An acoustic guitar is a wooden instrument that’s shaped like the number eight and has a hole at its middle part. Often mistaken as a classical guitar, an acoustic guitar is hollow and is composed of six strings made of steel. These strings, when struck, produce sound.
Enough of the slight introduction. That just gave you the idea of what an acoustic guitar looks like and what is its purpose. Enumerated in lessons are steps on how to play an acoustic guitar successfully without the thought of giving up that easily.
1. Before starting, be sure you have a guitar. Acoustic guitar to be precise. It doesn’t matter if its old or new for as long as its acoustic.
2. Choose the best website that can provide you with all the options on the how and what of handling a guitar. There are tons of websites designed to offer a great amount of resources and knowledge regarding instruments. Catching up those sites can also provide free online lessons.
3. Have an idea on whom to patronize. Some musicians play for the sake of popularity while some play for an artist’s sake. Choose someone who plays for good music. Artists like John Mayer are most popular on this category. Remind yourself that acoustic guitars aren’t exclusively for the mellow ones but for all sort of music.
4. Memorize the physical parts of your guitar. Remember every angle and functions built with it. Understand how they produce such sounds and how it turns out bad. You might think this isn’t vital. But fact is, this is one of the most important things you should remember when handling and playing an acoustic guitar.
5. Learn the basic chords first. Aside from that, learn the different ways to play those chords. Example, C has more than 6 different hand positions. This will add more flexibility on your hands when moving from one fret to another.
6. Master your chords by not looking at them every once in a while. Practice the muscles of your hand while talking to someone or listening to the radio. The purpose of multitasking is to help you avoid looking more often on your hands while playing. This is a good strategy for easier retention of the different chords and to make your hands familiarize itself with the different frets.
7. Practice at least 5 days a week for at least two to three hours. If you’re really itching to be on the pedestal, learn to be patient. Everyone has to start somewhere. And that somewhere is from the very basic. Apart from that, practicing daily entails proper body mechanics. Meaning you have to learn to position your body in a manner that won’t strain your muscles and body parts.
8. Build up those callous on the tip of your fingers. This is painful, very. But as you go on with your lesson you’ll realize that calluses are with good use. Calluses make your fingers numb. Thus, making it easier for you to play.
9. Upon learning the easy part, put extra effort on learning the hard parts of the chords. Barre chords are considered the most difficult part of playing an acoustic guitar. Most beginners skip it. Word of advice, don’t.
10. Rest. Don’t exhaust yourself if you can no longer go on. Do it the next day. Remember, learning doesn’t have to be an obligation but a right. It has to be slow but accurate.
