Guitar lesson intervals?

[Chas007]

Originally Posted by CarolD

I'm also a beginner (not quite 2 years in and I started older... age 58).

I began teaching myself with Guitar Tricks. It's only $99/year and has a very well laid out methodology, which is what I need. I appreciate all of the free stuff, but I didn't want to waste time jumping around. Guitar Tricks has a pathway for learning which is excellent. I definitely need the structure.

About 8 months in, I knew it was time to have in-person lessons. I found a great teacher and I now take lessons every other week. One hour long and he comes to my house. I LOVE my teacher, my lessons, and feel I'm making good progress.

I am very self directed and love to practice, so I don't need a lesson every week to help me be "accountable." The extra week gives me plenty of time to enjoy the process and not feel stressed about having to conquer something new. It also allows me time to go on a side tangent on my own if I see something interesting to learn on YouTube, etc.

I think that as I become more proficient, that perhaps I will consider moving to weekly lessons, because once the actual mechanics of playing become easier, I will be able to digest more material more quickly.

Cheers and hope you find a way that works for you.

Thank you so much. It really helps hearing from other beginners. I'm considering several different options. One of which is Mr. Silly Moustache from the AGF. He has posted a few times on my threads and I have watched some of his YouTube stuff. I think he is in Britain and I'm in the US so it might be hard to schedule anything time wise. I do like the idea of helping to support a fellow AGF member though. I can't emphasize enough how appreciative I am of the people on here......

[619TF]

Originally Posted by CarolD

I'm also a beginner (not quite 2 years in and I started older... age 58).

I began teaching myself with Guitar Tricks. It's only $99/year and has a very well laid out methodology, which is what I need. I appreciate all of the free stuff, but I didn't want to waste time jumping around. Guitar Tricks has a pathway for learning which is excellent. I definitely need the structure.

About 8 months in, I knew it was time to have in-person lessons. I found a great teacher and I now take lessons every other week. One hour long and he comes to my house. I LOVE my teacher, my lessons, and feel I'm making good progress.

I am very self directed and love to practice, so I don't need a lesson every week to help me be "accountable." The extra week gives me plenty of time to enjoy the process and not feel stressed about having to conquer something new. It also allows me time to go on a side tangent on my own if I see something interesting to learn on YouTube, etc.

I think that as I become more proficient, that perhaps I will consider moving to weekly lessons, because once the actual mechanics of playing become easier, I will be able to digest more material more quickly.

Cheers and hope you find a way that works for you.

Some good advice here but I'd say just the opposite as to online vs in-person lessons. You'll want a teacher who can see and correct any issues as they arise and before they become bad habits. Once you have the basic mechanics down correctly you can start to explore online options.

[sayheyjeff]

Had lessons for a few months when I was a kid. Wouldn’t sit and practice. Lasted about 6 months. Tried playing again in high school. Learned 3 chords and the intro to White Rabbit. Tried again in my 30s and missed most of the lessons due to work. That attempt lasted about 4months. This last time, I started about a year and a half before I retired. That was about 13 years ago. Did every other week for an hour. Took 3 years off to care for my parents, but started back up when we started isolating for covid. Have a lesson at 3:00 this afternoon. For me, 30 minutes isn’t long enough to grasp what I need to work on. Every other week gives me time to get in some good work. My situation has worked out nicely as my teacher has ‘fixed me up’ with other students of similar skill levels and done a nice job of putting folks together who have become friends. This group has many of the same tunes and exercises to work on over time and we get to practice and play together most weeks. Nothing better. I need all the guidance I can get, so this has worked for me. I use online lessons sometimes as a supplement and for fun, but not as a replacement.

Jeff

[mawmow]

I got weekly one hour private lessons two years ago for a whole year :
Half an hour every two weeks would have worked better for me.

[Saxonbowman]

I took jazz guitar lessons for a couple of years. I had 30 minute lessons every week. It seemed that 30 minutes was enough time to learn a new concept. I often thought that a week wasn't enough time to absorb what we were working on though when we skipped a week I didn't do much better. In retrospect I wish I kept practicing the older material instead of just working on new stuff.

Now I'm trying to learn fingerstyle. I've gone through a couple of tutorial books that contained mostly exercises. I took a casual approach at first but found that I need to practice the material consistently to make any progress. Currently I'm working my way through one of the video and PDF lesson sets from Guitar Workshop, learning actual songs. Progress seems slow but I'm getting there. I'm sure I am developing lots of bad habits which I try to correct as I go along.

[twowheels]

What is a good book or online tutorial system to learn guitar for a beginner?

• I don't want a book that wastes a lot of pages on non-playing stuff like how to purchase a guitar, how-to tune, how to string, parts of the guitar, etc. If we got this far it is not an issue plus it is easy knowledge to pick up yourself.
• How to fret chords is fairly simple in most cases to pick up. I find, that putting it together with timing and strumming is much harder for a song to get from tutorials online. Most videos devote 95% of their time to the fretting of chords but only 5 seconds of muted strumming to get across the strumming pattern, which is not enough for me to follow. My ear for rhythm patterns has not developed yet.
• I want a book or tutorial that holds my hand from start to end on how to learn simple songs.

[Gas]

Practice daily, lessons weekly. Push yourself

[AlreadyStrechin]

Originally Posted by buddyhu

I take lessons every week. But there are times when I think every two weeks would be sufficient.

I second that 2 week idea. With my current weekly classes I sometimes feel I don't have enough time to absorb/practice everything covered. Thinking about trying a bi-weekly schedule.