Playing A Melody

Questions & Answers

9 months ago

everytime i lift my finger up from the guitar to switch frets it makes sort of a buzzing sound, how do i prevent that sound during the transitions

Josh Workman 9 months ago

Hi, this will become less noticeable as you become proficient on the guitar. That said, there is a certain amount of squeakiness about the guitar that is normal and expected.

9 months ago

In this video, you played a melody. What is a melody? And I don't know how to read chart music. Would that affect my guitar learning?

Josh Workman 9 months ago

That is a very good question! Here is one definition: "The two basic elements of music that define melody are pitch and rhythm. Melody is a succession of pitches in rhythm. The melody is usually the most memorable aspect of a song, the one the listener remembers and is able to perform." If you sing "Mary Had a Little Lamb," the words are the lyrics and the pitches and rhythms comprise the melody. Learning to read actual musical notation can help you better understand what is happening in any given song much more than TAB alone. I can't say for sure how it will affect your learning. That depends on your own innate sense of pitch, rhythm, form, etc... Written notation makes all that very obvious.

1 year ago

So I'm left handed would that affect the way I hold the guitar.

Josh Workman 1 year ago

Hi, the two most common choices would be to 1. simply learn the guitar right-handed or 2. buy a left-handed guitar/modify a right-handed guitar and play it upside down (what Jimi Hendrix did). Either way it's literally a mirror image of what you see in the Guitar Tricks videos. A third, less popular option would be to take a right-handed guitar and just flip it upside down (as-is), so that the treble strings are pointing up to the ceiling, instead of the bass strings.