Starting To Learn Guitar :D

[blacky0g]

Im borrowing my moms guitar and trying to teach myself through youtube. Anyone have any tips on learning?

[Gorecore]

Play as much as you can, as often as you can. Practicing anything helps you get better but this holds especially true when it comes to playing a musical instrument. Just don't get frustrated when you can't play something. Work hard at co-ordinating your strumming hand with your fretting hand is my first word of advice. Don't bog yourself down with too much theory and scales. Just learn songs by learning to read tabs. There are dozens of great online tab sites. I think my favorite is www.ultimateguitar.com

Good luck and just hammer away at 'er!

[Ikku]

Learning songs is a good way to start. Although personally I would recommend a different approach. I used to take lessons and would just constantly learn songs (did learn some theory, scales, chord progressions etc eventually but it was mostly learning songs). It was OK as an introduction but it didn't take me anywhere and I ended up giving up eventually, even though I was halfway decent. Here's how I would start if I were to start again (actually planning on picking it up again soon, haven't played in years): learn some common major and minor chords (don't worry about trying to do anything away from the very top of the neck yet, bar chords feel weird to a newbie) and learn to move smoothly between them and be able to strum a decent progression. Then I would look into learning scales and fingerpicking, so you can just play new melodies on the fly from your basic set of chords. Also I'd get a capo (I'm assuming you're playing acoustic guitar) once you start getting into it, it will let you play higher pitched songs with some simpler fingering.

It really all depends on what you want to do with it. Just remember it's something you're doing for FUN and shouldn't ever feel like a chore.

EDIT: Really thinking back about how I learned songs I probably just went about that the wrong way. Start with simple songs like folk songs, 12 bar blues, and stuff like that. I jumped headfirst into some heavy rock and metal songs and even though they often use a lot of simple power chords, a lot of the stuff they do is pretty tough and discouraging for a first timer.

[J O E]

take lsd

[sugarstalker]

I would recommend having a look at www.justinguitar.com

free online lessons, and the guy teaching is pretty good.

[AbbyRoad]

i was learning how to play the ukelele up until recently.....

[blacky0g]

im just practicing finger exercises so far

[pkkupo]

When I started playing, i just played a few scales forward and back incessantly, for maybe an hour or two a day, playing them as fast as i could without compromising accuracy and overall cleanliness. Also, practicing chords the same way... simple progressions... Learning to play the guitar is quite the process (of love) and I'm glad I started young because it's been incredibly rewarding. If you can find an instructor you like and who really listens and adheres to what you want out of your playing, that can truly be helpful as well... What these other fools say is also relevant...

[WeedGuru_Flow]

Nice man, the first piece of music I ever learned to play was the bass line to Nirvana's Lithium

I recommend learning to read tabs ASAP and as gore said ultimateguitar.com is a pretty epic site to find them and get hints & tips!

[omnific.dc]

Bought a new acoustic guitar, two teachers taught me how to play but my hands aren't used to it so now I'm a drummer.

[leprechaun]

I wasn't gonna reply to this, as i thought you'se had covered it all, but i just found an amazing tab site, for any of you who are into fingerstyle guitar.

www.soulmelodi.com You'll have to download a winzip thingy to access their file's but, seriously it's amazin'. You get full books of tabs, (i'd reccommend the paul simon fingerstyle book) all for free.

I know this post sounds a bit bot-like, but trust me, i've only just found this site and it's awesomo! it should definitely be shut down by sopa or something.