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One of the first questions I often get asked by someone who’s just starting to play the guitar is ‘how much do I need to practice?’. Sometimes they will even ask deeper questions like ‘how many months until I can play like (insert favourite artist here)?’. I wish those questions were easy to answer, but the truth is that the answer will be different for every single person asking the question. To help you understand why there is no single answer to the ‘How much do I need to practice?’ question, we should take a look at a few determining factors that will shape how much you should practice. Before we get started, let’s clarify that more practice time is

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By Jennifer Barlow What’s one of the things about your performing that if you improved, would help to captivate your audience more when you perform? You might think it’s your stage moves, maybe playing more complicated songs, or maybe even improving the sound of your singing.  All of these are important but there’s something else you can do that will help to get your listeners attention and keep hold of it throughout entire songs, or even entire shows. The big skill for you to work on The big skill that is most overlooked is something called “dynamics” (put simply, playing loud and quiet).  This is one skill that great performers are using throughout every song they ever play. Here’s how

Are guitar scales important or is that stuff just for the theory buffs who want to do everything by the book? The short answer to this question would be: “Yes they’re important. But to what extent and how many scales you should learn depends on your musical goals.”  Let me explain further. I talk about the importance of goal setting in many articles but for the specific purpose of learning guitar scales, I’ll simplistically divide your musical goals in two: Whether you intend to just play other people’s music only. Whether you also intend to create your own music. Because while learning scales is important if you have either of these goals, a more thorough understanding of, and ability to

Learning songs from other artists is a great way to learn how to play music. It allows us to learn the techniques and styles of different musicians, and figure out how we can sound good by mimicking what others have done. But what happens when we don’t want to simply just copy other people anymore? How can you make a song sound like it’s your own rather than just playing a piece note-for-note as other artists have played it? Today I’m going to share some ideas with you on how to put your own spin on the songs you learn so that they can begin taking on a new life. 1. Change the rhythm or feel of the song This

  Many Beginner to Intermediate Guitarists struggle to learn and improve their Strumming skills to their satisfaction. This begins with the challenges presented by the right hand not being in sync with the fretting hand that is playing the chords.  What most beginner guitar players fail to understand is that it’s the easiest thing to learn and develop on guitar, if you pay dedicated attention towards it.  This might require practicing strumming in isolation, playing rhythm to a metronome or drum beats and lot of other ways. Whatever is your method to work on your strumming skills, you can fasten the learning process  if you just remember a few key principles every time you practice strumming.  This would begin with

Sometimes taking a break from playing the guitar can be good for both your mind and your body (provided you play often enough to begin with), but when it comes time to get back to playing, it can be easy to feel overwhelmed with the process.  It’s easy to be filled with thoughts of just how many things that you need to work on, how much practice you missed, how hard it will be to get back into the groove, and other negative thoughts that can prevent you from getting back on track. I’ve created a list of 5 simple things to keep in the back of your mind as you get things moving again. Just remember to do things one

Playing an instrument is very rewarding for both the child and the parent. To see the progress that they make over their guitar play journey and over a lifetime. One of the essential elements to make them improve their guitar playing is practice. For all children, they will be more motivated at certain times compared to others when it comes to practicing the guitar. There will always be challenges and difficulties when learning new things on any instrument. The key is overcoming those challenges through determination and practice. This really helps the child build confidence in the fact that when they work hard, they can get result from it. Playing guitar gives them a very clear example to reference from

By Jason Wilford Single note guitar playing can be defined as playing notes one at a time, rather than playing multiple notes at time. Chords would be an example of playing multiple notes at a time, whereas examples of single note guitar playing can be seen when a guitarist takes a solo, plays a catchy riff, or any other situations where just one note is being played at a time. Quite often I have students who are quite adamant that they only want to learn chords. They only want to be a rhythm guitar player, after all, so why should they bother doing something that they don’t need? I totally get where this feeling comes from - it’s natural to