this special
effect in both folk and rock groups from time to time (Crosby,
Stills Nash & Young, Led Zeppelin etc).
Dobro
or resonator guitars invented in America in the late
1920's, are an unusual guitar type having a steel 'inverted
dish' in the place of the sound hole in a normal acoustic
guitar. This concept, with its steel strings, gives the instrument
considerable volume and has been used extensively in country
music, blues and Hawaiian music, and for bottleneck (slide)
playing. It comes in versions with a wooden body and an all-steel
body (top, back and sides).
Latin
American countries (Mexico, South America, Cuba, etc) were
originally regions invaded and settled by the Spanish and
the Portuguese. Both nations brought the European version
of the guitar (early classical) to these colonies and many
types of guitar have developed there since - mainly because
to own a guitar for the local natives in these countries meant
making one out of any available materials. Thus strange types
of guitars were made out of tortoise or turtle shells like
the Mexican vihuelita guitar, the small 4-string Bolivian
charango guitar made from an armadillo shell, and the
Venezuelan 4-string cuatro guitar made from wooden
packing crates. The Mexican guitarron is an enormous bass
acoustic guitar (hung around the player's neck) with a body
twice the size and depth of a normal sized guitar. All of
these instruments are still used today in the performance
of national folk music and dance. Westside Music 2003.
©
2004 WM Guitar Music
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