[eddiez152]

Randomaire,
Maybe its time for a new thread as to how we all began. In other words, the first time we had a guitar in our hands and what did we first do or want to do. Obviously play MUSIC !!!!
WHERE IS THE BEGINNING IN ALL OF THIS.
Example: My beginning was with an accordion. I had no lessons, I picked it up and started playing melodies no idea as to how to play bass. About the same time I went to a friends house, there they had a guitar. I remember picking it up and trying to make a tune with single notes. I got no where. Had someone shown me how to play a chord and another,and another I would then have began to assemble a tune.
Had they shown me how to play a melody, they I would have been playing melodies.
So where is the beginning ? I think the beginning is when one is introduced to any instruments, repeating over and over a sequence of moves until we can do them with success no matter what style we choose.
We all have different levels from slow to fast as we progress. A pioneering feat when we can finally manage one song from start to finish.
It is much harder to play from sheet music then being taught by Kirk's video lessons where we play by repeating visual aid.
Our frustrations come from not being able to move our fingers as quickly as we'd like. Or being accurate with our chording.
So, watch copy and practice over and over to best of your abilty. We will all be beginner's of the next new song.
Kirk's lessons can move our hearts and minds but not our hands.

eddiez152

[dojo100]

please help. I'm new to guitar and i keep searching the web for a nice little song to strumm away to but i can't find one. does anyone know of one thats recognisable that i can sing along to so that i feel my time on gutiar is not wasted. pleaze help dojo100

[eddiez152]

Maybe its time to introduce open string tuning so that beginners can get introduced to strumming a tune along the fretboard.
eddiez152

[BigG]

When I learned to fingerpick it took me about a year to learn to play the first tune well. I learned the accompaniment first. I started with fingerpicking patterns over chords. Learning to play a melody was just too slow. Once I had the patterns down it became easier to get the idea of what was needed to play melody. My first song was Freight Train. Kirk has a lesson.
This is basically the way I still learn a song. Find the melody line on the strings. Learn the chords at the melody note positons and play fingerpicking patterns as accompaniment. Only when I can move freely through the chords do I then start to add melody notes.

[starsailor]

Hi randomaire, 5 hours is a long time if you're fairly new, if you're getting frustrated try and break the practice up with a couple of songs you've nailed, I'm learning fingerstyle and it is a bit daunting, mixing a practice session up a bit tends to keep the confidence levels up.
Have the more experienced guitarist got a view on this?

Hope you get on alright

[eddiez152]

I would think that guitar playing should be a mix of what you do and don't know.
But first it should be a fun quest at any level. I takes many of us a long time to accomplish any style.
Thank you for those who try to give us a small picture aid to develop our style.
Everything I learned, I learned from the help of others and a little on my own. All in good time.
eddiez152

[__tsidewinder__]

some great advice here. A good way to get used to fingerstyle is to start with something that doesn't have any chords in it. You just hold a chord, and play arpeggio sequences. Of course that gets boring, so try to learn a simple song that mostly uses chord arpeggios.

A really good example is "is there anybody out there?" by pink floyd. (If you want the tab for that one, pm me.)

This helped me a bit. Another good song to learn with is "nothing else matters" and "fade to black" by metallica. There are other sites besides this one, though perhaps none quite as good.

I wouldn't say all the fingerpicking songs are for the beyond players. In fact, I found only a few that I would dub as advanced. For the tougher ones, you really have to love the song to keep motivated. I'd reccommend Desparado, because it is a lot of fun to play, and fairly short. Its pretty tough at first, but I'm sure you'll get it.

Recording your work is really a good idea. It helps you to understand where you are making mistakes, which parts sound really good (makes you get confidence when you find those parts) and when you listen to some of your earlier recordings, you can see how far you've progressed. I record a lot of the stuff I play, especially if I make up a short riff I like.

The first few weeks were difficult for me on fingerstyle. My right hand fingers didn't listen, and I had a lot of trouble going from flat to fingerpicking. Now I almost never use a pick (and find I'm losing my abilbity to use a pick too) and learn fingerpicking pieces nearly excusively.

I don't have much advice really. Still a beginner too. keep going, its worth it.

[eddiez152]

dojo100,
what kind of music do you like or would like to play? Maybe as a beginner, like all of us we want to get ahead of our capability and that soon gets us frustrated. I have read of few of your posts and cries for help.
eddiez152

[Leroy4bz]

I agree with all the others, imho i always tell people to go as slowly as it takes to get it right, if that makes any sense.
What i mean to say is go slower and make less mistakes rather than go fast and loss the timing, stick to a few chords like G and C and D and just pratice pratice and you guessed it pratice

[mjohnson]

Im really new too... I've just been practicing chords and trying to strum rythmically. The first song I wanted to learn was Sugar Magnolia by the Dead... I think that's a little lofty since I have'nt developed the streangth to play solid barr chords yet... But I keep plunkin

[Kirk Lorange]

Originally Posted by mjohnson

... But I keep plunkin

That's the key, mjohnson ... just keep plunkin'!

[buffy]

Great site,I like it already...and iv only been on this site for 3 days

[DBoyer0]

Randomaire,

Well I've been a member of this site for about a year, and I'm finally making my first post.

I got my first Guitar for Christmas 2005. I found this site immediately after doing a search for fingerstyle lessons. Keep in mind that I wanted to learn fingerstyle. My voice isn't that great for singing, so I wanted the guitar to sing for me. This site has been great, but keep in mind that it serves up the style I want to play.

One book that helped me a great deal in the beginning was "Guitar for Dummies". It has some good beginner songs that you can strum with just a couple of basic chords.

The other thing I got that helped me a great deal was Guitar Pro 5. You can download Kirks lessons and not have to keep replaying the middies. You can also rearrange the lessons, single out the melody vs the bass line, marry multiple Tab's lessons on a single song into a single tab.

Within the first year I have a play list of about 10 songs(Father and Son and Kirks rendition of Amazing Grace our my best). Doesn't seem like much, but after a year my learning curve is vastly improved. I'm beginning to play basic melodies by ear off of one basic scale (C Major). I'm a long way from being ready to post a recording of my playing, but I'm a lot better than I was a year ago.

A real easy picking pattern that you can try to sing along with is Dust in the Wind by Kansas. It's an arpeggio over a couple of basic chords and a quick learn. My greatest moment was walking into a guitar store after about 3 months of playing and having the salesman recoginze the song when I played it.

The lesson for me is patience, practice and perserverance. One thing I found that helped immensely was when I got to a plateau on one song, I'd take a break from it and go to another song for something fresh and new. Soon my warm up would be my early melodies (On top of old smokey, Tom Dooley, to name a couple) and progress through the tougher ones. It can be tedious and redundant at times, but nothing good comes without work. Keep trying you'll get there if the desire is real.

Good Luck
Don

[rapter]

I know what you are saying I think. I have always wanted to play classical guitar, and have just started. My problem is I get to focused where my fingers should be on the fretboard and I am happy to hear it come together, while the timing part seems a long ways off. The good thing that at least I see out of learning to finger pick it seems to help me with other aspects of guitar playing. It makes you think.

[Ryan]

i agree comletely with you