Want to get started on your first guitar solo?

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September 11, 2021

9:13 pm

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Guitar Tips

Become a guitar soloist by learning these phrases

Our soloing phrases are made up of solos. The music in these segments is short. The solo will be divided into phases which you must master before moving on to the next. See how the notes relate to one another. Analyze the pattern of notes played and the way they are played.

Master one phrase at a time, then add more phrases until you can play the complete solo. The solo is built up of phrases. The first block is completed, and then another block is added until the solo is finished. There is no restriction on the length of a phrase. You will learn most short solos with short phrases.

Put the brakes on

Ensure that you can play it slowly before playing the solo fast. Trying to play too quickly at once will trip your fingers up, and you will make mistakes. A slow pace would be best for the solo. There will be a difference in the sound, but you’ll still be able to master the notes.

As you master playing the solo at a slow speed, use a metronome so that you can speed it up until it is playable at speed on record. You’ll have to practice a lot to become good at this. Improve your guitar speed by practicing the solo often. Slowing down is one of the best ways to learn a solo effectively because you have to walk before you can run.

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Getting ready to play the guitar

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April 19, 2021

7:45 pm

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Guitar Tips

How can you make sure you are ready to play the guitar? and start learning? Two things that are often missed be people starting to learn to play the guitar.

Let’s think about these two things and what they might be!

Having short fingernails

This is one that goes out to ladies but sometimes it’s for men as well. It’s important that you keep your fingernails nice and trim to help you learn to play the guitar. You do see people managing to play some “with long fingernails however this is a rarity. And actually makes a very difficult to get a clean sound after your guitar. You might have seen some professional guitar as with very long fingernails on one side, that’s for fingerpicking or classical guitar playing. They will have long fingernails on one side and shorts and a mouse on the other on the fretting hand. But if you are a beginner I would just keep everything nice and short. 

Time

Got to make time to do the things that you like. A lot of people say I know have time to practice. Now when you’re a complete beginner you might not know how long it takes to learn an instrument day in day out and stay out the week. And that doesn’t matter it just depends on how fast you wanna progress.

I see you are enjoying the journey then it doesn’t matter if you don’t have time to practice just keep going to your lessons keep doing a few bits here and there to keep it up. But I do you wanna make sure that learning instrument just take time and if you’re expecting to get good then you do need to put some time in. 

Keep reading our blog and find out what other things you might need to get learning to play the guitar!

Remember, everything is easier with a mentor by your side. Whether that’s just for inspiration or give you a helping hand.

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Helping a child to learn to play the guitar

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March 24, 2021

9:42 pm

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Children Guitar Learning

A lot of parents that we see who send their children for guitar lessons have never done any music themselves. They want to give their child the opportunity to learn to play guitar, where they didn’t when they were younger. Many parents actually want to play the guitar themselves but

they only have time to send their kids to learn and not for themselves.

If that’s you, and you’ve never played any instruments before or done any music but you want to be supportive and you want to be there for your child you’re wondering how you can help them learn to play the guitar. And this is the article for you.

Being supportive to your child

Number one, be supportive.

This is the biggest thing on helping your child learn to play the guitar you want to be there for them if they asked you that they want to do an extra workshop they want to do performance they want you to sit there and listen to them repeatedly play the same song, over and over again, hundreds of times, just be there for them.

Show them that you’re interested, let them show off to you and be supportive.

Never criticise your child

Number two, never criticise. It’s very easy for parents to criticise because it might be the culture that we’ve grown up with. Maybe that’s what our parents did to us. If they used to criticise our homework when we’re growing up, it’s very easy for us to start doing on fly child.

This is something you want to avoid. If you’re trying to help your child learn to play the guitar. You want them to have a positive attitude towards learning. So what do you do instead. If you’re thinking that you’re giving them constructive criticism.

That’s not how a child thinks was the very important. And there are ways that we can motivate them to improve without criticising them.

I hope these couple of things help you to support your child when they are learning to play the guitar or any musical instrument.

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Take a refreshing look at your guitar practising

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March 16, 2021

7:19 pm

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Guitar Tips, How to practise guide

Sometimes you just need to reset how you’re practising the guitar to feel fresh about it, get a new outlook on how it’s going. And get out of the same routine so you start to enjoy it again. 

Here are some ideas on how you can refresh your guitar playing. So that you can feel more excited about the guitar again. 

For the first thing, you can either do this one or two ways: 

Having your dessert first or last? 

You can either put your favourite thing to practice first to play first, or you can get the toughest thing out of the way. 

Normally people tend to be more one or the other anyway, so I recommend you do the opposite of what you normally do. So the idea is that you want to get the toughest thing you need to practice out of the way first, so you can enjoy the rest of your practice, knowing that you’ve already achieved something. 

But for some people, they prefer to just get going play something you really enjoy. And then it might lead you to do more practising. And actually that is more important for you. So see which approach works best for you. 

They’re both really good approaches to get a fresh look at how you practice and get you getting more out of it depending on what Which one’s gonna work for you best 

Practising without your guitar

The next thing is something that few people do enough of which is practising without your guitar. Yes, that’s right. Without your guitar, I want you to get out a notepad and do practising on there. It could be writing out or scales that you know, writing out notes on the fretboard, writing out chord progressions that you might like to play testing yourself on some music theory. There are so many things you can practice without your guitar and on a notebook instead, to grow your musical knowledge and understanding and also helping you to retrieve really difficult information that normally might come to you quite easily on the guitar. These things will help solidify ideas that you have in your head

I hope these couple of things have helped given you some ideas on how you can refresh your game. Talk practice. Stay tuned for Part Two, to find out more about how you You can practice the guitar in different ways So you can get more excited about learning the guitar.

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My First Experience of Music School Part 2

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March 8, 2021

3:01 pm

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Music school

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This is part 2 of my first journey of music school. If you haven’t read the first part yet, this might not make a lot of sense as we ended in a cliff hanger before!

The tutor was going over techniques used in jazz guitar, something I had never even considered being from a rock and blues background. If I remember rightly, we were exploring modal ideas and how to use them over certain chord changes. 

Modes? What are they?

I had never even heard of a mode, let alone extended chords, but I was too scared to ask the question and make a fool out of myself on the first day. It was clear that everyone else in the room was familiar with these techniques since I could hear them playing the parts with a degree of competence. 

This was a brutal first lesson and I walked away feeling very intimidated. I got home, made dinner and just locked myself in my room for the whole night. What I did was practice for hours, so that the next day I wouldn’t leave with the same disparaging feeling, and that I would hopefully be able to make a good impression on the tutor and my peers. 

As far as first days at music school go, I had a very bad experience. I didn’t give up though, so the morale is that no matter how difficult something is, if you have the desire to be successful then you will make it happen. 

Learning to play music

Learning to play music might not be easy. But it’s been a fulfilling experience. I would never change anything that’s happened previously, even though they were full of challenges.

I definitely think that no matter who you are you will be able to see the music if you work hard at it. It does help if you start when you’re younger however I’ve met even older people who have managed to learn to play the guitar and have it as a selling hobby that they have on the side. One of my friends actually bought a guitar for his son who never played it and he ended up picking up guitar lessons and now he has his own Instagram account of the following playing guitar. 

So anyone can get started and I urge you to pursue whatever your interest is. What are going through 2020 has really taught me is that you really need to go for the things that matter in your life because you might not get another chance. I’m really glad that I’ve pursued music so far and I can’t wait to see what it’s installed for me in the future.…

My First Experience of Music School Part 1

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March 1, 2021

3:01 pm

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Music school

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I studied professional music performance at the Academy of Contemporary Music (ACM) In Surrey, England back in 2014. 

I was 18 years old with a head full of dreams and a heart full of passion, hoping that one day I would work as a professional musician in one of the toughest industries there are. 

Which has been getting tougher ever since 2020!! But I still have high hopes for the future. 

I was a fairly good guitarist, mainly playing in rock and blues cover bands around my local town, staying very much in my comfort zone. When I auditioned for my place at ACM, I was confident since the piece was a rock/blues guitar solo with techniques that I was very familiar with. 

The audition

There was also an improvisational part of the audition which was based around the pentatonic minor scale, so no issues there. My first experience of music school was actually at a house party that myself and my housemates threw, long before any classes had begun. We invited a lot of people who were due to start the course the same year that we did, and I was instantly feeling ashamed of my own ability. 

We were jamming, and the level of musicianship that some players were showing was way beyond anything that I was familiar with. This one guy, who was also a guitarist started playing ‘Waves’ by Guthrie Govan, which if you don’t know is an extremely complex guitar composition. 

There I was recycling old blues riffs and relying on the pentatonic minor scale to get me through, I was definitely feeling anxious for my first class. 

The Jamming experience

Having had the jamming experience go less than ideally. It didn’t dampen my enthusiasm though, and I was ready to get learning. 

So, the first day of class arrived and it was a lesson called ‘professional musicianship’, which was basically just a group guitar lesson where we go over different techniques and have the chance to perform them. I was sat there like everyone else with my guitar and my music stand, attempting to comprehend what the tutor was talking about whilst staring blankly at a sheet of music. 

My skills were brutally exposed when I got up to perform for the first time, barely being able to keep up with the level of ability that everyone else in the class was displaying. At that point, I knew that if I wanted to pass this course, I’m going to have to practice, and I mean practice a lot. 

I think having that first few brutal experience actually just drove to get better quicker!

Read Part 2 to find out what happens next in my journey in a music school.

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Common Myths With Learning How To Play Guitar

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February 19, 2021

9:26 pm

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Guitar Tips

Learning to play guitar is one of the best skills that you can ever learn. You can become a professional player or play as a hobby whenever you want to relax. 

Unfortunately, today when you ask anyone for advice about learning guitar, they will crowd you with ideologies and theories. There are so many myths that are associated with learning to play the guitar. And if you’re not careful, you might end up believing some of these myths and think that they are true. 

But that shouldn’t happen to you. This is because this article will share with you the common myths that you’ll hear about playing guitar. 

  • It’s Not For Everyone 

This is the first thing you will hear, almost telling. Sometimes you wonder who are the chosen few to learn guitar. But that’s not the case. Anyone can learn guitar. 

So, don’t doubt yourself thinking that you are not among the few people who are meant to play guitar. Anyone with good training and persistent practice can easily play the guitar. So, don’t doubt yourself, find a trainer, and get started. 

  • You Need Long Fingers 

This is a myth that has been told for a very long time. Most people think that they need to have a special kind of hand that would hold and play guitar. The idea behind this myth is that you need long fingers to reach the guitar strings and play them effectively. 

But that’s not the case. All you need to learn is how to hold the guitar so that your hand can be flexible and access all strings and play effectively. No matter how your hand and fingers look like, you can train yourself on how to hold a guitar properly, and you’d play perfectly. 

  • You Need To Be Highly Talented 

Talent is overrated. Sometimes, you believe the myth that to learn guitar, you must be talented in the music of playing guitar. This myth comes from people who believe that the best guitar players were born to play guitar. But that’s not the case. Anyone can learn and play the guitar. 

The difference between the excellent players and just any other player is the effort they are willing to put into practice. If you spend much time training and practicing how to play guitar, you will be one of the best players the world has ever seen. 

  • It’s Hard 

Don’t believe this lie. Learning to play guitar is not hard. All you need is to find a good tutor who can break the lessons into manageable bits. And with excellent training and persistent practice, you end up playing guitar like an expert. 

  • It Will Take Long To Learn 

The amount of time that it takes to play guitar depends on the effort you’re willing to put into it. If you’re passionate and persistent about it, then you are in a better position in learning. 

Parting Shot 

Don’t let the myths about learning to play guitar hinder you from starting. Get out of your comfort zone and get a trainer. 

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