subject: Learning Guitar – Some Basic Advice for Beginners [print this page] Youve decided to learn guitarYouve decided to learn guitar. Youve picked one up, stringed it up and are ready to start where every beginner starts with Smoke on the Water! Hold on, now. Before you get carried away, lets talk about some rather bland but incredibly important practical things to keep in mind when playing.
Playing the guitar should not be something that invokes pain. The bad news is it can. This is particularly true for beginners. Why? Those of us who play call it the hunch. Beginners tend to hunch over the guitar to look at their strumming action and fret play. This is the road to ruin. If you want to know how your body will feel at 70 years old, just keep playing like this!
There is proper posture when it comes to playing. First, you should sit on a chair with no arms. Second, you should scoot to the back till your rear end and back is flat against the chair. To really make it work, get something you can rest the foot closest to the neck of the guitar so that it is propped up in the air. Now you can play without doing undo damage to your back.
Okay, I have to now admit that I lied a couple of paragraphs back. If you are serious about playing guitar, there is going to be pain. The good news is it will only last for a short while. The pain will be in your finger tips. Most people play metal strings. When you press on the strings in the various fret positions, it is your skin rubbing against metal. Guess which one is going to win? Right, the metal. Is there anything you can do about this? Yes and no. Some people put super glue on their finger tips or other substances that will save the skin. In truth, most just bit the bullet and wait for calluses to develop. Once you have calluses, you can jam for hours on end without any pain.
Playing guitar is something youll really enjoy. Develop calluses and play with the right posture to ensure pain doesnt limit that joy.
