HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO LEARN TO PLAY GUITAR?

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HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO LEARN TO PLAY GUITAR?

BLOG 9/9/2023

Two questions people often ask when taking guitar lessons.

1.HOW OFTEN SHOULD I BE PRACTISING THE GUITAR?🎸

2. HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO LEARN PLAY THE GUITAR?🎸

1. Practising should ideally be done each day, keeping in mind that the idea is to become a little (or a lot) better than before you started the session.

At first, short periods and as often as possible.

Eventually, methods of practising can be learned which increase the efficiency of the process and avoid dead-ends. A good teacher will be able to advise you about the correct and efficient methods - there are many! It requires experience to learn the ways.....

Most people practise far too quickly.

Very slowly and accurately is best, gradually increasing tempo as you improve accuracy in time and rhythm.

2.HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO LEARN TO PLAY THE GUITAR?

Pablo Casals was one of the world's most accomplished Cellists.

He lived to the magnificent age of 97 and was still playing cello.

In his early 90s, he was asked by a journalist,

"Why do you still practise at your age?"

Pablo thought for a moment and replied,

"Because I think I'm starting to make progress." .......🤔

And that, dear friends, says much about learning to play an instrument.

Playing guitar is no different.......

You never stop learning, improving, creating.

There's always more to learn, ways to get better.

In Guitar lessons at Westside Guitar Studio, the aim is not only to provide you with a solid foundation on which to build your guitar playing, but also to continually improve musicianship and your perception of music.

That process involves ear-training and understanding music 'theory'- it's inseparable from music practice.

Perhaps the most important aspect of performance is control over time, rhythm and phrasing.

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SCALES AND ARPEGGIOS - WHAT USE ARE THEY?

By ROBERT DODDS • October 29, 2024

SCALES AND ARPEGGIOS Inexperienced guitarists often avoid or even belittle the importance of scales and arpeggios. However, they are a great way of getting to know the fretboard, different keys and also to improve fluidity in getting around the fretboard. They are also very useful in some styles of soloing because the guitarist gets to know where all the chord-notes are located and can therefore create better sounding solos in some styles. In a chord progression, it is not good to end a phrase on a 'wrong' note unintentionally. The phrase will sound wrong. In some styles it doesn't matter so much but if you wish to improve your musicianship and have greater choice, then it is very important to know the key in which you are playing and through which keys the chord changes are progressing. One way of going about that is to play through the chords of a key in arpeggios along the fretboard. Three octave arpeggios are great for exploring a key- so for example, in the key of C major, play up the C major arpeggio and then down the next chord arpeggio Dm. Then up the next chord Em and down the next chord F major. So the routine will be like this; C ascending, Dm descending, Em ascending, F major descending, G major ascending, Am descending, B Diminished ascending and finally C major descending. When you have mastered that, then try playing the diatonic 7th chords as arpeggios in the same way, then the diatonic ninth chords, 11th chords, 13th chords and then do the same in the minor key. Then take the 7th 9th 11th and 13th instead of starting on the root note. Or 3rd 5th 7th 9th etc. Then do the same with the chord progression of an actual song or instrumental composition, in order to explore soloing possibilities. This is one of the processes by which you get right 'inside' the music. It's very difficult at first but pays-off in the long-term. So - scales and arpeggios are not a waste of time and you can be creative about how you play them.