just curious...how many of your are self taught, and how many had lessons, and your thoughts on each.

I had lessons, playing jazz & rock, and as a result I have a lot of knowledge many guitar player I meet don't have.

But as far as playing goes, we're all self-taught. Lessons are only what you put into them.

Also, I had to spend years incorporating what I'd learned into something useful. Essentially I simplified my playing. The jazz I learned didn't always work for rock.

Self-taught. Just a couple of lessons. I think the best thing to do is jam with people who are better than you. They won't laugh at you, trust me. Musicians love to help each other. IMO, the basics of guitar are very easy; what you need help with is soloing.

I've learned more from a three-minute record than I ever learned in school.

No, wait - that's a Bruce Springsteen lyric. Anyway, all things will help - lessons, DVDs, jam sessions. Any/all of those will get you where you want to be a lot faster than trying to teach yourself.

But one thing you can do if you want to go it alone is pick a Song of the Week and dedicate yourself to mastering every guitar part. That will help your ear, but it's not easy to do in the very beginning.

thanks for the comments, nice to hear yall's opinions. I am currently going it alone route. Just started, so I have only learned the basic chords and are currently working on chord changes and rhythm. I wondered if maybe taking a few lessons might provide additional insight.

I am working off of books/cds, watch alot of others playing..and hope to jam with some one day.

both, had lessons and in-between lesson (years sometimes) I self taught. this is a cycle that every guitarist will go through. If you read articles on guitar players that have made it big, many will say that they still take lessons to learn things outside their niche.

Here is my .02 - and I am a guitar teacher....

You do not become a better player just because you take lessons. it is the work you put into it at home, between lessons, that make you a better player. Now, if you have a good teacher, they will know what you need to do to improve week over week and challenge to do so with good material (songs, etudes, scale/chord studies, ear training, reading, etc). The trick is finding a good teacher. Plus, when you pay for lessons, that is the "kick in the pants" that people someimes need to be consistent with their practice routines. (i.e. you don't want to pay that money and work on the same thing week over week because you didn't learn it)

With that said, many of your leaps in playing ability will come from "A-Ha" moments you have when you're practicing (teacher or self taught). I had several of these and they always got me very excited about music. For example, your teahcer has you working on 7th chords and their inversions. As you play through them, you find a chord that sounds like the intro chord to Rasberry Beret (12 inch). You then work your right hand rhythm until you've got it and voila, you had an A-Ha momement that made you a better player.

Tunky said:

thanks so much for your input! I spend alot of time practicing, not only because I want to get better, but I find it fun. If you aren't having fun, what is the point. I practice about anywhere from 2 to 4 hours a day. My concern with a teacher was (1) alot of money if it isn't a good fit, (2) i don't wanna learn to play mary had a little lamb...and alot of people say that is how you start out...WTF? I can figure that out on my own,

but..at the same time, I need someone to give me the nudge and say yes, you are getting better at this, or here is a better/easier way to learn/do this.

It's such a cool journey (learning the guitar). I've had lessons, I've wasted too much money on books, I've even went to the National Guitar Summer Workshop in upstate New York. I've taken college classses and I've taught myself.

My is that I learned a little from all of it. I've got to a place in teaching myself where I felt like I was becoming stagnant so I started taking lessons. Once I feel like I'm growing again, I stop the lessons, go back to the basics and regroup and the process starts all over again. Playing with others helps learn, playing with your favorite songs helps and the most important thing is to never give up or get frustrated when you run into a wall, stop regroup and try it from a different angle. That's the beauty of music and the git fiddle.

Oh yeah, guitar teachers are love-hate relationships. Ego's and let's-string-you-along-because-I-need-the-money teachers are signs but go with how you feel about them and walk if it doesn't feel right.

I went Berklee College of Music and took lots of lessons from serious teachers like Vincent Bredice, Joe Diorio and Scott Henderson. I also played on the road all over the world for years with rock, R&B, wedding and top 40 bands ... played many clubs with many different types of groups. All I can say is you learn from the whole experience. You gotta get out and play lots of gigs and sit in on jam sessions. There many things you learn on gig or a session you'll never learn from music school. I never regret studying classical and jazz guitar but you still need to learn to play the blues.
[Edited 12/2/06 5:10am]

I've had a little of both - I started off with a coupla years of lessons, then spent 3 years getting everything I'd learned right, then had more lessons, then went back to the woodshed. I'm hoping to take more lessons in the next year.

I would absolutely recommend some tuition at the early stage of your playing, to ensure that you get the fundamentals right first time, and don't have to relearn them painstakingly later. Things like good position with your fretting hand and good picking technique will come from a good teacher, and form the bedrock of any future learning. Professional tuition will also mean that your practice time is better structured, and more effective.

I've been lucky to have two excellent teachers, the first from a jazz/fusion background, and the second from a neoclassical/shred background. I think their key attributes are what anyone should look for in a guitar teacher:

1) An understanding that playing the guitar well is the sum of many parts, from the way you hold your guitar to which edge of your pick you're using during your 1/128th speed arpeggios.
2) Slackers must die
3) Not being anal about what you want to learn. My first teacher was brilliant for that - he'd come round for a lesson raving about some Dwight Yoakam solo that he'd just heard, and then proceed to teach it to me. That enjoyment of all music and ability to see the coolness in any song is infectious, in the best possible way.
4) An understanding that every student is different.

On your side of the bargain, you'll be doing yourself no favours not listening to a teacher, or thinking you can do things better, at this stage at least. If the teacher wants to show you Mary Had a Little Lamb, learn it. The quicker you nail it, the quicker you're on to something better.

Remember,someone playing nursery songs well is always better than someone playing Steve Vai badly.

Slave2daGroove said:

I managed a music store and I noticed how some of the teachers strung students along for YEARS with no noticeable improvement. Socially, it was cool, but from a musical perspective, it was a waste of money, imo.

Then on the flip side of things, I've seen some very talented students who simply didn't practice their "homework" and never progressed, either...

Basically, it's all what you put into it and how much you enjoy it. However you get to where you're going (whether it's lessons, jamming, etc.) have fun with it. As the great Bruce Lee put it, "play seriously".

I was taught from age 9 by my dad, who was a pro in the sixties. Later I took classical leesons for about two years, but my heart wasn't in it. I took a music theory course and a couple years back I studied jazz guitar with a private teacher for about a year. I've been gigging for nearly twenty years, and that's where you learn most, I suppose (never use a chord voicing you can't play while jumping up and down ) I've also done some dj-ing and producing and that gives you a great added perspective on music, its effect on an audience and the guitar's place within an arrangement. For the last 5-10 years I've studied purely on a need-to-know basis. Whenever I'm dissatisfied with my playing on a certain set of tunes, I dig into it and find the scales, techniques, whatever, to fix it. Playing with jazz horn players was a great learning experience, too. You really learn to think in Bflat, Eflat etc. And to fight for your solo spots

Completely self taught. It says a lot that the only instrument I took lessons in is the one I absolutely hate playing (the violin!). I've never been a stickler for playing an instrument the "right" way - what I do seems to have got me by fine so far.

Rowdy said:

Very well said. On December 7th, I will return to practicing again. I hope that a year from now, I will be happy with what I've accomplished...Thanks for the inspiration.

Alasseon said:

Good stuff - have fun!

On the topic of nursery songs, after I'd posted, something really obvious sprung to mind, that I really should have thought of at the time: http://www.youtube.com/wa...aX7Y1GQl5w

I woke up one day and bam, here it was, rocking me like a hurricane.

mandolinist here

self-taught, been at it for only a year and have played once for an audience thusfar... i'm hoping however to get a couple of lessons from a more experienced person - tips & hints, more or less.

anyone in the houston area? can you recommend a teacher?

Completely self-taught. The same applies 2 the other instruments i play. I cant read or write music so i listen 2 records and learn them by ear.