I was at a friends house today and he was cleaning out his loft and found an old acoustic guitar – my friend knowing that I've always been interested in learning the guitar but never had the money to buy one asked if I would like it, now that I have the guitar I'm a little confused on where I start…… would anyone be able to give me some advice on where would be a good starting point?
Regards
Blue
First take a look at Nils' basic setup page
http://home.nycap.rr.com/nils/BasicGuitarSetup.htm
and make sure the guitar is playable. New strings at the very least will probably help :D
Then fumble's link :D
What type of music are you interested in?
"Things may get a whole lot worse/ Before suddenly falling apart"
Steely Dan
"Look at me coyote, don't let a little road dust put you off" Knopfler
Probably the first thing you need to do is change your strings. New strings will make a huge difference in sound if they are old. Then you will need to get a tuner, and tune up.
If you can afford lessons, they are the way to go, if not there are several great sites on the internet to help you along, and you will be surprised at all the help you will get here, be sure to click on lessons at the top of the page and go to the beginners section.
http://guitar.about.com is a good site too.
All that being said, Welcome to GN! Learning to play is hard and takes tons of practice but it is completely worth it!!!!
~Mike the Redneck Rocker.
"The only two things in life that make it worth living are guitars that tune good and firm feeling women" - Waylon
First take a look at Nils' basic setup page
http://home.nycap.rr.com/nils/BasicGuitarSetup.htm
and make sure the guitar is playable. New strings at the very least will probably help :D
Then fumble's link :D
What type of music are you interested in?
Luckily my friend also had some new strings for it so it also has brand new strings on it :) – Now this is the weird part I listen to music by bands like funeral for a friend and I hate Kate but at the moment I would be more then happy just learning anything to build up my confidence and familiarity with guitars in general before buying an electric one (I would also need to save up to buy one as I'm strapped for cash at the moment which also means lessons are out of the question),
Oh i just thought - does the make/modle of the guitar make any difference?
Well, if you don't mind some older songs, https://www.guitarnoise.com/topics/easy-guitar-songs/
start at the bottom
The make/ model shouldn't make a difference, but out of shear curiosity, what is it?
"Things may get a whole lot worse/ Before suddenly falling apart"
Steely Dan
"Look at me coyote, don't let a little road dust put you off" Knopfler
It's a Hohner - if that means anything to you guys
Here is a picture
DAMN! That Hohner looks just like the same Yamaha I started learning on (and still play). Great guitar to start on too (Classical Style Guitar).
Just start learning some chords and stuff man. Then maybe start out on David Hodge's Lesson on "Horse with no Name" That will help you alot. Hell its the first song I learned.
Have fun man!
GN's resident learning sponge, show me a little and I will soak it up.
It doesn't look like it has any dots on the fretboard, or maybe they just aren't visible in that picture. I think that'll make things harder to learn.
I think the first thing I did was strum an EM chord
It doesn't look like it has any dots on the fretboard, or maybe they just aren't visible in that picture. I think that'll make things harder to learn.
There are 4 or 5 dots down the side of the neck, are these what your talking about?
On most guitars, there are fret markers (most commonly dots) on the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, 12th, 15th and 17th frets, as well as dots on the side of the neck at the same positions. Without the fret markers it could make things difficult. But the key word there is could. The fret markers usually help in finding where to play certain notes, chords, etc.
As for where to start, I'd say the link that Fumble Fingers posted is a good place. Start with some easy open chords.
