Guitar Tricks, Acoustic Challenge or Jamplay

[Mrbirdog]

Does anybody use these ? I want to start one but not all....Am having hard time deciding. Leaning toward Acoustic Challenge as they give you lessons/tasks to do.......Any comments or thoughts would be appreciated
Mrbirdog

[sroh]

I don't know about the others, but I can speak to Guitar Tricks. I paid up for a year when I first started learning to play. It was ok, but I won't be signing up again. For a beginner/novice, I think justinguitar is much better.

Now that I am a bit further along, I'm leaning towards Truefire. I want to focus on fingerstyle and Truefire has tons of great looking lessons.

[Mrbirdog]

send this to the top

[BeachBill]

I feel the same about Guitar Tricks as sroh. They were good for me as a "returning" student but I may renew again. I did renew once - asked for a nice discount and got it. (Ask and you may get in for around $75. They really do have detailed song lessons.)

I really like Justin Guitar, especially for learning songs. But I also use a variety of other YouTube guys/gals for songs.

I am really caught up in ActiveMelody.com for working on technique. Brian has a new lesson every Friday. Not all of them are a "fit" for me but those that are include enough theory that I can explore further on my own.

[Denny B]

I subscribed to Jamplay for a year when I first started playing, but stopped using it long before my time ran out...

There seems to be a lot lessons there, and one of the things I was looking forward to was the advertised interaction with all the teachers...you have a problem, an instructor helps you thru it...

What I found out was that far too many instructors hadn't been active on the site for several years...I would go to post a question and find out that half a dozen students had asked the same question 2 or 3 years ago, with no response...

I actually found Justin Sandercoe's site Justinguitar.com MUCH more helpful and it's free...you can purchase study material to help support the site if you choose, but it's not mandatory...I recommend him highly...

[Mrbirdog]

Justin has a nice piece on music theory and may try and buy the download and print it out. I want to learn more on music theory, ie notes ,scales ,chord progression etc. I also like his free song lessons .If he was a online teacher so to speak I would use him for sure...

[Warrenaines]

Curious as well, I liked Justinguitar enough to support his site. Haven't used the others, would be happy to pay for a service that has a good instruction in a structured format. Not interested in sites that have quality material but are geared to people that want to bounce around between lessons. Nothing wrong with that approach, but right now I'm looking for something that has a progressive schedule like Justin's beginner program (with more advanced material) so I won't waste time looking figuring out what I want to learn next. I think I'm going to go through Justin's intermediate program and make sure I have that down and go from there

[Mrbirdog]

Originally Posted by Warrenaines

Curious as well, I liked Justinguitar enough to support his site. Haven't used the others, would be happy to pay for a service that has a good instruction in a structured format. Not interested in sites that have quality material but are geared to people that want to bounce around between lessons. Nothing wrong with that approach, but right now I'm looking for something that has a progressive schedule like Justin's beginner program (with more advanced material) so I won't waste time looking figuring out what I want to learn next. I think I'm going to go through Justin's intermediate program and make sure I have that down and go from there

I need to check out the intermediate program to I wish it was available to view video wise

[tbeltrans]

I have not signed up for TrueFire, but I do have a number of their acoustic fingerstyle DVDs I have purchased over the years during their "Easter Egg Hunt". Periodically, they will have a sale and you can get these at a very reasonable cost. For me, they are "rut busters" to get new ideas or inspiration. It could well be more cost effective to sign up for a year subscription during one of their sales. They will offer that for $99, as I recall.

Currently, I have a 1 year subscription to Jam Play because they just had a sale on that. Both TrueFire and Jam Play have a wide ariety of courses and instructors, across a variety of skill levels. I am not familiar with any others.

I did some looking around Jam Play and saw a couple of courses by Don Ross. I am not familiar with his work because mostly, what I have heard is not music I would be particularly interested in learning. However, his two courses on Jam Play are much more to my liking. Don Ross has a degree in music in combination with a lot of years of self-teaching prior to that - a great combination. He seems to be really creative and very good at teaching. To me, his two courses were well worth the cost of entry, not to mention all the other courses that look interesting to me. Today, I discovered he has an archived live set of 9 sessions called "Thumb IQ" that look quite good. I watched a 2 hour (!!) QA session of him, done by Jam Play. In it, he mentioned that he has a new course coming on ear training. That would also be of interest to me.

Since I tend to work independently, I have not tried to contact any instructor, s I can't comment on that. I have enough self-taught background that I don't really seem to need that interaction.

One thing about "canned" courses such as these is that the instructor had to design the course and present it as a series of relatively short, concise videos, that focus on the course concept rather than wandering around on this and that. These courses are typically very focused and well worth the effort it takes to learn to use the material. This should be true for most any course of this nature, and seems to be true for both Jam Play and TrueFire.

Not all good players are also good teachers (i.e. they can do it, but may not be able to explain clearly what they do). Not all guitar teachers are good teachers. It can take time to find a good one that fits well with your learning style, but I am sure nothing can beat a well matched live teacher. These courses, especially those through a quality site such as TrueFire or JamPlay (and others, I am sure...), will be taught by people who are very good, if not great, players who can also teach. Each course has a clearly defined focus, and you pick what interests you. You can take all the time you need to take in the material, rather than a fixed limited amount of time like happens in a guitar camp. If this means of learning suits your learning style, I would think many of this type of site would fit your needs if it covers the styles you are interested in.

So, for many folks, this type of learning can be a great way to go, and is not cost-prohibitive.

I have read nothing but good things here about Justin Guitar. I don't have personal experience with that site, but if the number of people here that praise it every time the subject comes up is any indication, I would seriously advise you to check that out too.

Tony

[Diamond Dave]

Originally Posted by Mrbirdog

I need to check out the intermediate program to I wish it was available to view video wise

???

Every video is right here, in order.

http://www.justinguitar.com/en/IM-00...iateMethod.php

[TBman]

I just started using TrueFire and the two lessons I've worked on take you from point a to point b, with multiple songs in them to learn a technique or style. I also joined ActiveMelody and these aren't so much lessons as just an instructional video to learn one song, which is fine. The ActiveMelody "lessons" are very well done, a little slow paced, but good. Once I get to where I want to be with some certain new skills I can then go back to ActiveMelody and just relax and learn some songs. I have no experience with any of the ones mentioned in the OP but you have to define what you want to learn, technique or build a song base.

[sroh]

Originally Posted by Diamond Dave

???

Every video is right here, in order.

http://www.justinguitar.com/en/IM-00...iateMethod.php

Yep, Justin makes the entire course available. I completed his beginner course in full, and bought a couple of his songbooks, which are great. I started on his intermediate course, but got sidetracked learning fingerpicking songs.

[JBCROTTY]

I've been subscribed to GuitarTricks for about 2 months. I'm a returning beginner - played for several years as a little kid, quit at 12 years old, and picked up the guitar again at 45 in December of last year.

I'm about 1/4th through the "intermediate" course. Most of the beginner course was review for me. Some helpful basics in the beginner and intermediate course work, and the instructor is very competent, but OMG is she BORING. I dread the lessons, just like back when I was 12 in my instructors basement playing Sloop John B and begging to play something I recognized. I think they have songs to practice on but to be honest I have not tried those yet. I did the monthly so I can cancel anytime.

I desperately want to stick it out and get through the intermediate stuff - but really I shouldn't be feeling like this. It should be fun and rewarding.

Justin Guitar - whom others have recommended, is fantastic. He makes it fun and interesting by mixing in songs and keeping it interesting. I'd start there and if you want to get into more of the blocking and tackling basics you can go to Guitar Tricks. But do the monthly subscription in case you want out....

[jeremyguitar]

Give Guitar Compass a try for a comparison. The site is more focused on learning how to play/solo in general than specific songs.

[WonderMonkey]

Another vote for JustinGuitar here. I've purchased a few books and even just donated.