In May, my dad and I went through some of his old stuff in a closet and I happened to stumble upon his old guitar. This guitar, being 40+ years old, still was in perfect condition and I decided that day that I would teach myself to play.
From a young age, I have not had a lot of musical talent, I couldn’t sing well, and although I did play piano for 5 years, I didn’t enjoy it and it always felt forced. Learning guitar, however, was something that I wanted to do for myself.
I started out by watching Youtube videos on the basics of learning guitar. I learned about tunings, scales, and chords. This was a lot of information to digest, and it was extremely overwhelming. Being left handed, I didn’t know if it would make a big difference in how I held the guitar or if it would make it harder for me to teach myself. My left hand was stronger than my right and it actually was an advantage when it came to developing finger strength and switching between chords.
Around a month into learning, my lower e string snapped. It was a combination of my guitar being extremely old and also quite cheap (which I found out when I went to get it restrung). We decided to buy a new guitar instead of getting it restrung, because it was more cost effective.
At first it was very frustrating because I would constantly find myself taking an extremely long time to switch chords, or whenever I fretted a chord it would sound buzzy. A tip that I would recommend would be to practice a lot. Repetition is key, especially when learning something that requires muscle memory. In the early months of teaching myself, I would often give up for a week and then come back to playing and find that I did not improve at all. Later on I realized that if I practiced everyday, I would improve much faster.
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Another tip that I found helpful is watching others play. Whether it be on Youtube or TikTok, I enjoyed watching others play guitar because it helped inspire me and motivate me to practice. As a visual learner, watching others play helped me adapt my own skills and mimic theirs.
Today, I have grown tremendously as a guitarist, and have found a passion that I will continue to pursue throughout my life.
Here are some songs that I recommend learning as a beginner:
- TV by Billie Eilish (simple chords, slow strumming, no barre chords)
- Riptide by Vance Joy (3 chords, no barre chords)
- Stranger by Olivia Rodrigo (4 chords, no barre chords)
- Ceilings by Lizzie McAlpine (simple chords, not a lot of hand movement)
- Glue Song by Beabadoobee (4 chords, not a lot of hand movement, one strumming pattern)
A few youtube videos and channels that I found extremely helpful:
