Educate me- adult beginner acoustic guitar

[3ChordTruth]

Congratulations on that beautiful Taylor guitar Bill. There are lots of great tunes in that nice Taylor just waiting for you to play them. I understand the folks saying keep your guitar out on a stand so you will play it more, and in most locations they are right. But in a 20% humidity Montana home you will have a much happier Taylor if you keep it in its case with that humidifier. Just leave both out in a place easy for you to grab your new guitar and make some music. Let us know your progress, good luck!

[Bill]

We got used to the low humidity. Old wood chairs need to be re-glued occasionally (maybe I just weigh more) and your hands/nails need Vaseline or hand creme rubbed in when they dry out.

Certainly not your typical Texas weather.


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[Bill]

Educate me- adult beginner acoustic guitar

It’s a couple weeks now and I’m not progressing through the online lessons as fast as I hoped.

I don’t want to move forward until I have some basic chords mastered and memorized. Frustrating.

I’m finding a tremendous amount of strain in my left wrist- I’ve even started wrist stretches I found on a YouTube for guitar players.

The other problem is although I do not have large hands- I touch the adjacent open strings and get a buzzing.

For example, here’s my hand while playing A minor. I just can’t get my hand positioned to not interfere with the open 1 string (E). I can’t flex my wrist any more without pain to get finger tips on the strings.

What am I doing wrong?




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[WyoBull]

My concern with leaving it on the stand is our house is 20% relative humanity. I bought a humidifier that goes between the D and G strings when it’s cased. Taylor’s warranty excludes humidity caused cracks in the wood.

It’s part of living in Montana a dry area at 5k+ elevation I guess.




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I grew up here in Wyoming and have a lot of friends who play guitar. I have never seen any of them use a humidifier.

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[Olphart]

Bill, you need to curl your fingers where the tips are on the strings, not the bottom, fleshy parts. Make those fingers hurt!

[Bill]

Thanks let me try that.


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[JTRichardson]

It’s a couple weeks now and I’m not progressing through the online lessons as fast as I hoped.

I don’t want to move forward until I have some basic chords mastered and memorized. Frustrating.

I’m finding a tremendous amount of strain in my left wrist- I’ve even started wrist stretches I found on a YouTube for guitar players.

The other problem is although I do not have large hands- I touch the adjacent open strings and get a buzzing.

For example, here’s my hand while playing A minor. I just can’t get my hand positioned to not interfere with the open 1 string (E). I can’t flex my wrist any more without pain to get finger tips on the strings.

What am I doing wrong?




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Fingertips my man, not the fatty part of the end of your finger.

Also, that thumb needs to be behind the neck, not at the top, should lessen the strain on your wrist. Doesn’t always apply, but is a good rule of thumb (haha)

Once you get more comfortable with the motions and chords your thumb can go anywhere.

[Shane]

What they said about hand position ^^

You don't want your whole palm touching against the back of the neck. And don't leave fingerprints on the fretboard. Use your fingertips to press the strings.

Like this.....

Am





E





G





C





D





F





Bm

[Shane]

Whenever you get to the bar chords like F and Bm, notice that F is the same as E - just with your index finger laying across (barring) all 6 strings behind the E chord shape that the rest of your fingers are making one fret up the neck from E. ("Up" = closer to the bridge. "Down" = closer to the nut/headstock.)

Same thing for Bm. It's the same as Am, with the index finger barring the first 5 strings (omit the top string) and played 2 frets up from Am position.

Once you get comfortable with bar chords, you can play them anywhere on the neck. E becomes F when you bar the 1st fret. Slide it up to the 2nd fret and it's F#. Slide it up to the 3rd fret and it's G. 5th fret = A. 7th fret = B. 8th fret = C. 10th fret = D. 12th fret and you're back to E, just an octave higher than down where you started.

Bm at the 2nd fret. Slide it up to 3rd and it's Cm. 5th = Dm, etc....

[Bill]

Thanks again


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[chancito1]

Tonight, starting to strum.




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Man that’s a nice guitar

[Bill]

Thank you, it sure is pretty.


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[3ChordTruth]

Bill, good advice here about forming those chords, you will pick it up OK, just keep practicing. Speaking of picking, I play lead guitar so I want to encourage you to also get that right hand used to picking strings individually, not just “strumming” all the strings together playing rhythm chords. It’s really easy to do this, just “slow” your chord strum down to let individual strings ring out. In your guitar lessons you might see this referred to as “arpeggio”, just a fancy way musicians mean playing the chord notes individually rather than together. That is the basis of learning to play lead or playing the melody of a song. Last tip for today, you will see improvement quicker with 15 minutes of playing your guitar EVERY day, rather than playing 1 ½ hours on a weekend. Really cool to follow your progress as a guitar player, good luck.

[ThisLadyHunts]

I’m so impressed! You did it. You really went out and did it!

[3ChordTruth]

I’m so impressed! You did it. You really went out and did it!

Lady, I hope you are still interested in joining the picking and grinning ranks like our new recruit Bill, so go grab that ukulele I suggested and join the party!