How to get young people motivate to learn guitar?

[Nimiety]

I played mandolin in a church group for several years. Sometimes we'd have a guitar player in the mix. And there is quite a bit of 'catchier' music available. There's no reason not to play some of those hymns.

But I wouldn't have them playing only hymns.

Most kids need to have a 'cool' factor. It's part of being a kid, finding yourself and growing up. Maybe it's time to check out the latest K-Pop?

Regardless, that 'concert' I recommended can certainly be a recital of easy hymns at the end of the course.

[handers]

Originally Posted by martinhubltz

The university has to replace guitars every five years.

Huh??? That way a student will never have the understanding of what age can do on a guitar.

This is a policy which was never created by a musician who played guitar. Silly in my view.


hans

[egordon99]

Originally Posted by handers

Huh??? That way a student will never have the understanding of what age can do on a guitar.

This is a policy which was never created by a musician who played guitar. Silly in my view.


hans

Yeah. Weird. And to think they had such nice Martins as well.

What University is this?

[TOPDOGJIM]

My three grandchildren each have their own instrument when they visit. They are happy to get a lesson from PaPa. Grandma does the uke. Ages 10-6.

[wguitar]

It's really pretty simple ...

1) always have a guitar available and visible to them

2) ask the youth group if anyone knows how to play guitar at all, and
encourage them to feel free to play if they want

3) now and then MENTION to the group that there's a guitar or 2
available if anyone wants to use them (even during
break time")

My thoughts ...

In the eyes of youth someone who can play guitar is "cool" and will attract an audience when he/she starts playing (however good or "not so good" (see what I did there) it might sound)

NOBODY likes to be told what to do ... let it happen

Some will be pick up the guitar now and then, want to learn more, etc. -- others will not. With youth you just need to go with the flow sometimes

Good luck!

[Steve DeRosa]

My wife and I ran an after-school guitar program for fourth-/fifth-graders at the elementary school where we taught...

Every week before class we'd either play a song or two for them, or demonstrate/discuss a different instrument from our collection...

In addition to exposure to unfamiliar musical genres/styles. the kids got to understand that "overdrive" gave them the "rock-guitar" sound, learned about tubes/pickups/stompboxes and how they worked, what the tonal differences were between various sizes/shapes/woods, heard their first archtop/mandolin/banjo/ukulele/bouzouki/sitar - and when logistics permitted, we allowed them some supervised hands-on time with each of the instruments...

They used to come back asking, "Hey Mr. D. - what did you and Mrs. D. bring this week?"

Interest level and motivation was generally high - enough so for them to plow ahead through the usual beginner rough spots (use of the pinky, the barre F-chord, etc.) without complaints - and their classmates loved us at the end-of-year assembly programs...

Then again there were always those one or two who couldn't care less, came just to hang out with their friends, and felt it was their sworn duty to try to make everyone else as miserable as they were...

Either individually or together, we would take the recalcitrant individual aside and very gently suggest that, in the best interests of all concerned, a deep existential re-examination of personal values/goals and their relationship to one's present and future well-being might be in order:



No problem...

[vintage40s]

Originally Posted by martinhubltz

... ... hire a guitar instructor to provide a group lesson once a week... ... the other church told me that it will be hard to get kids to be interested in guitar. They tried it once before but had to shutdown after three months due to lack of interest...

I don't think kids want lessons. I quit piano lessons, and never had a guitar lesson.
When I got to college in 1960, guitars were being played by kids up and down the hall. Good guitars, good players and singers, folk songs, bluegrass, flat picking, finger styles, travis picking. Play along and sing along. Free for the watching. Constant exposure and plenty of time to practice, made it easy to pick up on.
I got a mid-priced classical, was hooked, and went to a Martin D-18 by Christmas. Joined the college Folk Singers club.
A couple of years later, a community center put a notice on a bulletin board asking for someone teach a guitar class. I typed out and printed song requests on a mimeograph, and the kids played and sang along with me. They asked me back for a second term.
I think lessons can be a turn off. Show kids the real thing that they really want to do, and they will enjoy imitating it and learning it.

[rstaight]

I just started teaching my great niece. I am a firm believer in learning to read music.

Now I need to figure out what clicks with her musically to keep the interest going. And still teach her notation.

[rllink]

I applaud the OP for what he is doing. As far as the question, I am a complete and utter failure. I could never get either of my kids to be interested in anything that I wanted them to be interested in. If I was interested in it, they weren't. I tried again with my grand daughter. She gets interested in things I want her to be interested in for two or three weeks and then gets interested in something else. Seriously, she's gotten me interested in more things that she's interested in than the other way around. The nice thing about what the OP is doing is that there are probably lots of kids out there who's parents have no interest in guitars what so ever who will go nuts over them. I hope so anyway.

[frankmcr]

Originally Posted by Steve DeRosa

Esteban! (?)

[Scott O]

Originally Posted by frankmcr

Esteban! (?)

Este-banned substances

[aeisen93]

The way to get young people motivated to learn guitar is to have them listen to The Beatles. I started taking guitar lessons when I was 9 years old after getting into the Beatles music!

[vintage40s]

Originally Posted by rstaight

... I am a firm believer in learning to read music... .

That would have killed my interest. I just wanted to make the music I was hearing.
I can't read music, and figuring out tab is hard. I don't know the names of the strings or the notes. But I can play OK, finger picking and flat picking. If I have one regret, it is that I learned finger style with two fingers instead of three fingers, each finger dedicated to a string. But that is not what I was seeing back then. Watson did it with one finger and Travis with two.
I know Molly Tuttle and Courtney Hartman went to Berklee, but Billy Strings picked it up by eye and ear.

[rstaight]

Molly Tuttle could play before she went to Berklee.

[Everton FC]

Originally Posted by Peter Z

First of all, I like what you intend to do!

Then I would present them a weekly Youtube link to listen/watch. There are great young players the kids could identify with.

A few suggestions:
Reina del Cid & Tony Lindgren
Josh Turner
Carson McKee
Mary Spender
and many more!

The thing with the girls might be important too. BUT I remember more than one situation when friends walked away with them while I had to keep on playing! Don’t tell them!

I watch these young players all the time! Good plug - they deserve it!

I have four kids. My eldest is a very young married mom, who failed with the flute. Gregorian Chant was her music. My son is about to enter university an accomplished viola player who sacrificed sports, for his craft. Discipline is why I bring that up. He picked up my old Yamaha after I kept pushing him to do so. He learned the Beatles "Blackbird", then "Yesterday", quickly. He's obviously gifted. I then got him the old Goya LP Custom copy and he picked up AC/DC's "Thunderstruck" riff in a couple of days. Then it was "Crazy Train". I challenged him to learn Sting's "Shape of My Heart", and he did. Now, he's playing all the time - when's not practicing viola. I purchased the Recording King in my signature last week because he's playing daily. We needed a second acoustic in the house!

My two youngest - both violin players - were inspired by their big brother. Both girls picked up "Blackbird", quick. My youngest was actually inspired prior, by the old Harmony mandolin in my signature. It was a wall-hanger on the in-laws farm in most-rural Saskatchewan, I restored. She could play it immediately, because she played violin. So we'd jam together on the front yard, she on mandolin, me on an old Ami I used to have, and should have never sold. My youngest also plays some of the songs I've written. Pretty cool.

I think the answer is get them into music young - whether guitar, or other string instruments. My kids started at 5. Get them listening to good guitar music - classical, James Taylor, Simon & Garfunkel, the young players in the original quote. The Beatles inspired my kids. Get them a guitar that's easy to play - a Recording King RPS-7 or 9, an old A&L Ami like I had, a Gretsch Jim Dandy, the Yamaha Jr. - one that won't frustrate them. And jam w/them, if they'll let you!

As for reading music - my kids transition was obviously different. I can't read guitar music, and have no interest at my age. I can read "saxophone", as I played into my teens. But I hated the structure. I liked doing my own thing on guitar. Still do. My kids were accomplished, albeit very young musicians, when they grabbed my guitars. Their teachers all these years are some of the best in Canada - perhaps in North America. Some kids do well in this type of environment. I was not one of those kids!

Start them young. Get an instrument they can bond with (the lime green Recording King parlours would be a good one!). Challenge them a little, w/o being "choleric". If they aren't interested, so be it!