How should I learn to play the guitar?

Question

My sister has this acoustic guitar sitting around collecting that she never plays. It's not super nice, but I'd like to learn to play it. I played violin for four years and was good at that, so I figure it shouldn't be extremely hard. I want to teach myself. Any advice?

Answer 1

^ like he said. go to a guitar shop or a website like guitar center and search for tablature books of your favorite band. these books will not only show you the frets you need to play but in the intro of the book it will explain what the symbols mean but it will tell you how to perform techniques like hammer-ons and pull-offs, slides, bends, and all that good stuff.

they are usually around 20 dollars and will have all the songs from a certain album so that you can master 10 or more songs with one book.

Answer 2

I am going to make an exception.  I always say "Get a Teacher"

Go to the music store and get a book on learning to play CLASSICAL guitar. Since you already learned to read music and on a string instrument much of the reading skills are the same.

Forget the shaping of finger nails that the classical ask you to do.

After you can get through a book or two look for books on acoustic guitar and learn from them. There are also lots of web sites with material at that stage. I am betting you will do pretty well very fast.

I am not discouraging getting a teacher, and if you struggle, get one.

Enjoy the playing, it is a great 1st or 2nd instrument

Answer 3

You can use this site while you are learning. ..  http://virtualguitar.net

It helps me!

Answer 4

first you need to buy a guitar tuner. you can't play it when its not in tune.

try ultimate-guitar.com. it helped me alot. also learn chords from chordbook.com

make sure to build up the calasis in you fingers. and don't stop playing when your fingers hurt. that's good. my fingers were sore for days before they finally got used to it.

good luck :)

and remember, it won't be easy.

email me for more stuff/questions. i've been playing for a while and i have an awesome guitar teacher that could also help. he's been playing for 24 years.

Answer 5

get some tab books and learn the songs you want to.  it's fun...your new instrument has frets so it should be cake and you've got good theory grounding i assume.  so just learn which notes are which on the guitar and transpose it and speed it up.  

Answer 6

Start with chords so that you can play songs right away.

Learn these first position chords (you can find them in any cheap chord book):

G - Em - Am - C - D7

Practice 4 strums each and try to switch "on the 1 beat." Keep practicing until you can switch smoothly between all the chords. Leave fingers fretted whenever possible.

Then go to the library and look at old guitar magazines or books and learn a song that has some or all of those chords in it. Believe it or not, but you can play a lot of songs with those 5 chords.

Good stuff to start with would be Bob Dylan, Beatles, Nirvana, Green Day, etc.

Answer 7

First, If you need to change the strings, do so. 2nd, get a tuner, or online tuner (youtube etc etc), Learn basic chords, G,D,C,F etc. And learn how to strum, plucking,sing along with plucking/strum. After you master those, try to cover simple songs, such Pearl Jam - Last Kiss. :)

Good Luck.