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It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

adamharkus.com

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Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#131

Post by johnohara »

cousin_it wrote: post #6

Warning! If you're middle-aged and thinking of picking up the guitar, you should realize that the public image of guitarists has shifted from "sexy gods" to "annoying hobos" sometime in the last two decades. If you are at least partly motivated by popularity (and who isn't), maybe pick another hobby that actually helps people be popular now, not in your imagined past. So in a sense, yes, it is sometimes too late :-(

Far from annoying, I am reminded of Seasick Steve.

href='https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a33sB3ck28A'

Edit: url

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#132

Post by Inception »

fhood wrote: post #73
Inception wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate on the bad habits starting out on an acoustic teaches?

Sure, the one I was thinking about is a tendency to strum really really hard, and you would think this would be an easy habit to break, but it is surprisingly difficult.

Thank you. I've been debating trying to learn guitar and this is helpful information if I decide to learn on acoustic.

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#133

Post by jasode »

DanHulton wrote: post #63
beat wrote: post #41

As someone who has been playing for 35 years or so, here are some observations... First and foremost, guitar is a pretty straightforward instrument for beginners. There's a reason it's the most popular instrument in the world. If you put in the effort, you can be playing something musical in a few months, and proficient in basic folk/rock music in a couple of years. It doesn't take "talent". It just takes effort. Som…

What is involved in getting your guitar "set up" anyway? I'm looking to get back into learning the guitar I bought a few years ago, and I mean it sounded fine to me when I brought it out to check on it, after a tuning, of course.

For acoustic guitars, "set up" mostly means turning the truss rod to adjust the curvature/straightness of the neck. Some people adjust it once as "set & forget" while others might change it twice a year (adjust in the summer counteract higher humidity and again in the winter to compensate for lower humidity).

Acoustic set up can also include filing down the nut slots to make it easier to fret. The issue is that a mistake is not as easy to reverse as a truss rod adjustment. If one is not willing to do a DIY nut replacement[1], you'd have to pay a repair shop ~$100 to fix the mistake. Same pitfalls can happen if one tries to polish frets with steel wool and gets over aggressive causing unwanted buzzing.

Electric guitars set up will include individual string intonation, string heights, tension on springs if it's a floating whammy bar, pickup height, etc. It has more hardware machinery to tweak.

https://www.google.com/search?q=acoustic+guitar+nut+replacem...

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#134

Post by Tycho »

lambdas wrote: post #127
Tycho wrote: post #35

Here's something I wish I'd realized when I first started playing. If you know the right set of chords you can play them in basically any order and they'll sound nice. If you take scale like C major, there's a chord that goes with every note of the scale. On a piano this would be mean playing three note chords on the white keys only, all the way up. So for the key of C that gives you C_major D_minor E_minor F_major G…

Tycho as in the Scott Hansen Tycho? If it is then I would like to say four years ago I listened to your music in a depressed slump, a week later I picked up the guitar and never looked back. Either which way, that's some good advice and as a beginner it's hard to realise these things if you're self learning. Scales can feel like a practice routine rather than a palette.

Not Scott Hansen Tycho, although I'll need to check out his music now that you mention it.

Theory can be very dry and confusing and frankly off-putting, but the above I think is something anyone can absorb and then start using. If you play chords from that set you can sing and make up a tune with the comfort that any of those chords is going to be a good option to play next, so it's very liberating and you can quickly try different things.

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#135

Post by mcrad »

tarr11 wrote: post #50

I learned to play guitar as a kid, played some classical and jazz as a teenager and in my twenties, then put it down. I have a nice classical guitar sitting in my closet for a decade. My problem is that although I can read music, understand some theory, can play chords and even some can play a little bit of complex music like Villa Lobos, I have absolutely no "ear". I can't even tune the guitar without help. So this…

Try singing the melodies while playing. I never really wanted to be a "singer" but found that practicing voice has improved my ear and more intuitive side of the instrument.

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#136

Post by beat »

flavio81 wrote: post #123
beat wrote: post #41

As someone who has been playing for 35 years or so, here are some observations... First and foremost, guitar is a pretty straightforward instrument for beginners. There's a reason it's the most popular instrument in the world. If you put in the effort, you can be playing something musical in a few months, and proficient in basic folk/rock music in a couple of years. It doesn't take "talent". It just takes effort. Som…

> First and foremost, guitar is a pretty straightforward instrument for beginners. I agree with your assessment and comments! I play drums, guitar, keyboard and some bass. Guitar is the easiest by far. From the list, drums is the hardest. With regards to technique, bass is straightforward if you know how to play guitar; however the mindset or approach to bass playing within a band is way different than guitar's. > Th…

Drums are hard! I occasionally noodle at them, but I'm a crap drummer.

My favorite hard, hard instrument is the tambourine. It's amazing something so small and simple can present such challenges, but it does. And played well, it's extremely expressive.

The only instrument that ever actually defeated me was pedal steel guitar. I quit and sold it. Becoming an accomplished player on pedal steel would have taken about three years as my primary instrument, in bands so I could get lots of stage time. This, after decades of guitar! On the other hand, there are things that can be played on pedal steel that cannot be played on any other instrument! The ability to change a chord to another chord by bending the pitches of some, but not all of the notes - wow. It's glorious.

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#137

Post by trgn »

mattparlane wrote: post #30

If you are interested in learning /music/ and not just learning the /guitar/, I would strongly encourage you to start on the piano. I started on the piano and moved to the guitar later, and I've now realised that the piano gives you such a good musical grounding, so much better than the guitar can. There's nothing quite like having it all laid out in front of you. It's the only way that things like sharps and flats m…

Yes and no imho. The piano is a beast of an instrument. It's an accommodating instrument to play something fairly simple fairly fast, but then there's an enormous wall to climb up on. It's really difficult to be a good self-taught piano player, the learning curve is steep beyond the basics.

Also, playing beginner piano doesn't practice your hearing as much as a stringed or wind instrument. I think it's important for beginners to learn to listen to what they play and adjust their intonation accordingly. Guitar, even though fretted, really does requires players to listen intently to pitch and tone from day one.

I'd say music theory and harmony - broadly speaking - makes more sense on a guitar, than it does on a piano. Solfege, yes, that does make more sense on a piano, but imo most amateur musicians really don't care about that particular approach to music education. And for rock&roll and country/blues, it's really not all that important either.

Apart from all that, yes, of course, piano is an amazing instrument, but much harder than guitar in the mid to long run.

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#138

Post by otterpro »

H1Supreme wrote: post #80

Here's my $0.02: Learn barre chords straight away. Don't waste your time learning all the open chord songs you can before you jump in. Jump right into it. Open chords will be easy down the road. Training your hand to barre strings with one finger, while moving the rest independently, is the most challenging, and the most rewarding thing to learn. It opens up so many doors to your playing.

Wow, I wish I had known before I started learning. Moving up and down the fret with barre chord is cool and easy once it is mastered. However, Barre chord is also the hard to learn to play, requiring a lot of finger contortion, and also probably most painful for players as the finger presses down on all 6 strings. A lot of beginners either skip or avoid barre like the plague. I've found that it is easier to do barre on either light string and/or electric guitar.

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#139

Post by beat »

SyneRyder wrote: post #103
devwastaken wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The big thing that's been driving me away from learning is the necessary hardware/Software to create the tones I want. Rather than folk/rock, I'd like something like the ghostly effect of https://youtu.be/mP194XwD2Wc . But audio hardware is expensive and isn't something I can directly research. I made a little jump a month ago and got a condensor mic and a Scarlett Solo mixer, which can do both XLR mic and 1/4 Jack f…

I looked through the YouTube comments on that one, and someone tracked down an interview where he describes his setup: http://www.metalsucks.net/2011/10/07/rigged-devin-townsends-... Though at the very end, he says: "At home, I use a Blues Jr. and a delay pedal. :)" In terms of software, I'm not sure if reverb VSTs will help for that sound, but I've heard rave reviews for the Valhalla Vintage Verb (and Room Verb). Th…

I've been using Valhalla reverbs for recording for years now. I started with Valhalla Room, but mostly use Valhalla Plate now. The sound and simplicity are huge wins.

Re: It's Never Too Late to Learn Guitar

#140

Post by flavio81 »

beat wrote: post #136
flavio81 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> First and foremost, guitar is a pretty straightforward instrument for beginners. I agree with your assessment and comments! I play drums, guitar, keyboard and some bass. Guitar is the easiest by far. From the list, drums is the hardest. With regards to technique, bass is straightforward if you know how to play guitar; however the mindset or approach to bass playing within a band is way different than guitar's. > Th…

Drums are hard! I occasionally noodle at them, but I'm a crap drummer. My favorite hard, hard instrument is the tambourine. It's amazing something so small and simple can present such challenges, but it does. And played well, it's extremely expressive. The only instrument that ever actually defeated me was pedal steel guitar. I quit and sold it. Becoming an accomplished player on pedal steel would have taken about th…

> My favorite hard, hard instrument is the tambourine. It's amazing something so small and simple can present such challenges, but it does. And played well, it's extremely expressive.

There's the brazilian "pandeiro"; it's amazing. I've seen some demostrations of skilled pandeiro players and they can sort-of emulate a full drumset with that toy-like instrument.

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