Advice from experienced guitar players needed.

[hittman]

My practice for the next week will be:

C - Csus - C - G - C - Am - G - F:\\

Instructor says I’m excelling but I sure don’t feel like it. This F chord is gonna take a few days … no doubt about that.
And, I’m still not remembering what you call each chord.

When he says “G” ( or whatever ) I find myself having to stop a moment and think about finger positions. He says to remember back when I started my career …. Nothing was “second nature” but says this will be in due course.

 

[Ride1949]

Moving right along. Keep at it. I picked up mine a few years back and tried to play a couple tunes I knew pretty well. It was like using rented fingers. Didn't take me long to put it back down. Arthritis has got me now. My future as a rock star is in doubt.

 

[hittman]

Rented fingers! Good one.

On a talk show years ago someone asked Glen Campbell if he still played every day. He said he hadn’t played for a few months and was surprised at how much he’d LOST. Even my very young 30-something instructor says Glen Campbell was THE man. His list of credits is way way longer than most folks know.

 

[Ride1949]

Yup. Glen was part of a large, loose group of studio musicians, (many of whom later went on to become famous themselves) that were known as The Wrecking Crew, who backed up some (now*) top name artists before his own career took off.

Edit: * The majority of them were unknown at the time and were cutting their first records at Phil Spector's recording studio, where The Wrecking Crew made up the session players.

 

[Prescut]

I have found that closing my eyes works the best. my fingers FEEL the fret.
your eyes get in the way of your brain talking to your fingers.
you don't need them getting in the way.
if you stare at your fingers, you will never play guitar.

you also learn to LISTEN.

Try it for 10 minutes and you will understand.

prescut

 

[Ride1949]

Here's a real good video about Muscle Shoals FAME recording studio with with segments about Phil Spector and his Wall Of Sound. It tells about The Swampers and The Wrecking Crew, along with. many others you'll recognize,including Glen Campbell, at the start of their careers.



Edit: I should have said documentary as it's 1hr. & 42.min. long.

 

[hittman]

Barre chords …. Gotta be the devils work I tell ya’!

Haven’t found one person yet who said, “Oh yeah, barre chords are easy to learn”. So I guess that’s a plus. It apparently ain’t just me!

 

[Fox Mike]

Hang in there. Someday, you never know, you may be the next Roy Clark. Practice, practice, practice.

 

[Prescut]

if you can make a barre chord F, you can slide that shape up the fretboard for every chord.

With Arthritis you can stop; or you can do like me and go to the slide using G tuning or maybe D tuning.
No more finger twisting barre chords; but i can still play all day long.

 

[hittman]

Barre chords are still very hit or miss after a couple of weeks. He’s not surprised.
I really need to speed up my transition from one chord to the next and be able to make them in tune EVERY time.
Nothing practice won’t fix.
And today he assigned me the melody of Tennessee Whiskey. Had to go the You Tube route cause I’d never heard it.

This is gonna take some time for sure.

 

[Ride1949]

I had to look it up too. Sounds like a great song for chord practice. You work up some callouses yet? At least you're still at it. Many others would have given up by now.

 

[Taterman]

Don't give up on the bar chords. Once you get them down it really opens things up for you. In reality, when playing a lot of types of music, every note on the bar chord doesn't have to ring out clearly. Especially if playing rock on an electric guitar.

 

[RC44Mag]

Here's a real good video about Muscle Shoals FAME recording studio with with segments about Phil Spector and his Wall Of Sound. It tells about The Swampers and The Wrecking Crew, along with. many others you'll recognize,including Glen Campbell, at the start of their careers.



Edit: I should have said documentary as it's 1hr. & 42.min. long.

“Now Muscle Shoals has got The Swampers,
And they've been known to pick a song or two, (yes they do)
Lord they get me off so much,
They pick me up when I'm feeling blue, now how bout you?" L.S.

great show, we watched it at the first opportunity.

 

[GasGuzzler]

I have a different way to play F so I can skip the barre chord but it's not much easier and doesn't sound as good.

 

[hittman]

Oh yeah I’ve got callouses on my fretting fingers.
Appreciate all the comments.

 

[Ride1949]

“Now Muscle Shoals has got The Swampers,
And they've been known to pick a song or two, (yes they do)
Lord they get me off so much,
They pick me up when I'm feeling blue, now how bout you?" L.S.

great show, we watched it at the first opportunity.

Damn! Looks like the video is now private. That's a shame. It was a real good one.

 

[hittman]

Transitioning from A to Bm barre chord at 90 BPM is kicking my butt today.
All my respect to the guys and gals who have this part mastered.

 

[hittman]

It’s funny how sometimes the most simple advice from a teacher gives me an “ah ha” moment.
On barre chords I was always late and many times my middle, ring and pinky fingers seems too far away from the fret.
So, I’m late and then need to slide fingers toward the guitar body. Frustrating.
Well DUH …… barre the chord FIRST.
Good Lord …. So simple I didn’t think of it.

 

[gnappi]

Being retired and having the time and money to spend, I’m thinking about an entry level acoustic guitar and some lessons.

There must be a thousand or more guitar brands and styles on the market. My small town only has 1 guitar / music store. They sell Teton brand that have some pretty good reviews on line. Seems this brand has some “entry level” units which is ( I think ) the direction I should go. Nothing used in stock, only 1 left hand model and I am left handed.

Store owner recommended I learn to play LEFTY. Says maybe trying to learn RIGHT handed be nothing more than another obstacle to overcome. He does 30 minute lessons for $20.00.

Ok, let me have it! Your comments and suggestions and ideas will be appreciated.

Welcome to git playing 101. First off let me say that playing "RIGHT" handed is actually "LEFT" handed. Think about it... If you learn to play "righty" and 20 years in for some reason you lose your RIGHT hand. Can you still play music even if your right forearm has a hook attached to it? Yes you can, maybe only chords but you can still make music, that makes the right hand a pick holder.

Now reverse that scenario and you learn to play RIGHTY (left hand on the neck) and you lose your LEFT arm, can you play anything? No, why because the music is in the LEFT hand.

I'm left handed and when I started to play in the 60's that sounded as logical to me then as it does now.

 

[Ride1949]

Good to see you're sticking with it. Many would have given up by now. Keep on rockin'.

 

[hittman]

Oh yeah I’m sticking with it! Hard headed Missourian in me. LOL!

This is a lengthy process to even get “average”, I know that much for sure. There’s SO MUCH to learn.

I still pick up the acoustic a couple times a week but the Tele is for sure the “go to”.

 

[hittman]

Frustrating today.
Pinky finger … 6th string … 10th fret. Quite a reach.

 

[Ride1949]

I've moved on to one of these. The difficulty matches my current skills, but man, can I shred on it!

 

[GasGuzzler]

Traded for a Fender 12-string and gave it to a buddy yesterday. Man was he surprised! Couldn't mess around with it much as it was getting dark and he was headed out to change batteries in his game cameras.

 

[hittman]

Just picked up my Telecaster from getting new strings. He said he lowered the action a bit too.
I’m finally to the point where little things like that are very noticeable to me.

Was a long struggle working on barre chords and I’m still not real good with them.

Can’t believe it’s been a year already. I’m still not bored with it and still practice every day.

 

[Deuzekko]

I kept my calluses by playing even just 10 minutes a day. Running through a few chords or a song helped without feeling like a full practice session.

 

[GasGuzzler]

Just picked up my Telecaster from getting new strings. He said he lowered the action a bit too.

Did I mention the guitar I got that went through a tornado? After getting it all cleaned up and re-strung I decided to order some basic tools and set up the action myself. Lowered the bridge a lot (by percentage) and got the pickups all consistent heights to the strings. Now I am just waiting for my buddy that can actually play it well to try it out for me.

 

[Tensaw]

I have a friend in another state who's made his living playing guitar for the past 30 years. He also suggested I play LEFT handed. So now my trusted friend with experience, the music store owner and the teacher all say LEFT. I'll go with their thoughts at least for now. If I struggle more than some, store owner has RIGHT guitars I can play for free during the lessons.

Store owner said he doesn't care where I get the guitar and I can still get lessons there. Sounds like a stand up guy to me and leaned me to buying the guitar from him ( locally ) too.

Thanks for all the input so far, I appreciate it. We'll see where this goes.

In my 30s I took golf lessons. Instructor said I'd have more power if I'd golf RIGHT handed. I'm so dominate LEFT that I never could get my hips to move in the right ( proper ) direction on the backswing. Even that instructor told me to give it up and continue LEFT.

Making Lefties play right handed golf is old school. If you are left handed play left handed. My son is left handed and he is a good golfer.

 

[JackBull]

My practice for the next week will be:

C - Csus - C - G - C - Am - G - F:\\

Instructor says I'm excelling but I sure don't feel like it. This F chord is gonna take a few days … no doubt about that.
And, I'm still not remembering what you call each chord.

When he says "G" ( or whatever ) I find myself having to stop a moment and think about finger positions. He says to remember back when I started my career …. Nothing was "second nature" but says this will be in due course.

Make sure you learn music theory. I had years of lessons but never learned scales or theory.

 

[MaxMan]

Oscar Schmidt makes reasonably priced decent guitars.