The guitar is a stringed instrument. Learn to play the guitar can really be tiresome. It may even take years for perfection. You need to perfect a lot of skills and techniques to become a good guitarist. Well here is your Beginner’s guide.
Well for the beginners there are two types of acoustic guitar you may start with a steel-string acoustic guitar or a nylon-string acoustic guitar. Nylon string guitar is usually used in classical and Spanish style music. You don’t use a guitar pick with a nylon string guitar. In the coming section, I will teach you how can you play the guitar.
Handling the guitar
Well, to play the guitar, first of all, you need a chair without armrest. You can place the guitar on your lap. This position will provide you complete access to the freat-board.
Guitar Anatomy
Strings
Well, we will be discussing the 6 string guitar. Each string has a specific name. Starting from the top it goes like this E A D G B e. Moreover, the name of the strings may change when you tune your different other than standard tuning. We will discuss the tuning in the later section.
Fretboard
The neck of the guitar is called a fretboard. Music is all about playing the right notes and these notes are present on the entire fretboard. Each fret has a specific note and it runs throughout the board. On the single string whole scale is covered. Moreover, chords are also played by pressing certain notes.
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Learn to Play – A beginner’s guitar guide.
Tuning
Tuning is one of the most important things. Without it, you will never be able to learn to play good music. Moreover, it will sound better when your guitar is in tune. There are many types of tuning including Standard, Drop D, DADGAD, etc. As a beginner, I recommend your guitar tune your guitar on standard tuning. The standard tuning is EADGBe. You can simply purchase a tuner they are readily available in the market. Moreover, it may cost you around 1500 PKR. You can also tune your guitar with mobile applications. There are a number of applications on Google Play and App store. Simply download those applications and tune your guitar.
Handle a Pick
The pick is a small thing made of plastic. It is used to play guitar. In addition to this, you can also play without it i.e. using your fingers but It is better to use a pick in the beginning. Furthermore, they are available in the market in different sizes ranging from thin to thick. Choose the pick that suits you. Moreover, thin picks are usually used for strumming and thick are used for solos.
Rhythms & Strumming
Well, it is basically the movement of a hand in an upward and downward direction. You may simply start to strum the guitar in upward about 3 to 4 times and then downward 3 to 4 times. Furthermore, keep on counting while strumming. For example, if you strum four-time down and 4 times up. Say it like this Down, Down, Down, Down and Up, Up, Up, Up. This will help you to keep track of what you are playing. When you perfect this skill try other rhythms like Down, Down, Up, Up, Down or Down, Down, Up, Down, Up, Down, Down. After that try it on the chords.
All you need to know about Chords
Well in music, the chords are the combination of two or three notes. They can be played on the guitar and on the piano as well. Basically, there are two major types of chords which include Major Chords and Minor Chords. There are other chords as well including Seventh, Sixth, Suspended, Diminished, slash and triad. As a beginner, you should start with major and minor chords. You can easily find them on the internet. Well Open this website and you can find them here as well. Moreover, you can try strum different chords as mentioned earlier.
Guitar Techniques
After strumming the next thing you should learn are the techniques. It includes pull off and hammer on. In pull off, you simply play a note and then pick your finger up. You can see in this video. Similarly, on the other hand, you can do a hammer on. In this technique, you place a finger on the note then play it. After that, you tap on another note just like you use a hammer. You can learn from this video. Other techniques like legatos can be played with a hammer on and pull off. There is another technique you should learn it is called string bend. You simply bend the string up or down, this will give a great sound. You should watch this video to learn it. It can be used alternative to hammers on and pull off. 
Solos
Solos are usually played in the middle of the song. They are usually a single picked note. Playing and making solo in music is an art. You need a lot of creativity, practice and music sense to make a single solo. Well, scales may help you to make the solo. just like chords, there are major scale, minor scale, diminished scale, harmonic minor scale, etc. Each of them starts with a root note and followed by other notes. The guitarist also uses sweeping, legatos, and shredding techniques.
Music improvisation
After learning all the techniques, you can now improvise your own music. However, you do require to learn different scales. A simple practice that I use to do was that I play a piece of backing track music on youtube on any scale. After that, I try to find all the possible notes on the fretboard you can find the scale diagrams on the internet. Keep on playing different notes on the same scale. In this way, you can also improvise your own music
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