How to Play Guitar for Newbies

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  Due to its versatility, portability, and the fact that it can be used to play almost any type of music, the guitar is one of the most popular instruments to learn how to play. Whether you're interested in folk, country, rock, jazz, or any number of other musical styles, learning how to play the guitar can give you the ability to play and perform your favorite songs, or even write some of your own.
  But just like any instrument (or anything worth learning for that matter), learning to play the guitar can take a good deal of patience, perseverance, and good old-fashioned practice. For those who stick with it, though, learning how to play the guitar can be an extremely rewarding experience and can provide endless hours of personal enjoyment.
  
  Learning how to play guitar can seem like a hard task at first, but with practice it is a worth while goal. Weather you want to know how to play guitar chords, play scales, or wish to one day be in a band, learning how to play guitar can be a fun and educational process.

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• How to Play Guitar for Newbies

• What You'll Need

  1. A six-string Guitar: See Mahalo's Guide to How to Buy a Guitar in order to choose the right one
  2. A Guitar pick: Light gauge (thinner) picks are preferable for beginners
  3. Patience: Definitely a virtue for learning how to play guitar
  4. A love of music and a desire to learn

• Things to Remember

  Keep your fingernails short by trimming them regularly. This will allow your fingers to hold down the notes easier and produce a better sound.
  Your fingers will start to hurt as you begin to play. This is normal. Eventually, with time and practice, your fingertips will develop calluses and the pain will go away.⁶
  
  Take some time in between lessons to make sure that you've mastered each part. Practice each lesson for a few minutes before moving on to the next.

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• How to Buy a Guitar

• Lesson 1: The Basics

  • Before we start playing, let's first go over a few of the basic terms and parts of the guitar that you will need to know in order to proceed:⁷

• Strings

  A normal guitar has six strings, each of which has a different size and note value. In standard tuning, the bottom string (also the skinniest and highest sounding) is an E note. This is also known as the 1st string. The 2nd string up (a little bit thicker and lower sounding) is a B note. The 3rd string up is a G note, 4th is a D, 5th is an A, and the 6th string (thickest, lowest sounding, and closest to your body) is also an E note.⁸ When in tune, playing the 1st and the 6th strings open should produce the same note, albeit at different pitches. Mnemonic devices can help you remember the order of the strings: For example, from top to bottom: Eat All Day Get Big Easy. Or come up with your own.⁹

• Frets

  • While the strings divide the guitar from left to right (as in the diagram), frets are small metal strips that divide the guitar into sections from top to bottom. If you look at your guitar from above, you can begin to see that the strings and frets together form a kind of grid that covers the entire neck of the guitar. Placing your finger on a string in between two of the frets is what enables you to play a note. The higher up you get on the frets, the higher the notes sound. In general, each fret is a half-step higher than the previous fret.
  • TIP: Since you don't actually put your finger directly on each fret, guitarists usually describe frets as the space on the neck between each metal strip. So, the 2nd fret would refer to the second gap between frets that is found on the neck, rather than the second actual metal piece.¹⁰

• Other Important Guitar Terms

  • Headstock: The top-most part of the guitar on which the tuning pegs are located.
  • Nut: The small piece of material that is found where the headstock meets the neck. There are usually small grooves carved out in order to guide the guitar strings up to the tuning pegs.
  • Neck: The long, skinny part of the guitar that holds the frets and strings and where the fingers are placed in order to play individual notes or to create chords.
  • Body: The large base of the guitar (usually the most bulky part) that is attached to the neck. Acoustic guitars will usually have hollowed out bodies, with the circular "sound hole" in the middle used to project the sound of the instrument. Electric guitars use "Pick-ups" instead of sound holes in order to capture and project the sound of the strings being played.
  • Tuning Pegs (Keys): Hold the strings in place and allow the user to adjust the pitch of the string by turning the peg.
  • Bridge: Small piece of hardware used to anchor the strings at the base of the body.¹¹

• How to use a Capo

  This video teaches viewers how to use a guitar capo. This video is also part of a wider series of guitar videos hosted at the Mahalo YouTube channel. 

   

  From  http://www.mahalo.com/how-to-play-guitar-for-newbies