Which acoustic guitar?

I am just beginning. I have an old nylon string classical guitar. As a brand new guitar player I would like to know what guitar would serve me best to create better habits in the long run. I have looked at steel string acoustic guitars and find the main differentiator between that choice and my classical seem is

1) The classical has a wider neck

2) It doesn't have the fret markers that a typical acoustic guitar has.

3) I like the sound of the nylon strings over the steel strings, but my only concern here is whether the feel of one over the other will teach me better habits.

So,specificaly with the end goal of creating better habits with an ultimate ability to play any type of guitar when I am more experienced, what type of guitar is best to learn on?

Thanks for any feedback!!

Hi ron90265,

A nylon acoustic guitar might serve as a crutch overall since the strings are much softer. Nylons do sound really great and the classical guitar shape is wider, which helps stretch out your hand.

If you want to ultimately play any type of guitar, I suggest finding a nice acoustic, steel-stringed guitar since a lot of guitars used in contemporary music and even classic pop music (Elvis, Dylan, The Beatles, etc) from the 50's until now use a steel-stringed guitar.

I recommend Taylor's Academy acoustic guitars because they sound fantastic and if you need, comes with some essential electronics depending on the model.

That's my 2 cents!

- Billy

Thanks Billy. That was helpful. If I go to a Taylor acoustic, do you think it’s more difficult to go to the wider neck classical later? I’m almost wondering if steel strings on the wide classical neck wouldn’t be the best for building fundamental habits.

After going to a few guitar stores and also borrowing my friends 1960's Gibson acoustic to try, I decided I really like the nylon string sound. Truthfully I am not sure what kind of music I will most want to play later. I just love that sound.

I ended up with an Ibanez GA35 Thinline. I decided that the thin body will allow me to see the frets better while learning how things work and where they are. It also has fret markers, which a lot of nylons seem to not have. It's certainly not my last guitar, but we will see how it does for this step of learning.

Thanks for your input Billy!

I have been playing a classical guitar for about 8 months. Prior to that I had been playing steelstring accoustic and electric. I was having problems with extreme wrist pain, and bought the classical just to be able to play due to the lower string tension. Love the Yamaha, wrist pain gone- but when I try my accoustic I feel it coming back. I just saw the [br]GA35 and the neck feels fanatastic to me. Narrower side to side but thicker the other way. I will be buying this for sure. In researching this type of cross over guitar, someone had said the strings can hit the fretting fingers when getting rambunctous. I am a beginner yet, love playing cool sounding chord progressions, learning easy songs, exploring sounds. Just googled Spanish chord progressions and having fun with those.

For me, I think the GA35 will be a great fit and the electric part may work better for the open mics I hope to get into. Good luck and keep at it!!