Hello!
How much time do you recommend on each lesson. ? I'm having difficulty with the chords and transitions. [br]I have steel strings which are painful! Will it get easier? Also am I supposed to put my fingers close to the frets? She doesn't mention that.
I have tuned my guitar ( acoustic Martin) but doesn't sound exactly like Lisa's ? !!
Only been practicing three days . One hour each day. [br]I really want to learn but it's difficult!!![br]thank you for your time!
Hello Katie,
Welcome !
I`m sure you`ll be hearing from others far more experienced than me ( halfway through acoustic 1) but figured I could give you some tips and encouragement from my perspective.
1) It will be a bit painful until the calluses form. That takes a few weeks. When your guitar store reopens, you may want to have the action lowered and possibly either substitute a smaller guage string or maybe nylon if things don`t get better after a few weeks.
2) Yes, place your fingers just behind the frets for best sound.
3) As for time on each lesson, of course that can vary greatly for each person as well as different lessons. My guage for permitting myself to go to the next lesson was if I was able to fully grasp the concepts in the lesson and to be able to play the song tutorial pretty well at least 80% of the time. An hour per day is probably plenty enough for now until the calluses form and your fingers and hands strengthen.
Again, I`ve only been playing for about 3 months. Hope this helps.
Katie, make the guitar as easy to play as you can. Some pompass ass will take exception at this comment and call me girlish, but when I started at age 55, I put 9 gauge electric strings on my acoustic because my fingers hurt! I am now doing just fine over a year later and I no longer run 9 gauge strings on that guitar. And the best news of all is my manhood remains intact.
Your fingers will still need to toughen up, but why not make it easy on yourself. Regular practice is important, if you can do an hour each day, great. If not do what you can but do it regularly.
Good luck
This year the diet is definitely gonna stick!
Thank you so much for all these great suggestions. [br]I need to keep going, stop whining and practice!
Also need to go slower and focus on each task .
Exactly right, Katie! Also do be careful not to try to do too much too soon. You are really eager to learn as fast as you can, but until those calluses develop and your fingers build strength and endurance you can hurt yourself and then you will have to take a break and heal up. A solid hour at a time sounds like a lot to me for starting out, but you may be doing that hour spread into two or three shorter sessions. [br][br]
You asked how long you should spend on a lesson. Most of the people who have answered this question say they stay on a lesson until they understand the skills being taught in the lesson and are able to execute the skills at maybe 70%, then move along to the next lesson. You don't need to stay on a lesson until you have absolutely mastered it. Keep in mind that the skills do build on each other, so as you move forward, you will continue to practice everything that came before. If you realize that you are struggling with a lesson because you have not gotten something from a previous lesson, you can and should go back and work on it a little more. You've paid your money, so those lessons will be right there for ya to review as many times as you need. Personally, I loop back to previous lessons frequently. It is very satisfying to go back and compare how well I am able to execute something that I know was really challenging a few weeks (or even days) ago. It is a little confidence booster for me when I start to question whether I am really getting better at this or if I am just wasting my time.
Good luck, and I hope you keep the excitement and the joy of learning as you settle into a regular routine.
Dave...
It takes as long as it takes unless you quit - then it takes forever and you will never get there.
