Question. When I play chords I always touch the strings that I should be playing open. How can I avoid this?

Answer. Touching the wrong strings when you play chords is a common problem that many beginners face when learning the guitar. Today we will look at some simple solutions.

1. Try and press your fingers straight down. Your finger should be at a 90 degree angle with the string. This means that only the tip of your finger should be connecting with string.

2. Are your fingernails short? If your fingernails are long, your fingertip will not be able to sit on the string and your fingers will touch the other strings on the guitar.

3. Place your thumb directly on the back of the neck of your guitar. This puts your hand in a good position to keep your fingers clear of the wrong strings.

4. Practice with chords you find easy. Look at how your hand sits when you play these chords. Try to use the technique that you use on easier chords with more difficult chords.

5. Using a capo at higher frets can make it easier on your fingers as the frets are closer together. However for people with big hands this can make it more difficult. So experiment with a capo to see if it helps you.

Each person has different size hands, finger shape and flexibility. For this reason there is no universal rule that will change your playing to avoid touching the wrong strings when playing. You should practice chords as much as you can until you feel confident and comfortable with them.

Good luck with your practice.

One of the most important things you’ll ever do in your music career is buy a guitar. We are often asked to give people advice about how to find a good guitar. The fact is that there is a LOT that goes into buying a guitar, way too much to put in one Newsletter, but here are some basic tips.

1) Do Your Homework
When you’re buying a guitar you have to do your homework. As a beginning guitar player it’s easy to get confused with all the information and advice that is available. There are a lot of places you can get information and you should check them all. Guitar magazines are a good place to find prices and reviews on different models of guitars. You can also get information at your local music store. Another great tool is the internet – you can get information on the manufacturers, search for other guitarist’s reviews and opinions and find the best prices online.

Remember that a lot of the information and opinions that you will find will be biased. A salesman in a music store wants you to buy the brand of guitar that HE SELLS, so make sure you read reviews and opinions from independent sources.

2) Stick to Your Budget
Once you’ve got the background knowledge that you need, you should make a short list of guitars that you are interested in and set a budget for yourself. THEN STICK WITH YOUR BUDGET! Don’t let salespeople talk you into spending more money than you planned.

Research price differences on the internet with a trusted site like Ebay. You could buy new or used but again, it is worth finding out how much the same item generally costs.

3) Play it BEFORE Your Buy It
Trying out the guitars you have short listed can be intimidating for beginners. It is important to remember that you are not in a guitar store to show everyone how good a guitar player you are – you are there to decide whether the guitar on your list is right for you.

One of the most important things about a guitar is how it “feels” when you play it. There are also mechanical things to check. Check the frets for buzzing by playing each one. Make sure that the neck is not warped by looking down it as if you were sighting a gun. Check that all of the volume and tone controls work.

4) Borrow Someone Else’s Experience
It is also a good idea to take an experienced guitarist along with you when you are looking at guitars. Not only will they be able to offer helpful advice, they will be good moral support when it’s time to pick up the guitar and play it in public.

Good luck with buying a guitar!

Question. I find it hard to change between chords and when I do it sounds bad. Because of this I can’t make my guitar sound good. What can I do?

Answer. This is the most common problem for beginner guitarists. Don’t worry, nearly every professional guitarist has had your problem!

The best way to avoid this is to start with the easiest chord changes for your fingers. Also, there is a lot to be said for slowing down everything that you are trying to learn.

Before you try playing along with your favorite band, practice the chords and chord changes by yourself until they are flowing nicely. Play things slowly to get accuracy and once you have that you can start speeding up.

Playing things at full speed without first learning them properly will make your chord changes sound muddy and unclear. If you start slowly and build your chord changes progressively you will find that you can improve your playing and stay motivated. Remember, like anything, playing the guitar takes time and effort.

You can’t expect to wake up and play like a pro. If you keep working on it you will improve your playing and achieve what you want on the guitar.

In this article we look at how you can develop good guitar practice habits and we look at the common problems that many people have when learning how to change between chords smoothly. Let’s get started!

There are two main factors when it comes to discipline in practice. They are practicing regularly, and practicing well. Both of these are important points.

Practicing regularly is the most obvious and easy thing to do. Basically, you should play the guitar every day. These don’t need to be mammoth, three hour long sessions, 30 minutes will generally be fine if you are focused during that time. Doing regular, small amounts of practice throughout the week is far better than doing one or two long sessions.

Life gets busy and it can be hard to make the time to practice but to be honest, 30 minutes a day is achievable for most people. There is no set time that is best for practice but many people prefer to do it in the evening simply because they find that playing the guitar is a relaxing way to wind down after a stressful day.

Practicing well is a much harder thing to do and there are many reasons for why this is the case.
Bad practice affects even the most experienced player but it can be overcome with some help. Here are some of the problems that you may have when practicing and some useable solutions:

1) Problem: Getting stuck in a rut. This is a very common problem that affects nearly all guitarists at some point in time. You end up playing the same thing over and over every time you play and you can’t seem to move on to anything new.

Solution: Aspire to play everything perfectly. However, if you are stuck on this one thing and you feel like practice is getting a little stale, you should really move on to something else that inspires you. It is so important to be inspired in your practice and you can always come back to something later when you are in the right mood.

2) Problem: Moving on to new skills too quickly. Also a very common problem, moving on too quickly will ultimately turn you into a “jack of all trades and a master of none”.

Solution: This problem is the opposite of the last problem we looked at. You can now see that there is a balance between too much and not enough emphasis on perfecting a song. You should master each thing before you go on to the next, but if you are finding a particular skill impossible to master and you are dying of boredom trying, maybe that skill is a little out of your reach. In this case, it is best to go back and learn something less difficult.

3) Problem: Becoming narrow minded in relation to the different areas of learning within musicianship. Some people get into the situation where they are practicing only one style and neglecting everything else.

Solution: Try splitting your playing into parts. For example, spend 5 minutes practicing new scales or chords, 10 minutes working on writing new music and maybe 15 minutes learning a new song or part of a song. This way, your practice never gets boring and you can achieve a lot more.

4) Problem: Playing things too fast when learning them. This can cause you to become disillusioned with your playing when you are trying to learn a new song.

Solution: A fairly obvious solution here – Slow down. Try playing a song or new skill at a slow speed before trying it at a fast pace.

Practicing properly and regularly is the best way to become good at anything including playing the guitar. This requires discipline; not only discipline to practice regularly, but also discipline to stay focused and on track when you are practicing. If you stay disciplined with your playing you will develop in to an excellent player.