How long does it take to get good at guitar?
Vložit
- čas přidán 16. 05. 2023
- 52 Week Guitar Player is CLOSED for enrollment until mid-June. Join the waiting list: brandondeon.com/survey-page2
My Instagram: @Brandondeonmusic
52 Week Guitar Player Instagram: @52WeekGuitarPlayer
Do my students suck? Click here to judge for yourself / @52weekguitarplayer
I have nothing left to say.
#shorts
Except you're a bitch. - Hudba
R U GUD??
52 Week Guitar Player waiting list sign up: brandondeon.com/survey-page2
oh yes, very 😮
Personally, I played the ukulele first so everything came with intuition as i just had to remember new chord shapes and I already knew basic music theory before so ye
Took me 20 years to still suck.
NEVER! NOOOOOO
yes i play guitar from now 4 month and i know already how to do all master of puttets
25 years and from what i can tell, you never stop learning.
Same here. 26 years. Now learning Eric Johnson style runs across the whole fretboard to make my pentatonics more colourful. Also working on walking bass lines with chords on jazz standards as well as adding in extensions
Most Canadians (real Canadians) appreciate and admire Trudeau's hard work and accomplishments. He represents Canada well on the world stage and is helping us carve out our destiny. Trudeau saved the 2 Michaels and now him and Joly are professionally handling the Chinese interference with class. He is a true Canadian hero in my book.
So insightful and filled with info, thanks
I was 3 when you started playing .. i had my first lesson 1 year ago today , so im lightyears off being a good player
@@stallionstudiosno.
I’ve been playing guitar for 4 years:
1 year: I was comfortable with Chord transitions, and was starting to get into lead guitar
2 years: I was comfortable with fast alternate picking, and could play barre chords.
3 years: started to get much better playing solos/lead lines, but I still didn’t understand music theory at all.
4 years (current): I just had a major breakthrough in my ability to play by ear, and am starting to focus on music theory so I can learn how to improvise. I am able to improvise small lines in the key of C, and am still working.
My current list of skills include:
Tapping
Pinched Harmonics
Fast Alternate Picking
Bending
Pull-one
Hammer-offs
Vibrato
Sliding
I’m going to keep learning, because I can always do better!
Good luck!
This is almost exactly my guitar journey except I’m not good at pinch harmonics
I picked most things up pretty quick but sweep picking and barre chords? That took me forever breaking stuff down into small steps kinda helps me with learning new stuff
Bro did not just say “Pull-ons” and Hammer-offs” lol
Dude this is almost exactly where I right now
1 month in and my fingers have a mind of their own. Not stopping until they fall off
In what way?
In what way
1 month as a beginner or any specific exercise?
1 month playing electric guitar Update: I can now move my fretting hand ring finger lol
@@shawnparrish9606 noice. keep going
it’s been 4 month and jimi hendrix asked me to teach him some stuff
AHAHHAAH
Wow. Someone who is dead, and the best guitar player in the world, asked you to teach him some stuff.
@@RGGOTI My man, they were clearly joking, cool it
@@RGGOTI you live a boring life
@@RGGOTI somebody doesn’t understand jokes
Have been playing for 12 years
1. Memorized neck and open chords
2. Seventh chords, bar chords and can play somewhat in time
3. Learned Sweet Child O mine
4. Quit
5...
6...
7...
8... Relearned everything and learned pentatonic scale
9. Actually playing completely in time and started eartraining, started with modes.
10. Actually getting better at everything
11. Modes, exotic scales and overal technique improvement. Harmonic functions and a general understanding of all borrowed chords
12. Advanced techniques, started learning sheet music. Jazz chords and joined a band. Playing in front of around 200 people and not afraid of the stage anymore. Improvising in multiple keys all around the neck.
13. Will see what happens when we get there, hope I can clean up my playing a lot this year!
The pause helped me a lot and I am glad I quit for a while. i started when I was 7. The learning curve is like a sine wave. You have ups and downs and you always keep getting better!
Dang bro you’ve been playing for 12 years and you’re only 19! That’s insane. You’ll go far.
this comment is proof that sweet child o mine makes people quit
@@polterheist77facts
Almost did at me too
Anybody got like a guide on what to learn on electric? I'm stuck after learning basic chords, a few power chords and Barre chords and the Am pentatonic..no I can't afford a teacher but I've been doing decently on my own but there's just so much lol
i practice 3 hours everyday and still cant hold my guitar. Im pretty good arent I
You are a legend! Just keep going and U'll reach your score!
You'll get through this eventually. Keep going, king. Remember: slow and steady wins the race.
Change the way you practice, more practice doesn’t mean better practice
This means that u play so much so well that ur physically shattered and can’t hold ur guitar right?…. Right..
@@High_Groundd 🗿
I think it also matters how consistent you are. Just because you have a guitar in your room for 4 years that you played for 4 months in the first year then rarely picked up for the other 3 doesn't mean you're going to sound as good as someone who's practiced for half that time consistently.
Yes and some people practice more than others due to how passionate they are and how much time they have but for that to work you need to actually practice and challenge yourself at least some of the time.
This is very true! My friend growing up got a Gibson gifted to him on his 3rd year of playing guitar. One day when I was at his house I asked him to show me how guitars work and he played some chords and stuff that he learned in his lessons. Caused me to completely dive into learning guitar and I surpassed him within about 6 months. 15 years later he still owns that Gibson and only plays guitar when we hang out…meanwhile I now own 20 guitars and none of them are as nice as his. I still suck however
Yep, this. I got my first guitar back in 2018, but I was VERY inconsistent with it. I’d get into it for a few weeks, hit a wall, then give up for months before trying again, seeing progress, hit a wall, rinse, repeat. Wish I stuck with it, I’d likely be a pretty decent guitarist by today.
Goal this year is to stop that and stay very consistent. Make up for all that lost time.
I’m a slow learner and I work a lot.
So progress is very few and far between, but i can say that if there’s something that seems impossible.
Just do it a little bit everyday, if you think your fingers are too fat or too short I promise you they’re not.
Just don’t expect yourself to improve immediately,
Also this varies from person to person, but I find that taking sizeable breaks can help you digest things and improve much better.
3 days to a week even, but you MUST practice every week at least
Fingers aren’t to fat? Really? I’ll keep working it but all I get buzz buzz dink, get pissed an put it down
@@leonbogdan1413 then change the tuning style and play primarily through bar chords
Yeah taking a few days break really works wonders
It’s been about 5 months. 3 or so hours most days. It’s very fun for me so it’s no task to learn something new. If I can’t hear obvious improvement on something in a couple days I’ll come back to it when I feel like trying again. Instead I’ll just jam. Works like a treat
I started playing at around age 14, but I was never hardcore about practicing. I would go through phases where I'd be serious for maybe a few months, and then my attention will get sucked away to other instruments (keyboard, drums, bass, harmonica) or another artform (art, photography, writing fiction, animation). Then I stopped doing music completely for about ten years while I focused on other artforms. At age 47, I started to get serious about guitar again, and now I'm 50.
At this point, I can do everything mentioned in the video, except improvising over key changes is still a challenge and I'm working on that. I also don't have the fretboard notes memorized and rely on CAGED shapes mostly, and that's on the to-do list. The biggest challenge is perhaps virtuoso level playing where really fast and difficult passages trip me up and I practice them hundreds to thousands of times and it's still not perfect. I'm also running out of time at my age as my joints and tendons will atrophy and cannot do what a young player could. I regret not getting more serious about practicing when I was younger, because I'd be an advanced/pro-level player by now. But at the same time, the time I diverted to other instruments, composing, arranging, production, art, photography, writing, directing, etc. allowed me to have a colorful and varied creative career where I got to work in video games, film/television, animation, comic books, illustration, write song for pop-stars, compose music for film/games, and write novels. I don't know if I really would trade all that to be really good at guitar. Even now, writing fiction is my top priority and main passion, and I force myself to relegate all other passions to lower priority because in the second half of my life, I cannot afford to be stretched so thin anymore. I have to force myself to pick one thing and focus on it. But whenever I take a break from writing, I'm making music, practicing instruments, drawing/painting, and shooting photography, so I still practice guitar a lot. Even when I watch movies/TV shows, I have my guitar out improvising over anything I hear in the soundtracks.
You may have lived my dream actually 😂 but I still feel very anxious about running out of time with my life (cause you know most of the legends and stuff start music very young) even though I’m 18. Have any advice for an anxious 18yo? Thanks in advance
That sounds awesome man. relly inspiring to hear about someone who loves learning :)
As someone who has to split between guitar as a hobby and art as the career I'm pursuing, this is pretty comforting to hear - thanks for sharing :°>
@@cna934I can understand the anxiety, because I was the same way. I wanted to get really good at anything I was passionate about and felt like I had a late start. My mom wouldn't let me take piano lessons even though I begged over and over. By the time I was 18, I decided to use my own money and bought a multi-timbral synthesizer and a 2-track sequencer and started to teach myself how to compose/arrange by ear. A few years later I was writing songs for some of the biggest pop-stars in Taiwan. But I always lament not being able to have started as a child because all of my music heroes started as kids and even before entering middle school were already virtuosos. But we have to adapt to the cards we were given in this lifetime, and there are other musicians who didn't have all that classical formal training early on, and can't even read music, but still became famous composers (Danny Elfman, for example). So if you want it, then just go after it, because ultimately the only person who truly can kill your dreams is yourself. Other people can get in the way, but if you have the will to work around them and overcome those obstacles, you can still achieve your aspirations. But when you're the one who's giving up, then it's your decision to stop chasing your dream.
I have practiced consistently for about 6 months and can smoothly transition to and from most open chord shapes, and for the past week or so, I have started working on left-hand muting so I don't have to worry about my strumming hand when switching to and from chords that mute the lower strings. It's tricky for me, but I'm getting there.
I've been struggling a little bit with memorizing the fretboard, but I've been trying various "tricks" to map it out in my head, and I feel like I'm on the verge of breaking through a bit on that front.
I think a cool trick that works for me is having a use for knowing the notes. The most useful notes for sure are the 6th and 5th string (for bar chords or scales)
I played a grandpa's guitar for about 5 years. Was ok at playing most chords including that bitch ass F chord. Picked up and electric guitar just before covid hit. I spent about a solid year practicing and watching music theory videos. The thing that propelled me the most was HANDS DOWN getting a looper pedal. Helped with timing, ear training, and modes immediately clicked. Can't recommend a looper pedal enough.
Also I got off the cigarettes
You got off the cigarettes? Congratulations, mate! :D
my practice routine for a very long time was just practice at least 2 hours everyday, and whenever i went to play video games or watch videos or something i’d just play guitar instead. when i fell in love with drums, i followed the same thing except 3 hours a day. i’ve been playing drums for 8 months and i’ve already joined a band and play gigs regularly.
How do you find a band?
@mr.reaper66vipers90 late reply but theres usually a good amount of craigslist postings from people looking to form a band, or bands needing to replace members
My experience:
4 months: could smoothly make chord transitions
8 months: memorised every pentatonic pattern but it took me another 3 months to make decent stuff with it (with additional techniques such as pull offs, tapping etc…)
10 months: could play barred chords without any issues
A year and a half: started learning modes and other scales and incorporated them in my playing also improved in speed and can play fast alternate picking lines
Everyone knows that practice makes perfect 😊
ive been playing consistent for about a year (self-taught) and can transition seamlessly between almost all major, minor and 7 chords, and can play barre chords. i have not completely memorized the fretboard, i know maybe 15-20% of it subconsciously. i can play some rather complex rythym pieces but i still need a lot of work on lead and improv. thats my personal landmark
EDIT:
I forgot to mention that in that time i also learned a bit about guitars themselves too (ie. fretboard woods, body styles, scale lengths, obviously restringing, and how different strings affect tone etc) also, i feel i should mention that about 6 months or so in, i stopped using a pick for the most part and now will only use one for really fast pieces. hope this is helpful!
do you have any prior experience with music?
Been playing almost 20 years. I feel good about the 12 steps named. You'll never stop learning if you want greatness.
It's entirely up to you after you learn the basics. I had an incredibly bad teacher in school and let it effect how I felt about learning for years, one bad experience isn't indicative of the experience as a whole. You aren't too good to learn anything, take every piece of advice given to you, and study hard.
My current issue is: what next, where am I at, how can I improve? There's so much out there, but you also need a path. Something my tutors never helped lay out in front of me is knowledge of what comes next, (more realistically, what can come next and where I'd want to go) even if they were teaching ok for my skill level
It took me years to find a good teacher who actually got me beyond being stuck at the basic level
It’s never the teacher buddy
@@davidjimenez7258 it certainly can be. A terrible teacher can put anyone off
I started playing guitar at 23 so I didn't have to sing for bulshit cover bands anymore. I am now 38 and just in the past four to five years have really gained a lot of Mobility on the fretboard. Recently really focused on Triads about the past two to three years and that opened a lot of things up for me. I think I wasn't having fun playing for at least about six to seven years it was just work. Before the past five years it was more of a vehicle for songwriting. Now I can jam and contribute more in musical settings. I love that the magic just keeps revealing itself the more I play.
I'll be 38 in 2 months. I've started guitar 3 months back. I have this question, does learning new things gets slow now in comparison to us being 23 like when you started?
@@nayan20in wow you found me again. I would say that I've actually gotten better at learning things since I've been able to slow down and focus a little more in my 30s. My guitar playing has also grown and I'm a lot more melodic about my approach. Just put the time in it and you will guaranteed get results😀
@@jrawsadam thank you so much for the motivation 👍. And I actually checked out your channel from the comment here. Been reading the comments in this short. It's really inspiring to see so many people putting in efforts for so many years. I feel like I'm standing beside giants 😊
Im mainly a bass player and have been playing for about 8 years now.
Everyone is going to learn at their own pace, and even if you feel like you're taking too long, dont try and rush it, thats how you get burnt out and thatll kill your drive for progress real quick.
Of course all the things he lists are good things to learn, but the most important part is that you enjoy it, and are having fun. If you feel like practicing is a chore, then its not going to help you.
Being passionate about it is already half the battle, being good at it just comes with time, and effort.
Hope this brings some insight!
I feel like around the 3 year mark was when I hit my stride personally, that's when all the techniques and information I was learning finally started to make sense. It was the point where when playing along to my favourite songs I could begin to easily predict what was likely come next or better yet, how I could change riffs to make them sound better to me
yeah, im just hitting that 3 year mark and ive gotten to the point where i wanna play a song i look it up n just play, its really satisfying
20 years of the grind, and the learning never stops.
I’ve been playing uke on and off for the past few years, and recently picked it up again and have been playing pretty frequently these past couple of months. I find that memorizing chords or notes on a fret board goes a lot faster if I can see them whenever I need them, which is why I ordered a chord chart from amazon. Making a list of songs you like to play, or want to play, and trying to play every single chord in the song (no matter the difficulty), also helps, as eventually ones you didn’t know, you might remember after a few hours of playing, and eventually you can just add a few chords to your strumming vocabulary like that. 😊
I’ve been playing for about 5 months, and I can play basic songs. I can read tabs and I have a decent amount of chords memorized. Even though I haven’t been playing guitar very long, I’ve played piano for 11 years and violin for 7, so fluently reading music and having a really good ear have definitely helped me learn fast.
Been playing for seven months now.
First month or so, I learned some open chords and memorized them not by theory but by shapes.
After that, I messed around a bit with tabs, trying to learn songs I like.
Then, I solidified alternate picking while learning Ionian/Aeolian. I also learned that one pentatonic shape we all know and love. String bending, hammer, and pull offs were never too hard for me, so I got that down throughout soloing practice.
I struggled a bit, but it started to click once the music theory clicked. Then Barre chords clicked, and I can play a good amount of Barre chords in any key. I was taught a good deal about chord naming as well.
As of the 1st of this month, my music teacher is on a 2 month long vacation so I'm on my own for a little while. I've been hitting music theory hard trying to solidify what I already know by learning the 'why's' instead of the 'how'. The past week I caught up on memorizing the whole fretboard since I kept putting it off.
My goals for the rest of the year consist of
1. Getting better at playing in time
2. Solidifying triads, arpeggios, chord stuff etc
3. Learning the pentatonic shapes
4. Not dying alone
Didnt mean to write a book but TLDR Music theory, having a good teacher, and practice have been my friends. I think I've made good progress for 7 months, but to be honest, I have weeks where I practice a ton every day, and sometimes it sits aside for a week. If I applied myself harder, I could make faster progress.
How old are you? And do you work? I play every day and have played for a year but sound a fair bit behind you , great progress
@@isaacverrall8782 Turning 18 soon, and yes, I work every day. I usually practice after work and/or on weekends. Sometimes, I take a break for a few weeks if I get interested in something else like a new video game.
Some things for me were really easy because of transferable skills. I used to do really advanced Yo-Yo, so I already had dexterity in my fingers (I have talked to people who say they struggle with dexterity typing on a keyboard, never mind stuff like guitar). I also work in construction, so my fingers are already tough. I've broken skin on the guitar maybe 2 or 3 times.
There were certainly things I wanted to avoid at first because I couldn't do it or it was intimidating, but in my experience, tackling it head on is what helps you grow. Everyone learns differently at different speeds. Good luck.
So far I am comfortable with chord transitioning, barre chords, picking a string fast and barely legatos. I think I have been playing for 11 months so far. From my friends who are also learning with me, I notice it depends on the person a lot but for me improving was smooth at the start but now it takes longer for some things
Got my first acoustic guitar for Christmas from my ex-aunt when I was 11. We had a lot of sh## going on with my dad's mall kiosk and whatnot, and I didn't quite have the time for practice and for the most part lost interest for the instrument at that time. Once I got into songwriting a year later, I decided to pick up the instrument once again, watching CZcams videos and learning the bare minimum of basics before quitting again. A year later, I decided to try playing one last time by using guitar apps, but I couldn't figure out what was wrong because nothing could teach me right. I realized it was a combination of the guitar being a cheap children's toy and my fingers being poorly positioned before going into further detail of learning and actually picking some things up on it. Got my first electric guitar for my birthday not too long ago, and now I can apply the knowledge I obtained from my previous attempts at playing to my newer attempts, and so far I can play the intro riffs to some Avril and Hinder songs I like along with my own riffs I've written. Currently just focusing on going back and forth with chord progressions and acoustic songs I like, along with rock riffs I previously believed to be Hendrix level of difficulty but are actually much simpler than I could have expected. Once I'm more familiar with that part, I'll try my luck at learning more scales than the one I've partially gotten down and I might take one last swing at apps before just going off of videos and whatnot
I've been playing for about 8 years now, sure largely self taught I know it's not the best way to do it, but honestly a lot of that there wasn't a huge amount of progress until the last few years where I've really started getting a grip on music theory which I'd been too scared to even touch, and it's seriously improved my confidence in playing
Played for years as a kid.. then put it down for a while and came back to it as an adult. If you start, keep at it! Even if it’s only a little bit every day. Scales!!!
PRACTICE!!!
I’ve been playing for 7 years under the guide of top musicians in my country because there is a free public school for the arts for kids under 18. I graduated this may and can do all the things listed in the video. This is my Journey.
Year 1: I learned how to transition from chords but refused to learn how to read comfortably and still had to count the lines on the pentagram
Year 2: I learned how to play Barre chords as my hands but reading was still subpar
Year 3: I learned the pentatonic and could finally sight read simple pieces
Year 4: I didn’t improve too much this year because of Covid but I got the pentatonic down and sharpened everything else and could play 16th notes at a pretty fast tempo . Also I could play reasonably difficult finger style pieces as I started with classic guitar. Around this time I began playing electric.
Year 5: I learned about modes and theory at a deeper level( there was a mandatory theory class years 1 and 2 but I never paid any attention) I could improvise Jazz in F major and all of its modes but still struggled in other keys
Year 6: I was beginning to feel comfortable in all keys and could learned to play well with other musicians wi the put getting too nervous
Year 7: I learned proper sweep picking and started playing really fast and technical songs on the electric. Also learned how to Improvise on multiple keys and key changes(I played all the things you are with my Jazz trio this year). For my last concert( they had at least 2 concerts a year for the student to gain experience) I played Capricho Arabe by Francisco Tarrega and Canadian Sunset by Wes Montgomery.( originally I was also going to play Playing God by polyphia but I had too many other concerts with all the groups I was In and couldn’t memorize the beat switch in time😢)
Overall I saw that I only got better by doing things that were outside my comfort zone.
Been playing for a little over 3 years. Got comfortable playing onstage after 2. Currently working on improving my improv soloing specifically through using chord tones and triads. I got into and am going to Berklee in the fall, and I’m sure I’ll improve a lot there.
damn you sound like a prodigy😮 best of luck at berklee!!
@@jerrydean9239 I'm certainly not that but thank you!
I had been at it on & off for about 50 years and I was barely OK. Then I joined a band and I had to practice like mad to keep my end up. I got to where I was comfortable playing with musicians and performing in about six months.
Playing in a band will do it
I got my first electric guitar in last Christmas. I had crappy broken hard to play guitar like 4 months before I got that electric guitar. Some songs I already know how to play are straight way to heaven, Master of puppets *( not including solo)*, smells like a teen spirit*, come as you are, paranoid, rock you like a hurricane power chords*, beat it, parts of fade to black and some I have forgotten. I'm currently learning metallica one, nothing else matters and just today learned E and Dm scales and played some random sh/t with those.
I can also play Barre chords, and now started to learn improvising slowly.
That may sound much according to fact that I got my first electric five months ago, but I have played bass, drums and anything in last 2 years and also I learned to play basic chords like E,A,D,G,C like 1,5 years ago in school.
Being a guitar player is never ending learning you learn new things or skills as more musicians innovate and invent things but in the end its a journey worth taking on coming from my own experience
I’ve played guitar for about a year and a half. After playing ukulele for 6 months, I took up the guitar and within a few weeks I could play chords and simple songs. Then I started playing lead guitar, soloing and playing different techniques like slide. As of right now, I’m still learning.
good choice
I’ve been playing for about 3 months and in some areas I’m progressing very fast, but in many very slowly.
I already play piano and have an understanding of music, which makes learning a new instrument so much easier.
However, this doesn’t say much about guitar technique.
When I play a solo, I know which notes to play to make it sound good, but the solo as a whole won’t sound great yet because my hands aren’t used to playing a guitar.
I was also able to understand chords quickly because pianos also have chords, but I still have to work a lot more on making the chords sound less bad when I actually play them.
I guess my point is that understanding music and developing your guitar technique are as important as each other. Only working on one will slow down your progress, but when working on both they kind of complement each other and speed things up.
All this talk of modes and theory when you only really need to 0 3 5 and sometimes 0 3 6 5
I’ve been playing for a few years and I’m okay. I love the guitar so much.
Been playing for 6/7 years. Was comfortable with basic stuff after 1/2 years, after then I'd say I was "intermediate" and maybe at 3 years, at 4 yrs I could improvise solos in any key. I can now play in front of people perfectly, but I used to be TERRIBLE, only after about 3 years did I start to become fine with it. I've recently got the hang on fast alternate picking + generally much smoother playing. Getting into modes now, but can't do sweep picking yet
Good = having fun while playing
This can happen relatively early.
Basically, as soon as I reached that sweet spot of comfort -> I consider myself "good enough", because I am having fun.
But sure, most people are better than me while playing, and that's ok ^^
Your program does work.♥️
2 years in and I’ve picked up pinch harmonics, tapping, tremolo picking, fast legato, fast down picking and easy sweep picking. I’m not self taught though.
Started with a theory background about a month ago. Currently practice improvising leads across 2 strings (chosen randomly) and have started to learn scale shapes and have begun to memorize the fretboard. I expect to be able to find any note within the next 2 months.
Tbh, I just copy what I want to learn, regardless if it's hard because it sounds good.
I also take detours if a certain song or riff requires a certain technique.
I started 17 years ago. I've never been able to force myself to do skill building activities, I've only ever played whatever I felt like, and my skills topped out at around year 4 or 5, but Brandon is one of the various channels with advice and drills that I've been learning from in the past year and I've noticed significant improvement. I guess that progression is entirely what you put into it. I never learned the neck, but I did learn finger picking, so now I'm trying to go back and fill in the gaps that I just ignored for all those years. Still have a hard time doing the boring drills though, I always get distracted.
I have been a musician for the last 7 years of my life, learning only brass instruments including French horn trumpet, euphonium and a bit of tuba.
However Christmas of 2022 my father got me an acoustic guitar, so mind you it was a steep learning curve at the beginning. I had fun with it for a while but wasn’t too serious. Then, around march I picked it up again and learned a few of my favorite rock songs on it(also I started to fiddle around on bass, it wouldn’t conclude to much but I can still play many bass lines fairly well). I then started to learn how to change between chords and got good at that by around may(including barre chords). The hardest thing at this time was learning to use my fourth finger in more than just chords, but I decided to learn dust in the wind by Kansas and that got me using my fourth finger fluently and also taught me Travis picking. This was around June.
Next over the summer, it was just me and my guitar for three months, I learned a lot more about power chords and how they influence blues playing around the 70’s rock and roll era(which is my fav era of music). Then I started first by learning my pentatonic scale shape. And learning how to use that to find the key of a song. Then I started to solo over jam tracks on CZcams, improving my blues playing. I don’t necessarily have my major scales down but their pretty heavy to play. Then marching band started again so I had to put down guitar for a while. But when school started up I grabbed it agin. I’m now playing in a band with my friend syd and Caleb and also when marching band ended our school started up its afternoon jazz band(which is one of the best in in the state) and I’m playing rhythm guitar!
My dad just agreed to purchase me an electric guitar for Christmas of 2023, I decided to go with a telecaster because it’s nice and modable.
Personally, I’ve been on acoustic for a year and I’ve been taking lessons for a few months. I can switch chords quickly and I can identify chords, but I still can’t do perfect bar chords.
Find more songs that utilize barre chords that you enjoy so that it forces you to practice them. Journey - Don't Stop Believing is a decent one that uses B-Major and G#m and everyone knows it.
@@aeparaflux thanks for the tip
@ehodges i should have also mentioned that you can look up songs that utilize a capo that also use barre chords. Makes it much easier on your hands. Sometimes, I like jamming Eye of the Tiger as a warm-up song since it has you put the capo on the 3rd fret, so playing the F Major chord feels like a breeze.
Actually, thanks Brandon, your content helped me realize a lot of things for myself and not just about the me-guitarist but me as a person. I didn't like you in past because I thought you were obnoxious but I realized that you're one of my favorite guitar related content CZcamsrs and that I was wrong. Thanks for being with me on my journey!
I've been playing for just over a year, I still can't do half of this stuff but chord transitions were probably something that I got in at most a month, other musicians was about 7 months. I am still far from learning everything you need to know, but I will try and learn the things I need when I need them. I'm in a band and play rhythm or bass so I know and have perfected what I need to know. Oh and barre chords took me at least 3 months and a crap ton of finger pain
As a beginner I have to say that what really helped me get better faster is definitely music theory. Just simply knowing what intervals are and which chords use which intervals is super helpful but also knowing different scales and how they sound is super helpful to learn how to improvise faster.
Honestly for me, I always had the drive to continue, so the "ruts" and "blockades" a lot of guitarists hit, I rarely did. Your attitude towards building foundations and learning has a major impact on how you progress. I knew I'd be shit for a long time and just kept working until I got better. It's not hard. You just need to really want it and don't waver on your goals
Practice! (In moderation) don’t just play constantly because you just get bored of it eventually honestly. Gotta find something you enjoy and stick with it. When I first started, I just played songs with chords honestly. It sucks at first but once you get it, it’s sick. Once I got that down, I started learning easier songs that aren’t just chords. I played things like stairway to heaven (sorry guitarists) to get my fingers moving around more. Then once you feel more comfortable with the instrument, find songs that are slightly difficult for you (not HARD, but more challenging. Don’t be afraid to practice super slow. Learning songs now like from the band polyphia, I’m practicing stuff at literally half speed or less to get the muscle memory down then slowly speeding it up. And I mean slowly lol. But to wrap things up, with chords, find a fret or a few frets that have little change. Think of Eminor to Aminor. Not much changes. Lastly, if you can play one barre chord, congrats you can use that shape and play every note in barre chords lol they’re all the same shape (if you’re using all 6 strings at least)
I’ve been playing casually since I was 5 and tbh learning guitar varies from how bad you want to learn. For me I really didn’t start truly appreciating and loving guitar until a couple years ago, even though I’ve been playing for 15 years. The main thing is not to get discouraged by people who learn quicker than you as that’s the hardest part in my opinion
ive been playing guitar for 3 months, but piano for 6 years by ear and one thing that would boost your playing is knowing a little theory on how chords function and relate to each other. know your major scale degrees and get well versed into the number system, and playing by ear will start to really click. knowing how chords and scales apply to eachother on the piano really has been a shortcut on learning guitar just from knowing how things apply to each other, and in a way for me it’s just my dexterity on guitar is so far behind my mind😭 but in summary learn the number system for sure and things would come. a little theory is the craziest shortcut genuinely
8 years playing here and quite different order of improving:
1 and 2 years: Hardcore study and music theory learning all modes of major scale and leaning basic techniques such is bendings, hamer/pulls, alternate/economy/hybrid picking... Beggining to improvise over progressions with one key change. Everything so blues and classic rock focused but I discovered also John Petrucci's Glasgow Kiss album
Years 3 and 4: discovered Guthrie Govan, tried learn too complicated things for me, improving what i learnt years 1 and 2, learning harmonic minor and phrygiant dominant. Went quite to jazz fusion without being able to understand non diatonic structures. Going to jam sessions sometimes
Years 5 and 6: not such a big difference in technique but better rhythm feeling, tastier improvisations. Leaning tonal functions and using them. I started to go more often to fully improvising jam sessions (start with a riff/chord progression/rhythm and lets develop the things).
Year 7: huge deep into jazz, learning triads (if you understimate this you will remember this in the future), melodic minor and some of its modes, diminished-dominant scale, etc. Also joined a folk rock band (Stigia in Spotify if you wanna check). Learning jazz standards.
Year 8: keep trying to master what i learnt in year 7, also trying to sweep properly in 5 strings, solid alternate picking and legato lines and those techniques that I wasnt so into but i wanto to improve a little bit now.
#14. Getting used to record your playing
It took me about a year because I have a natural ear for music, but if you’re an average player, I can’t answer that
9 months into playing guitar and I've learned quite a lot. Roughly 2 months ago, I was still a beginner until I switched to the electric guitar and eventually switched to the metal genre. In those two months, I've learned a few techniques that helped me improve and now I can do a few solos (almost perfectly). I'd say I've been rapidly improving because I could finally play songs that I couldn't play. I've recently been playing fingerstyle in hopes that I get more comfortable with barre chords and finger picking. As of now, I can say that I'm comfortable with barre chords and chord transitions as well as fast alternate picking, though I'm struggling with fast down strokes (specifically referring to master of puppets)
Regardless if you become good or not, when you become good you must keep at it or you loose it. I just recently started learning solos for a cover band and man, if you don't keep up on them you loose it
Started at age 40
I practise every day, but am also mostly learning from youtube
Year 1. Memorized several basic chords. Got fairly passable at barre chords.
Year 2. Starting to work on lead. Getting better at barre chords. Starting to grasp SOME parts of music theory.
Year 3 (I'm in the early part of this): gaining a bit more confidence in my playing, working on getting my bends to the right pitch.
I feel like I should be further than I am after two years (and I do play a LOT every day), but I also understand that I started in my 40s and haven't had the best education here. I'm proud of what I've done so far, and my guitar practise is my favourite part of the day.
No matter if I ever "git gud" or not, it's been a great hobby that's really enriched my life. I DO hope to get good, though.
I have been playing for 3 years.
1st year: got comfortable with chords (barre chords included) and fingerpicking, and was trying alternate picking a little bit
2nd year: started *learning* sweep, fast alternate picking and memorizing the fretboard
3rd year: can fast alternate pick comfortably, can only sweep on 5/6 strings (struggling with hammer-ons and pull-offs mid sweep but getting better at it)
I’m trying to learn scales and that sorta jazz now because I wanna be able to improvise
Its been 8 years and i can say I’ve forgotten more than some people have learned
I picked up open chord transitions in a matter of days and could do them really quick after about a week. Barre chords took me ages as I played just acoustic for about 2 years but I could do all of them apart from f minor after 1 year. Memorising the fretboard took me ages as at first I didn't think it was important and just wanted to play chords and make riffs but when I actually tried I got it in about 2 months
1st year transitions and bar chords
2nd year minor pentatonic 3rd year scale type expansion and improv expansion 4th year decent mode understanding and blending through out the fret board
Started playing after I heard the Master of Puppets solo when I was in middle school in '95. Played every day almost until i got out of high school. Was pretty decent i thought learning from guitar books back then. Learned to improvise and make songs. Didnt have any training but myself. Played in a band and everything. Then after high school, life happened. Then got married, had some kids and then picked it back up in 2017 and got serious though it was a rocky beggining. The guitar felt foreign to me a little bit.
Metalcore is my favorite genre. With the new tools I didnt have as a teen at my disposal such as youtube, music apps and the internet in general, my progress made HUGE strides fairly quickly in learning these technical riffs and solos. Got back to my old playing form in about a year. Bought me an ibanez prestige as a treat and kept on shredding. I am by no means great but I can do a little bit of most techniques now. Trying currently to get sweep picking down and have done so for about a year a few times a week but for some reason that technique is one of the hardest I have tried learning. Can sort of do it but it is not very clean.
I will say that i need to focus more on the basics though and learn the notes of the fretboard as well as some basic theory to help me write some killer metal harmonies like most metalcore bands do.
With the tools that youngsters have today, I would say learning the guitar is easier and quicker then it ever has been. You just need to keep at it and always try and learn more. Practice as much as you can and buy headphones so you dont piss your family off until you can kind of play a little. I still play with headphones though because to me I don't sound that great. Maybe I do sound alright but I dont think so. Kinda weird I feel that way still.
Edit: Spelling errors
Been playing for 4 years and i became an advanced player in the end of my 2nd year.Keep playing and have fun dont try to push it. if you wanna play guitar good cuz its cool you cant get anywhere you need enjoy it enjoy the process even if it pisses you off. Its crazy tho i wanna re-live those times i was tryna learn guitar in my first few months it was frustrating but so fun, you only feel once those moments when you learned your favorite songs.
Been playing for 2 years, gigged about ten to fifteen times, and I understand lots of music theory.
Month 1- Pick up guitar (had experience playing bass, but I had only been playing for a few months) learned open chords, got comfortable with some transitions, though barre chords were hard
Month 3- Figure out barre chords
Month 5- Play first casual gig with guitar teacher (rhythm guitar)
Month 9- Play another gig (playing bass and guitar) Start to develop lead guitar chops, and memorize certain pentatonic and lead shapes
Year 2, Month 3- Begin to learn to tap and change shapes whilst doing so
Now (Year 2, Month 6) Get asked to play at a few functions and venues locally, and begin to broaden my composing abilities after starting a few years ago
And that’s my journey. Granted, guitar has been my main focus for the past few years of my life. I have strong adhd, so I hyper-fixated on my guitaring and improved steadily. I really enjoy playing, it fuels me, so it was easy for me to sit hours at a time practicing.
Good timing
Been playing for almost 2 years:
year 1 was mostly getting comfortable with open and barre chords, learning basic riffs, and experimenting with the pentatonic scale
year 2 has been increasing rhythm, speed, and accuracy. Learning some more complicated riff and solos, mastering hammer-ons and pull-offs + learning to play with others in a band
Good. I would say depending on what you learn such as song specific about 2 years. But if you continue to play and get to the point where you just feel natural playing many different chord variations you can get “good” pretty quickly so I would say around a year and a half if you play for about a hour a day combined
after 9 months I can play a lot of metallica songs, at the right speed (still learning solos)
I’ve played for 4 years, I’m an intermediate player and if I have any advice, it’s IMPROVE YOUR TIMING! I avoided metronomes for the longest time and I’m paying for it. A metronome will force you to play in time which translates to faster playing.
well as a guitar player that has played for 3 and a half years, practicing consistently every week:
In my first year, I was able to memorise the whole fret board, play most of the major scales, know most of the chords and patterns, with smooth chord transitions, and play barre chords, and hammering
In my second year, I was able to do most of the pentatonic scales in different shapes, pick 16th notes at 100bpm, comfortably palm mute and bend
In my third year, I can finger pick (if I practice a lot), also do some legato and tremolo (also if a practice a lot), I'm comfortable playing in front of other people, I can somewhat improvise solo in one key or multiple keys, somewhat do pinch harmonics and tapping (I just haven't practiced hard enough for those techniques)
I've been playing for 5 years since I was 12 and i'm just now starting to actually practice. Cleaning up my playing and learning some fun stuff like economy picking and getting my sweeps faster.
Having a lot of fun with it :)
Took me less than a few months to learn a few chords and get good at swapping some of them quick. Outta that, haven't gotten so far yet.
Bro has a favorite guitar
I've been learning for 27 years, and I've just learnt about frets yesterday! You never stop learning!
It took me 3 months to learn a full song and master it (Time in a bottle - Jim croce) while also learning another song, i didn't learn chord progression or any scales which i regret, but honestly i was happy afterall
Ive been playing for 5 years and you have to remember to have fun. If its not fun for you then its gonna be an uphill battle.
I've been playing for 10 years. First year was very slow progress with chords. The action on that $50 acoustic was terrible but I was able to get comfortable messing around the pentatonic scale. Fingerpicking mainly because I wasn't comfortable using a pick plus it was the style I was interested in. By the second year I upgraded my guitar and connected chord shapes via CAGED system, and scales. I would casually pick it up on and off for the next few years reinforcing those scales, chords and picking/strumming techniques. Then I took a long break. Got back on a regular playing routine and I recently bought my first electric guitar/amp. I'm dusting off all that music theory I've studied when I was younger. I'm able to build chord progressions in any key and improve around them but now I'm looking at jazz to learn more about chords. I'm amazed at the endless amount of tones you can get out of an electric right now so that's my playground.
Born good
I can do a couple of things and have been playing for like around 3 years. yes I had a rough start, but now I am growing with the months. I now am starting lead playing for real, with improv and learning solos completely.
I've been playing for 14 years, but not everyday. Recently got properly back into playing and I would say I'm an intermediate guitarist in terms of technique, and a beginner when it comes to theory.
Just changed jobs and now I have time to play everyday, so within the next couple years I plan on improving to the point where I can comfortably improvise in any key
Been playing for 8 months.
Months 1-2 learned some basic chords and some songs.
Month 3 learned how to play barre chords cleanly and learnt hammer-ons, pull-offs and basic slides.
Months 4-5 improved my technique and started using a pick.
Month 6 started to use hybrid picking and got better at alternate picking.
Month 7 fell in love with polyphia and started playing their songs (the worst, playing god intro)
Month 8 focusing on tapping rn, want to learn ABC by Polyphia.
6 months i had been comfortable with alot of techniques
open snd barre chords, working up and down scales, good music knowledge, comfortable with tabs, etc
Ive been practicing for about 4 hours a day for a month and a half (i quit drinking lol) and i can play almost all of master of puppets and for whom the bell tolls, and some of tornado of souls. I feel like im just speed running learning guitar by practicing so much. Learning alot of techniques without even realizing or knowing what they're called lol
Been properly playing for 6 years. Stuck in intermediate stage.
Pentatonic scale (minor) noted and can improvise sticking to one shape with some educated guesses about where to go next.
Feel like I really smashed a roadblock when my fingers gained the strength to play barre chords and this lead into learning the caged system.
I know a lot of theory but just cannot put it to use.
I’m self taught and play a variety of genres that help. I prefer metal and dropped tunings but everything came from leaning cowboy chords and wish you were here
I've been playing guitar for almosy two years now, basically all I did in my free time. My first 6 months I was able to put out an EP and now I have almost a dozen songs out (and literally hundreds more that won't be released). Each song i focused on a new technique i wanted to improve. At first It was barre chords, and palm mutes and now its improv and high speed riffs.
Its really hard at first but once you've really got the basics down (for me that was about a year in) learning new parts of the instrument becomes trivial. For example learning new chord shapes is very difficult in the beginning but once you are really comfortable on your instrument it takes maybe at most a couple minutes to be comfortable with that chord. Strumming patterns are felt almost immediately, you can learn riffs by ear in a few minutes. Its really rewarding to finally get to this point. You got this!
For me it took ages for me to start getting better at guitar but finally now as a 12 year old I can begin actually playing good music
You are definitely right on that .
The more you study, the more you practice, the more you search for upgrading your own skills, the more you getting better.
ive had my guitar for 1.5 years now and at first i didnt give it much attention so my progress was slow. when the 7th month hit. i couldnt go a single day without playing. at the 9th month i completed my first metallica song: for whom the bell tolls. now im trying to complete if darkness had a son and scientist by coldplay on my acoustic guitar.
I'm firmly intermediate after almost three years, but I also am not putting in the maximum amount of effort I could be. It really comes down to what you practice and how much you practice, as well as being consistent.
I’ve been playing guitar for about 5 months, but I started learning music theory 9 months ago. The first thing I did was start learning the open chords. It was only about a month ago that I really started to apply the scales to the guitar by memorizing the major scale patterns across the fretboard. From there it really took off with being able to start on any number in the scale and know which mode I was in. I still haven’t memorized the fretboard, but I’ve made a lot of progress on it. Aside from that, strumming was something I’ve only started to get better at more recently. Upstrums were very hard for me, and I still need to work on them. I still can’t play lead in time very well, and my soloing sucks. I have barely done any alternate picking. In terms of chords, I began focusing on chord shapes about 2-3 months ago. I began with the top 3 strings and started building the inversions on them. Then, I connected them within the major scale and started discovering the diatonic chords. From there I moved onto the diatonic seventh chords, which had a lot more voicings compared to what I was practicing. I’ve only just started breaking the surface on chords with all 6 strings and with more complex voicings. I recently started applying the CAGED system, and with my prior knowledge of the open chords, it was pretty intuitive. But that’s basically where I’m at right now. Having a decent music theory background (self-taught) definitely helped my progress. I’ve never taken lessons, but it’s something I want to do.
2 months. Learnt Barre chords, learnt to play Purple Haze and Back in Black (including the solos!!!) and now I’m learning All Along The Watchtower. I practice 2-3hrs a day. The trick is to really enjoy it. I didn’t enjoy practicing until I learnt purple haze, then I actually enjoyed it and was excited for the next song.
I’ve been playing a little over 2 years and I’m a decently good intermediate, I can play most of the intermediate riffs like snow by rhcp and more and I can do a 3 string sweep
My parents got me into playing classical guitar at age 7. I didn’t have much motivation in the first years and really started to play more in middle school. So I would say I’ve played actively for about 5 years, with 11 years in total. Honestly I don’t think I’m that good yet, but some important skills I’d say I somewhat have down include:
Fingerpicking (duh classical guitar)
7th chords (learning inversions atm)
Music theory (way ahead of my actual playing skills)
A pretty good ear
Basic lead with major and minor scales, sometimes some modal stuff
And bass! I’d suggest people to pick up multiple instruments, because this can help with your main one. I also have started singing somewhat.