Strumming Success – Getting Started on the Acoustic Guitar

Welcome to Let's Make Music, the Show for Aspiring Musicians. Hello, and welcome to the very first episode of Let's Make Music. Now, this is going to be a different kind of podcast because not only is it an audio podcast, but it's also, in conjunction, has a video podcast that goes along with it. The goal here Let's Make Music is to help us aspiring musicians want to learn instruments, learn about music, music creation, music production, so on and so forth. Now it's not for the musical snobs that have already been playing and everything, and you know, no offense musical snobs, but this is for the everyday people like you and me. So on each episode it Let's Make Music, we're going to explore all that music has to offer, the trials, the tribulations that we all go throughout here, those that those of us that love music, okay, and those of us that want to create music or have a passionate a desire, an inner desire inside of us to make some music. So we're gonna learn all about different instruments, a little bit of music theory, nothing crazy, just basic stuff. We're going to think outside the box on this program a lot as well. So that's gonna be a good thing, I think for a lot of us. And I'm going to invite you on the journey with me as we explore together all the wonderful things that music brings to our lives. So sit back, relax, and on this week's episode of Let's Make Music, we're going to talk about the guitar, getting started on the guitar, and specifically getting started on the acoustic guitar. On this episode of Let's Make Music, let's get started. All right, welcome to Let's Make Music. We're talking this week on the episode about the guitar, specifically the acoustic guitar. Now, if you've ever wanted to learn to play the guitar, if you'd like to hear your favorite country strummer or your bluegrass picker, or just your even singer songwriter, and you want to explore the world of the guitar, and you've never held one in your hands or anything, let's just go over some basics real quick. First of all, I'm holding up and for those of you that are listening, but for those of you that are watching, I'm holding up an acoustic guitar. This happens just to be a tailor. This is an acoustic slash electric guitar. You can get a regular acoustic guitar, but the majority of the flavors out there nowadays are acoustic electric guitars. What this allows us to do is not only play it acoustically, but if you're playing out or in a larger venue around the people, or if you want to get an amp. Most of them have an input on the guitar or some plays that you plug in, and you can select from a wide variety of acoustic electric amps and so on and so forth. So this is an acoustic electric guitar made by Taylor. The first thing you want to do is get yourself an electronic tuner. They're very inexpensive. You'll tune your guitar string starting at what's called the low e here and just regular what's called four forty tuning or standard tuning. That's kind of what it should sound like. They're all tuned up, and electronic tuners are really easy to use. You just basically put them on the headstock here. Some of them clip on down there and you'll just strike a string and then you would adjust and it has usually an LED display that'll tell you when you're in tune. Or not. It'll have some type of like green arrow or the screen like green. Pretty straightforward stuff, right, So, once you got your guitar tuned up, let's go over the parts of the guitar. First. This is what's called the body for those of you watching. Okay, this is the body of the guitar. Obviously you have here what's called the neck of the guitar. The neck also has these lines, all right, These horizontal are vertical lines. Rather horizontal vertical line is that are called frets. And the idea behind a fret is you take your finger and you place it as close as you can behind the fret, and you'll change the pitch of a note because you're shortening that length from where the string's attached down here to where it meets up here. So if I do this at the second, say, and as you get towards closer towards the sound hole on your guitar, you'll notice if you push down the pitch guitarre and lowers as we go back. Pretty basic stuff, right, So I'm going to show you a couple basic chords today to get you started. Now, the thing you want to remember with the guitar is that you don't have to have the grip of death on it. You're squeezing the life out of the neck of the guitar like you're ringing someone's neck. You don't want to do that. Just enough pressure to change the pitch of the strings to hold down using again your finger tips for those of you watching, those of you listening as much on your fingertips, not the flat part of your finger, but your finger towards your finger tips. And if you're just getting started, this is going to hurt a little bit. It's going to be uncomfortable, it's going to be unusual for you. Have no worries. You'll get used to it over time, it'll become second nature, like when you learn how to ride a bike or a roller skater or whatever it was when you learn a new skill. Now, one thing I forgot to mention too, is when you get a guitar, you want to have it set up and have what's called the action set. The action is the distance of the strings as you're looking at it from the side, in relation to how close they are to the fret board. I recommend getting it as close as possible to the front board without creating buzzing or you don't, I'm mad. Okay, take it to a professional guitar luthier. They're called a luthier. They'll help help you get it set up, and expect to pay anywhere from twenty five to fifty bucks to have it done. Because it's a skill and it's a trade. They're going to charge you for it, so don't worry about it. Money well spent in finger dexterity and finger comfort later. All right. So that being said, we're going to show you a couple of quick chords to get you going. I'm going to show you the G chord, now, the G cord for those of you watching. We're gonna take our bad finger that you give everyone in traffic. Put that on the third fret on the fattest string, or what I like to call the low e string third fret, the pointer finger, the one you point at people with. You're gonna put that on the second fret of the A string or the next string down from the top of the guitar as you look holding it. Then everything else is open until you get to the second last string toward the bottom. You're gonna put your finger next to the bad finger that's going to go on the third fret and your pinky it's gonna go on the bottom. This, my friends, is a your traditional, very melodic G chord. So let me show you something as you can do with the G chord. First, we're just gonna strum down two three four, one two three, and you don't you don't have to strum hard, just put your arm, fall up the gravity. Take one two three or one two three. There you go. Now, another strum you can do is what's called the down up strum. And again I'm not going wild for those of you watching all over, just you know, within a you know, maybe three fingers with of the end of the soundhoul up in the bottom. So when you go down up, it's down one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four. Okay, pretty simple stuff. Right now. Where you begin to make music is when you stagger the strumming, or you do what's called the strumming pattern. And here's just a basic one. It's down down up up down up down down up up down up down down up up down up down. And what you're doing with that is you're just going down down, up, up down up start off. When you learn something like this real slow down down up up down up down down up dump down up down down up dump down up down Now. One thing too I probably should have told you about and shown you for those of you watching, is how to hold a pick. Now. Some people play with their fingers and you can. You can do that. You can just do that like by doing the following. All right, put your and you can use your thumb or your thumb and your first finger. But you know it's how mellow that sounds. Now taking a pick for those of you watching, usually they come and looks like a mini triangle. You want to take your thumb, put it there and at your other finger here and just give it a gentle squeeze. Trust me, you're gonna drop the pick a lot. You're gonna get frustrated. You're gonna feel it moving around in your hand. Don't worry about it. What I suggest to do is find a pick that you're comfortable with, soft to a medium, to start with medium thickness. You'll know what that means when you look them up on like Amazon or eBay, a local music store, and just carry the pick around with you in that position. There's plenty of videos here too on YouTube that shows you how to hold it. But that's basically what you want to look at when you're holding the pick. Okay. And then just you don't have to have a lot of it going in and hitting the strings. It's just down okay, very simple stuff. And again, if you're brand new to this instrument, the guitar, it's gonna take time. You're gonna be you know, oh wait, you know, am I looking on my fingers? And with regards to looking and checking out your fingers and everything, let me just interject here. Posture is important. You want to try and be upright as possible. You don't want to be hunching over your guitar. You don't want to be doing this a lot because you're gonna give yourself a bunch of pain up here in your back and your shoulders. Ask me how I know? Okay, So just pay attention to your posture, be loose as a goose, as they say, and just relax. Just let it happen. Music is all about expression, feeling it and letting it happen. So that's all we're gonna do today here on the acoustic guitar. I'm gonna put this down over here, told you just real quick, just real quick, to start us off on Let's make music. Try practicing that G chord and leave me some comments down in the comments section of the website or your favorite podcast provider, or you can send us an email at Let's Make Music at Purplepitchstudios dot com. Again, the email addresses for us is Let's Make Music at Purplepitstudios dot com. Drop us a line anytime. I'll be more than happy to get back to you with your music questions, especially about this week's episode with the acoustic guitar, and I'll help you in any way i can. If you're watching on YouTube, just leave some comments down below the video below, and again we'll be happy to respond to you and help you out in any way we can. So start off with the G chord. Start off remembering your posture, no tension in your body, and just relaxing and let's make some music until next time. We'll see you on the next episode.