Beginner Guitar Lessons – Where To Start
Anyone who is beginning guitar lessons will first need to decide which type of lessons are best for them. All types of guitar lessons have their pros and cons, and the best choice for you will depend on things like your budget, lifestyle, musical ambitions and preferred learning styles. This article takes a look at the options available for those wanting to learn to play the guitar.
Types of Guitar Lessons
Guitar lessons fall into three basic categories: lessons with a private teacher (either individually or as part of a group); learning from a tutor book/DVD; or following a course of online guitar lessons. Let’s have a look at what each of these involve.
1. Guitar Lessons With a Private teacher
Many people who take up the guitar often look to private lessons as the most obvious way to go. And for good reason too – personal guidance from a skilled professional can give you the best possible start to your guitar playing journey. However, this is not always the best choice for everyone. On the plus side, private guitar lessons are great for those who want or need one to one attention, and it’s certainly very useful to have a knowledgable guitarist available who can answer questions and demonstrate the correct techniques in person. Private lessons are also especially valuable if you want to learn the more formal styles of guitar playing, such as classical or flamenco guitar.
On the downside, private lessons can be pricey (good teachers typically charge $30 an hour or more), and they’re also more time consuming if you need to travel to the teacher’s house or studio for your lessons (there are a few guitar teachers who do home visits). You also need to schedule your lessons at a mutually convenient time (which isn’t always easy), and there’s also the question of finding a suitable teacher to begin with, who teaches the style you want to learn, and who is a good fit for you, personality-wise. Another issue is that some people find it difficult to play in front of a teacher, although this self-consciousness generally fades as you get to know them. But even if you don’t want to take lessons long term, just having a teacher show you the absolute basics can be worthwhile.
2. Guitar Tutor Books/CDs/DVDs
Many people who decide that private lessons aren’t for them instead opt to start learning guitar from the comfort of their own home. A popular way of doing this is to teach yourself with the aid of beginner guitar lesson books, DVDs and CDs. This approach lets you learn at your own pace, and there’s no-one looking over your shoulder to put you off. It’s also a cheap way to learn – great for those on a budget – and you can find books, DVDs etc that cover pretty much all guitar playing styles, which is especially good if you live in an area where there aren’t any teachers of the style(s) you’re interested in. Guitar DVDs can be especially good, as they demonstrate the correct way to perform each technique, and you can also watch each segment over and over again, until you’ve fully grasped it.
This isn’t the best way to learn to play guitar for everyone though. For one thing, the quality of guitar book/DVD courses is very variable, and it can be hard to figure out exactly what you’re meant to be doing if you’re relaying on static descriptions and photos/diagrams in a book (or a badly produced DVD). Some books are also pretty dated in terms of the learning material they use, and you also need to be very self-motivated, and be able to keep going without encouragement from anyone else, which can be challenging when you hit a rough patch. DVDs can also be frustrating to navigate, especially when you want to refer back to a specific part of the material.
3. Online Guitar Lesson Courses
The third option for beginner guitar lessons is to go online. You’ll find hundreds of sites offering guitar tuition, either for free, or for a fee. In fact, the choice can be overwhelming, and the quality varies hugely between sites (though in general, you get what you pay for). A good course of online guitar lessons gives you many of the advantages of both book learning and a private teacher. As with books, you can learn at home at your own pace, and for a very reasonable price (most complete online courses are cheaper than a few lessons with a teacher). You also get to tap the expertise of skilled guitarists (the best courses are produced by professional guitarists who are also teachers). The advantage that online lessons offer over books or DVDs is that they are typically presented in a multi-media format, with text, video, audio and software combining to provide an effective and enjoyable learning experience from which people with different learning styles can benefit. Many web-based guitar lessons are available to download, so you can access them any time, without needing to be online.
Personally, I think that if private lessons aren’t an option for whatever reason, online lessons are the best choice. They’re not perfect – as with books, you need to be very self-motivated if you’re going to stick with it, and you obviously need a computer with internet access. You also need to be diligent about maintaining a good playing position and not falling into sloppy habits. Plus you need to sort the wheat from the chaff, and avoid the poor quality sites – I recommend checking out Jamorama (see my Jamorama review). You can also find a large list of guitar courses and other online resources in the Guitar Lessons & Training Directory, or read more about learning guitar online in Why Choose Online Guitar Lessons?
Whichever option you select, beginning guitar lessons is something that you won’t regret, as the guitar is such a great instrument to learn!
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Jamorama's multimedia guitar lessons make it easy to learn guitar from the comfort of your own home.
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