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I am putting this site together for everyone who wants to learn to play, or to learn about, the guitar. Music is being cut from middle and high school curricula all over this country. This is a crime in my opinion. Music gives kids in any environment an opportunity to learn a true art, and music gives both kids and adults a sense of self worth. Music has been good to me over the years, and I want to pass on a little of what I have learned. I especially encourage young people to learn an instrument: any instrument. I began at age 14 on trumpet and it was the trumpet that gave me an everlasting love of music. It wasn't until age 17 that I got my first guitar.
Cheap is actually not a derogatory word, and the true fact is that no guitar, no matter how expensive or beautiful, will make you or anyone else, a good player. Practice is the only thing that will make you better. A good player can make even a super cheap guitar sing, so don't worry if you can't afford the best guitar in the world. Get whatever guitar you can afford and start learning today. I recommend starting on an acoustic guitar because it will help build the muscles in your hands and forearms.
Use the tips of your fingers to form the chord. Press toward the fret, not in the middle. Strum only the strings designated to be played for each chord. Make sure the strings are firmly pressed against the Frets and that your fingers are not muting adjacent strings. Chording is difficult for nearly everyone at first. You have to train the muscles in your hands and forearms to know these chords so that you can form them without thinking. Practice, Practice, Practice!
Learn a few Open Chords like E Major, A Major, G Major and D Major first, and practice changing between them over and over again until you’re comfortable. Learn some more Open Chords. Then, move on to Barre Chords. Practice!
Buy a metronome. Practice with your metronome. Set it as slow as necessary for you to play with the beat. Tap your foot with the beat as you play. When you can play comfortably at a slow speed, turn the metronome up a notch. Repeat that procedure, gradually getting faster until you've reached the desired tempo. If you can't play a song or scale slow, then you can't play it fast! Practice, Practice, Practice!
The number of hours you spend practicing your scales and chords will directly affect how fast you learn. Use the Legend below for the charts and visual aids used on this site.
This site is for all people who wish to have a better understanding of the guitar. I promise that I will NEVER put malware (adware, spyware or toolbars of any kind) on this site. Many web developers today trick their users into installing malware onto their machines, and then receive a fat commision for every machine that they infect. This despicable practice can completely ruin a computer. Unscrupulous websites and webmasters create POP-UPS that make the user think that he or she is scanning their machine for viruses, or they may offer a cool screensaver or toolbar for "your convenience," or they may even make them look like official Windows dialog boxes that tell you to "Click Here" to clean your Windows Registry or some other nonesense. When those types of pop-ups show up on your machine, close them by holding down the Control key while pressing the W key. If that doesn't close the window, then click on the little x in the upper right hand corner of the pop-up dialog box. To be safe, never click YES or OK on any popup from any website unless you know that the company or person who owns the site is completely trusworthy. This WILL keep you from becomming infected and save you a world of trouble and time.
Brett W. Bertram