Some thoughts on approaches to learning guitar

[Jim Owen]

The way I’ve learnt the most is by playing with other people.

Next to that, I’ve learnt from such low-tech solutions as tab books in the pre web era. After tab came cassette tapes. Happy Traum and Stefan Grossman were the folks I learnt from then. Later came VHS, then DVDs. Now, streaming downloads.

But the way I’ve learnt the most is by playing with others.

[Arapaho G]

Appreciate the reference to David Hamburger. May give it a try. He's very good and plays the music I love. But...a LOT of talking! The video I watched could be condensed by 50%.

[Mandobart]

I learned as a teen (13) back when there was no internet or even cable TV. I did have a formal classical background in violin - it's easier to learn a new instrument when you already know one.

I bought songbooks by bands/artists I liked - Eagles, Neil Young, Dylan, Dead. The books had treble and bass notation with lyrics, and chord diagrams above. That's how I learned all the basic chords. When you already know how the song is supposed to sound a book like that was more than enough. It helped to be playing songs that were written for and performed on an acoustic guitar. It's harder to play a convincing version of a Molly Hatchet tune all by yourself on an acoustic. As a kid I had lots of free time, mental and physical flexibility and it was easy to read those tiny chord diagrams.

Many years later (over 30) I started playing mandolin in my 40's. I started playing in weekly song circles and learned everything way faster than when I was a teenager. I had 30 some years on guitar and was pretty good, but reached and passed that level on mandolin in less than a year. Meanwhile my fiddle and guitar playing improved as well. I now play a variety of stringed instruments, flatpicking, fingerstyle and bowing. I play a variety of genres (folk, rock, bluegrass, classical, Hawaiian slack key, country, old time, gospel, gypsy jazz, swing....).

Now I'm close to 60 and I play better than ever before, even with older, tired and beat up eyes, hands and fingers. The keys for me are:

1. Start young (none of us can change that now)
2. Start with music you really want to learn
3. Play with other people often
4. Cross train on other instruments
5. Play a variety of styles and genres
6. Intentionally learn new things - don't get stuck in a rut when you reach some level of proficiency.

[RichardN]

Originally Posted by janinep7

Like some folks here, this is my second time around learning guitar.

Of course, the risk with the Song-a-palooza approach is that there will likely be holes in my knowledge, but I figure I can fill them in as I fall into them.

The guitar is so expansive that you can play for fifty years and still have "holes in your knowledge".

[The Watchman]

A bit contrary here. If I was starting over, I'd try sticking with the "deductive" approach for as long as I could stand it, because I think it makes it easier to learn later in the inductive approach.

I have no natural talent, sense of rhythm or a good ear for tunes (or a voice for singing). So my early summer of classical lessons provided a foundation for understanding how notes relate, not just cowboy chords. Then I decided just to play popular songs when I realized playing "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" was not going to pull chicks.

Later, as an adult, I just didnt have time to learn more, so just focused on learning the songs I was interested in. But lack of theory limits intuitively understanding what notes come next.

[rllink]

For the longest time I found songs I liked with the chords I could play and sang my heart out. I think that is a good way to start. But after a while I just stopped learning and it all got tiresome. So I hired a teacher who got me playing scales, major, minor, and pentatonics. It opened up a whole new world and my playing became more complex. I think that if I had started there though I wouldn't have lasted very long. Scales are good if there is a context for them. On their own they seem useless.

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by Mandobart

I learned as a teen (13) back when there was no internet or even cable TV. I did have a formal classical background in violin - it's easier to learn a new instrument when you already know one.

I bought songbooks by bands/artists I liked - Eagles, Neil Young, Dylan, Dead. The books had treble and bass notation with lyrics, and chord diagrams above. That's how I learned all the basic chords. When you already know how the song is supposed to sound a book like that was more than enough. It helped to be playing songs that were written for and performed on an acoustic guitar. It's harder to play a convincing version of a Molly Hatchet tune all by yourself on an acoustic. As a kid I had lots of free time, mental and physical flexibility and it was easy to read those tiny chord diagrams.

Many years later (over 30) I started playing mandolin in my 40's. I started playing in weekly song circles and learned everything way faster than when I was a teenager. I had 30 some years on guitar and was pretty good, but reached and passed that level on mandolin in less than a year. Meanwhile my fiddle and guitar playing improved as well. I now play a variety of stringed instruments, flatpicking, fingerstyle and bowing. I play a variety of genres (folk, rock, bluegrass, classical, Hawaiian slack key, country, old time, gospel, gypsy jazz, swing....).

Now I'm close to 60 and I play better than ever before, even with older, tired and beat up eyes, hands and fingers. The keys for me are:

1. Start young (none of us can change that now)
2. Start with music you really want to learn
3. Play with other people often
4. Cross train on other instruments
5. Play a variety of styles and genres
6. Intentionally learn new things - don't get stuck in a rut when you reach some level of proficiency.

Thanks you have given me inspiration to go after the piano more than I have recently.

Tony

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by rllink

For the longest time I found songs I liked with the chords I could play and sang my heart out. I think that is a good way to start. But after a while I just stopped learning and it all got tiresome. So I hired a teacher who got me playing scales, major, minor, and pentatonics. It opened up a whole new world and my playing became more complex. I think that if I had started there though I wouldn't have lasted very long. Scales are good if there is a context for them. On their own they seem useless.

Back when I was single and had bought my first house, I taught guitar in the evenings. There was one kid who knew exactly the tunes he wanted to learn. Usually, it was the main lick or whatever it was in the tune that caught his ear.

Unfortunately, I couldn't get his mother to understand that if he started out highly motivated to learn exactly what he heard on the radio, later on he might be more interested in learning how all that stuff worked and that would be the time to introduce scales and theory.

The way Robert Conti teaches is much like how many of us learned - play the instrument and learn what you need to do that while playing tunes.

In the piano forum, it often seems from reading posts there that those going strictly formal down the classical piano path seem to "suffer for their art" while those into playing pop and jazz styles just seem to enjoy themselves more.

Tony