If you are a beginning guitar player, no matter what your age, your main challenge is pressing your fingers down with enough pressure to get a good sound. It’s incredibly frustrating to hear your guitar clanking, buzzing, blipping away while you practice. You may be tempted to just smash your guitar into a million pieces, but hang on, there’s a simple solution.
1.) Slow down.
2.) Make sure you press your fingers down close to the metal fret, and press firmly and HOLD your finger down for a split-second longer.
3.) Use the tips of your fingers.
Concentrate on being accurate, not fast. This will build your muscle memory and will in turn improve your tone.
Much Respect,
The Musician’s Toolbox
You can “learn” a lot on the internet. Seriously, that’s not tongue-in-cheek sarcasm. You can learn a hundred lifetime’s worth of information. This is especially true when it comes to music and learning the guitar, guitar chords, scales, whatever.
However, on a more, philosophical level (metaphysical?), we are humans and we need interaction. And that’s a cliche for a reason. It’s true.
No where in life could this be more true than in music. You need to get out there and experience music with other people. Take some music lessons, ask around your neighborhood, your apartment complex, whatever, go find people that enjoy what you enjoy. Not on Twitter, not on Facebook, not on YouTube, but in the flesh. Learn from other people face to face.
It’s this combination, learning stuff on the internet for free, or for a few bucks, and then going and applying what you’ve learned in real life that will give you real satisfaction.
Much Respect,
The Musician’s Toolbox
I’ve been working on a workbook and curriculum to accompany the Learn Guitar Chords DVD. Home school families and charter schools will be able to use the workbook as a resource for learning, applying, and testing the knowledge from the DVD.
I expect it to be finished within the month, and it will feature high quality photos and graphics like the DVD. It will be available for purchase along with the DVD for a reasonable price, probably no more than $10.00.
Andrew Wonacott, President
I know, it sounds like I’m just being really profound. Like I’m a ninja, or perhaps a little green dude with large ears and a propensity to fight with light sabers. But, no, actually this has everything to do with music.
Slow down your practicing (using a metronome of course) and make sure that you can play the part you’re working on without having to think about it too hard. When it becomes second nature, THEN you can speed up.
The more consistently you practice purposefully and slowly, the faster you’ll get faster. Therefore:
Slower equals faster.
May the metronome be with you, always.
The Musician’s Toolbox
Its not too difficult to slow down a song so that you can play along with it. There is plenty of software out there that will do the job.
That way, if there’s a part of the song that’s just too fast, you can slow the song down to, say, 70% of the normal speed and then work your way up.
You might want to try the “Amazing Slow Downer” or just google slow down audio.
Much Respect,
The Musician’s Toolbox
