Teach left or right handed?

[chitz]

Question for the membership...

I have a 60 year old LEFT handed friend who has an interest in learning guitar. I have offered to teach him the basics.

I am right handed, and he says he thinks he can learn it lefty or righty.

So the question here is...

Should I teach him right or left handed?
I'm sure I could do either, but what do you think would be best for HIM?
I don't want to do anything that'll create obstacles later for him.

I await the wisdom.

[guitararmy]

It will always be more difficult to find a lefty guitar, so I would suggest starting righty first....

[Woodstock School Of Music]

I play left handed and teach and I would say try it righty and see how he does, it's going to be hard starting out either way. Last night I gave a guy who's a lefty (playing righty) his first lesson and my observation was he didn't seem any more at a disadvantage than the beginner students, as a matter of fact he did better the most. There's always an exception to the rule but personally I think I could have learned righty and not had a problem with it.

[Wade Hampton]

Start with right-handed playing. At least half the lefties out there seem to do okay with playing right-handed. If that doesn't work, have him restring the guitar for left-handed playing. It's not as difficult to teach someone who's playing left-handed as you might guess - you just sit face to face and mirror each other.

To those detail-oriented folks who are just dying to point out that a lefty-strung right-handed guitar won't intonate correctly - yeah, duh. But it's simplest to experiment this way to determine if the student can learn faster this way, THEN go out and buy a left-handed guitar, than it is to buy a left-handed guitar to start with.

Incidentally, chitz, there are an amazing number of people who feel it's some sort of abomination for left-handed people to play guitar strung left-handed, and who aren't the least bit shy about saying so. This includes not only right-handed players meddling in matters that are none of their concern, but also some lefties who managed to learn playing right-handed. Their feeling is that if they managed it then all other lefties should suck it up, grow some hair on their dangling appendages, and learn to play right-handed, too.

We can expect to hear thunderations from those folks any minute now.

The reality of the situation, though, is that some lefties can learn to play right-handed, but others simply cannot. For those who are strongly left-handed it has little to nothing to do with will power or moral fiber, but everything to do with brain wiring.

But try starting your friend with a right-handed guitar, and see how he copes.

Hope this helps.


Wade Hampton Miller

[chitz]

The plus side of teaching him "right handed" is... I've got lots of guitars here for him to dabble on. No need to purchase a lefty right away.

[Mking]

I do everything left handed except play the guitar. I'm 61 and learned how to play when I was 13. He will do fine learning to play right handed. I wish you and him the best of luck.

[guitararmy]

As a lefty, I think I speak for many of us in that we can usually do many tasks right-handed, including guitar.

[chitz]

Thank you my left handed friends! I think we have a direction now.

[Wade Hampton]

Many, perhaps even most lefties can learn to play right-handed. But not all.


whm

[amyFB]

I am a righty who is selfishly in favor of righty because it is a pain to read backwards hands!
Or worse, transpose at the same time, and altered tunings....not a chance!

Good luck either direction !


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[PTC Bernie]

Ok, shameless plug, but I happen to have a lefty DN3 for sale, so..........

Having said that, he's better off learning right handed. Lots more choices in guitars, he won't have to look in a mirror to figure out what the other guy is doing( ) but bottom line, it's how you learn. If he thinks in terms of Left hand vs Right Hand he'll drive himself crazy.

If you fingerpick, both hands are equally involved anyway.

I've never heard of a left handed piano, trumpet, flute, violin, tuba, etc, etc, etc and there are plenty of left handed people playing those instruments.

Left handed drummers? I don' think so! ( BTW, how can you tell it's a drummer at your front door? He doesn't know when to come in!. But seriously folks,......)

I should have been left handed but had it beaten out of me in parochial school. I write with my right hand (very poorly, I might add) but do everything else left handed.

Oh yeah, I play guitar right handed.

LEARN RIGHTY!

Just my less than humble opinion.

[muscmp]

i would suggest learning to play right as future purchases of guitars will be much easier. once proficient, then perhaps he'll want to try left.

play music!

[zhunter]

Right hand militant here. Teach/learn to play right handed. I don't think there are many left handed musical instruments out there once you leave the guitar world.

hunter

[zenith]

Learning lefty worked better for me, and I'm glad I went that way, but go with whatever feels more comfortable for him.

I've never had much issue obtaining left handed guitars, although when you do find a nice lefty in a store, it does make it harder to pass up.

I've never had any trouble with any right handed materials, videos, etc... with the sole exception of scale diagrams. A problem that a $15 purchase of a left handed scale book solved.

[pieterh]

I'm a lefty and learned to play right handed, never occurred to me to try it the other way around.