Even 10 in person lessons would go a long way. I had someone in the family get me started plus maybe 5 lessons from a pro. That's all you really need. They'll get you started and help you avoid any major bad habits right off, school you on how to hold a pick.

Beyond that there are so many resources out there now I really wouldn't pay for more than a dozen lessons. Almost everything I know came from $4 magazines, a VHS tape of Paul Gilbert, and learning things off of albums. Now with YouTube and all the tools today, beginners have it all. Even the guitars got better for the money.

The place near my work offers $65/hr and $35/half hour lessons. I was thinking of taking 5 lessons or so. Should I go full hour or do you think I'd be ok with the half hour lessons?

It's been a long time since I took lessons but that sounds like a lot. But to answer your question a half hour is enough to keep you busy for a week's worth of practicing. I'd say just maybe sign up for 5 lessons and then see how you feel.

Once you know how to hold a guitar, get your hand positioning right (for both hands), know how tune the thing properly and understand basic tablature/chart convention, everything else you can learn and work on yourself. And you're not really even doing it yourself as you have the entire internet as a resource. Of all the guitar players I've known (an awful lot), there doesn't seem to be much correlation between being good and number of lessons taken early on. It's not like tennis or something where you depend on long-term coaching. Every other guitar player you see or hear you wind up learning things from just naturally. I still hear things all the time and go, "what's he doing there? That's a shifty little idea."

Plus guitar is easy to play. Jimi Hendrix got his first electric guitar at 16 or 17 and was working for name acts in 4 years. He was the face of electric guitar in 8. And there were kids learning that stuff in a year or two with enough practice.

You should be able to get lessons for $10 an hour or a lesson (45 min?) on craigslist. I would never spend that 65/hr for lessons! Thats like PGA pro rates or tennis pro rates.

And for the question of cheap guitar to start out with.... I made this video a while ago stating it was a custom shop fender and two-rock amp but its actually a line 6 amp and a squire strat. I made it to show that the instrument doesnt matter that much, especially over youtube.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZ9XNbYFWk4



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Yeah I thought the rates seemed steep. I'll check out other options

Definitely some better rates on Craigslist. One guy has a 4 lesson package for $70, 30 min per lesson. But who knows how legit he is. I even saw a Skype lesson posting lol, thought that was interesting

Prip, what are your goals for guitar? What kind of stuff do you want to be able to play? Do you want to write your own music or just play other people's stuff? Etc, etc...

i still really feel those are questions that have kept me from learning this damn instrument for years. def important ones to be able to answer.

If my trumpet teachers had introduced me to Stevie Wonder's incredible music, I'd probably still be playing. Instead they fed me a bunch of marching band **** and I lost interest.

What do you like?

I'll probably primarily play other people's stuff but that could change. I dont see myself ever performing, so anything I write would just be for fun.

I listen to a lot of different music, so I'd like to be able to play a variety of styles.

I would just pick out some songs you really like and practice playing them from tabs you can find online or w/e. Make it your goal to play those songs perfectly, exactly like they sound on the record. You can get a teacher, but like Bob148 said, they will often feed you a bunch of boring stuff that you won't want to do at first, you'll lose interest, and your guitar will become a nice decoration. Maybe consider theory lessons after you develop some dexterity.

i like a wide variety of music. rock, rap, pop, classical, broadway, and yes even that marching band stuff.
as far as for guitar, i think i like a lot of the classic rock sounds.

Having a good teacher is almost always better than not having one, at least for beginners. It's possible to do without, but I wouldn't recommend that unless you are a very self-motivated learner on a tight budget.

I bought a guitar! I'm now officially committed to this
It's a used Squier Bullet with Duncan Performer double humbucker pick-ups. The guy at the store that I spoke to said he's a huge fan of the guitar. Pretty much pointed me right to it when I asked about a beginner's guitar.

Here's an overall shot:



There is a small ding on it, shown here:



I'm super stoked right now. Gonna start looking at some stuff online while I wait to sort out in-person lessons.

good job mang. first step down. gl and let us know how it is going!!

Thanks
I'm starting here with the "beginner quick start" lessons: http://www.guitarlessons.com/guitar-lessons/

Then I suggest trying out the main riffs from: "Long Train Runnin" by the Doobie Brothers; "Locomitive Breath" by Jethro Tull; "Funk 49" by Joe Walsh. Joe Walsh might've been in a band by another name but I think a youtube search with his name should find that song. His rhythm style is pretty easy to emulate imo.

Also, to work on your ear, you should just put on the radio sometime and try to figure out the basic progression of songs. If you can figure out the baseline then you can play along with anything.

Priptonite: That's a pretty good basic guitar to start with. Hardtail, no single coil noise or distractions. You'll outgrow it pretty quickly but it has the basics if you want to focus on learning how to play for not much money.

That was the idea
I'm committed in my head but you never really know how these things go, so I didn't wanna drop a lot of money.
Here's a question, couldn't get any sound to come through my headphones when I plugged them into my amp. I don't have the 3mm adapter that came with the headphones so I bought one at the store that fits a bit differently. Wondering if that's the issue. Any ideas?

Starting lessons on Wednesday

dont know about the headphones issue. My recommendation these days is to not screw with a cheap amp if you want to go the headphones route. Just grab yourself a little Pod type device. Plenty on ebay also. At the upper end I still like amps when you have space and can crank them, but with the cheap ones modeling stuff will sound better. Plus you get a few effects to experiment with.

Google: Line 6 Pocket POD Guitar Multi Effects Processor

Just get an ipad/ipod app.

I actually have a headphone amp, think that would work?

If you really want to play guitar for a few years down the road/rest of your life, I'd recommend beginning with an acoustic. Although it is far more difficult to fret and the neck is wider, it forces you to finger the frets properly and using Barre chords on an acoustic seems daunting at first, but once you get that down you will absolutely fly on an electric.

Make sure you practice doing arpeggio exercises that make you go across several frets so you get used to using your pinky and ring fingers in awkward spots. Also, you can use the incentive of getting good at acoustic to get yourself an electric. Don't get discouraged because everyone thinks its impossible at first but within a few months you'll be playing songs you've known forever.

For modeling, there is also the SPICE-based computer stuff like Peavey ReValver. I don't think it's all that expensive, although you'd need a preamp interface of some sort I believe. The fidelity is really good for this type of modeling since it recreates each stage of a tube amp with analog component modeling (different than POD technology), and then the impulse responses for the cabinets are very good. I think there are some free ones also, but I can't remember their names. Maybe I can dig them up later.

Edit: Found the bookmark I had saved. I will just link this post that has a lot of good info. The specific one I was thinking of was SimulAnalog which has a signal path accurate clone of a JCM900.