How To Play Guitar

Guitar is the most popular string musical instrument in human history. The history of the instrument traces its origins back to 3300 B.C, but the exact form of guitars, as we see them today, is not that old, the latest variants, like electric guitars, being gifts of the last century only. Anyways, guitars are the reigning ‘cool folk’ of the music instruments. Being a guitarist gives you the automatic tag of being cool in modern terms. It is this appeal that emerges from the instrument, which pulls many towards it. However, learning guitar is not the same as liking guitar. The process requires immense dedication and precision. An ugly truth which is often disregarded is that only a few amongst the hundreds of hopefuls ever reach a stage of expertise and fewer become expert guitarists. The guitar legends of the world are even fewer. The only difference between an expert and a novice is the kind of enthusiasm the former shows in learning and the amount of practice he/she put in. However, apart from dedicated practice, what you need is a good start, i.e. you must be clear with your basics to become an expert guitarist or a legend per say. We have listed five steps for you to learn guitar. Use these steps to get a grip of the instrument. Thereafter, all that is needed is practice, creativity and passion. Have fun!!

 

Choosing the right guitar is half the work done. Select a good guitar on the basis of your comfort and tastes. Take assistance from a specialist, guitar shop owner or any guitarist you know. They will help you choose a guitar which will be good for you as a beginner. Just don’t rush for buying an expensive guitar because you have the money. Choose one which will be easier to maintain and practice on.

 

Comprehending the key elements of a guitar is utmost essential if you want to walk up the ladder of being a guitarist. Get familiar with the strings and understand the fret board. Look into the space between the fingerboard and the underside of the string and make sure it is appropriate for your finger. Place your fingers properly on the chords and practice holding the guitar ends, moving the fingers on the fret board. However, before starting off with the practice session, make sure you tune your guitar well.

Guitarists have their own system of music notation called guitar tablature, or "guitar tabs" for short. Learn to read these guitar tabs. Most of your guitar music is reliant on your understanding of these. Guitar tabs are pretty simple to grasp. The basic idea is to look at the tab in the same way you look at your guitar. Each line corresponds to a string and each number tells you which fret to hold down when plucking that string.

 

Without rhythm no real music will exist and if by any distant chance, there is music without rhythm, be assured, it will be only for the deaf. You have to maintain your rhythm while playing the instrument. Buy a metronome or use your foot to tap and keep yourself in the rhythm. Also, it is important that you learn proper strumming. Strumming consists of down strokes and upstrokes in various combinations. Each beat and offbeat can be an upstroke, down stroke, or no stroke. It can be difficult to learn by yourself, but practice and patience are vital.

Start practicing and keep to simple chords at first. You have to get familiar with the easy chords at first to move on gradually to more difficult ones. If you try and get too complicated to fast you will get frustrated and quit. Once you practice well and grasp all the chords you will find it easier to learn the difficult and more complex ones.