Learn Guitar Blog

A Few Problem you May Face While Learning Guitar Chords

Did you know that there would be some uncomfortable moments when you first learn guitar chords? One of the main problems you will face is when stretching your fingers to cover distant frets, especially if you are learning the bass guitar. This gives rise to three basic problems:

- Acute pain in the fingers arising from holding down strings with fingers stretched.
- Pain, numbness, and sometimes even blistering of the soft skin on the fingers.
- Inability to switch chords rapidly.

The problems mentioned above are universal to everyone when they practice chords for the first time. As with all problems, these too have solutions.

The pain in the fingers is because they are not used to being stretched thus. The best way of countering the pain is to exercise your fingers before your daily practice sessions. Practice stretching your fingers over the frets, playing single strings as you do this. This exercise stretches your fingers, while also enabling you to increase the speed with which you move the fingers across the frets.

The numbness and blistering of the soft skin is because of the skin rubbing against the sharp-edged strings for long periods of time. You can counter this by rubbing methyl alcohol over the skin of the fingers prior to practice.

The stiffness of the fingers and inability to change chords rapidly is because you have never done something like this ever before. A good counter for this is to learn the finger positions for each chord and practice changing chords slowly. Increase the tempo of changing chords over time. Learn to play guitar today!

People ask me - why should I learn guitar tabs? I tell them, because, if you know how to read guitar tabs, you can play songs on your guitar even if you can't read music!  Learning how to read standard notation requires lots of time and effort, whereas learning how to read guitar tabs will only take you a few minutes to understand.

Tabs is a simple alternative to music notation and is short for tablature. Tablature is a system of notation that uses 6 horizontal lines that indicate strings and number that indicate which frets are to be played. So in summary - Horizontal lines are the strings and numbers are the frets.

Here's a quick example of the C Major chord:

E |-----0------|
B |-----1------|
G |-----0------|
D |-----2------|
A |-----3------|
E  |-----x------|

The x on the bottom E string means that it is not played during this chord.

This is a very short intro into guitar tabs. Knowing how to read tabs will enable you to play any song that you can think of.

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The other day, a reader of my blog asked me about playing the guitar. The only thing is, they're left handed! I had never even thought about the differences that our left handed guitarists must endure just to enjoy this wonderful hobby. I decided to post his email to me for you to view and possibly comment about:

"Hi Kirk! I am faced with a major doubt regarding how to play guitar, and I would really appreciate it if someone could shed some light on how to work this out. I am a southpaw, and have been wanting to learn how to play the guitar for a while now. However, I have always been confused about how it would work out, as I would have to strum the strings in the opposite direction, on a conventional guitar, to the way a normal guitarist, i.e. a right hander, would strum them.

So how does one solve this problem? Are there custom guitars for left handers, or is learning how to play guitar, for a southpaw, simply about reversing the order in which the strings are tied on to the guitar? This sounds like a silly doubt, and it probably is too. However, it has been in my mind for quite a few days, and reached a point where I find it difficult to ask anyone about it. I figured the best place to post this question is on your blog that discusses how to play guitar, and so here I am."

I directed him to JamDojo.com so he could pick up the same guitar training course I bought because the course covers left handed players as well. If you're a southpaw, you too can benefit from the course that they recommend. Check out JamDojo and learn guitar quickly and easily.

Recently I got caught up with the idea of learning how to play guitar. I am not a very Internet-savvy person, so when a friend told me to surf the web for tutorials, I initially was quite skeptical. I mean, you learn from a teacher, not from some website. And how many websites would be there anyway? My friend persisted, and that was probably the best thing he has contributed towards my life in all these years.

I was amazed at the number of websites my search brought up. The skepticism stayed with me till the third website I went through called JamDojo.com. I promptly bookmarked the site. Everything I needed was there, down to the lesson on guitar types – this was something I was really bothered about till then. I also managed to get hold of an article that talked about the advantages of learning how to play guitar online over the traditional classroom approach, and with that I was hooked. I am currently into my second day of learning using the awesome course the website recommended, and I must say it has been a great experience so far.

Guitar lessons are not that hard to follow! This was the conclusion I arrived at, with an immense sense of relief, after my first week of guitar lessons. I was dreading it, in a way, as I had heard tough stories from other guitar players about having to be in class on time, doing your homework, and while that alone may not be much, managing it along with all the other stuff going on in my life would definitely have been close to impossible.

So I figured let me choose the easier option, so to speak. I bought an acoustic guitar and started looking up websites. I found this one website which seemed to have some pretty comprehensive information, so I grabbed the course they were recommending and started my guitar lessons within a few minutes. Boy am I glad I did!

Beginner Guitar Lessons are much simpler with relaxation, positive thinking and a focus on your approach. These lessons are immediately available to you online and there are a number of quality websites to choose from.

To get started you need a guitar. Chances are you have one and never learned how to play, or began taking lessons that did not work out for some reason, or something else got in the way. Taking traditional beginner guitar lessons does not always work when you have a busy lifestyle, but if you have a computer, you can certainly find many online sites that offer free lessons or low cost guitar lesson packages. Some packages include video and audio files that are always more helpful when learning to play the guitar.

A wonderful bonus of taking beginner guitar lessons in your own home is you completely remove the uneasiness factor associated with dealing with a live instructor.


Learn about an exceptional beginner guitar teaching package here: Beginner Guitar Lessons

Ok, so you have a guitar but you have no idea what to do with it? How about learning a few beginner chords?

If you did not know this already, a chord is a mixture of at least three different pitches played simultaneously. The different chords, when played in the appropriate sequence, constitute the musical flow in a song. There are simple chords as well as complex chords. As a guitar player, you must know how to play these chords.

Learn basic guitar chords by reading this cool and informative article: "Learning the Basic Guitar Chords"

Are you a total beginner trying to learn to play the guitar? So was I only a couple of weeks ago. I tried all the "free" online guitar training sites and got exactly what I paid for. Man I was so bummed out. Then I heard about a cool new approach to training and I began my beginner guitar lessons.

I ran across a site called JamDojo.com. They recommended a method called The Beginners Guide to Unlocking the Guitar. I clicked on the link I found on their page and grabbed a copy. It was inexpensive and totally fun to learn. In only a couple of days I was able to play one of my favorite songs. I now spend my time showing off my new found guitar skills. What a rush!