Anyone know a free online site that has lessons on string bending? Starting from simple bends and possibly working up to simple solos that include bends?

As expected my practicing as decreased significantly since stopping my lessons
Even despite getting Rocksmith.

what do you think has caused the decrease? motivation, structure, excitement....?

Elements of all 3 I guess.
Part of the problem is definitely that I'm busy and often when I come home I just want to relax. A lot of the time I choose something like watching TV or playing video games over practicing guitar.
Maybe more defined practice times would work.

Try to just pick it up once a day. If you watch TV, leave your guitar by your side and use it during commercials. Don't pick up your phone or tablet, pick up the guitar! Just play for a few minutes even. Get into a habit a little bit at a time.

I have mine hanging beside my computer desk. I'm parked here quite a bit, so any spare time I just instinctively reach for it to play a little.

If anyone's a beginner at guitar and they want to learn a song that looks and sounds technical, learn Blackbird- The Beatles.

GIVING THIS A WHIRL:

if anyone is interested Berklee college of Music is offering a FREE ONLINE 6 week course of Introduction to Guitar

it starts April 29th (so sign up before then)

https://www.coursera.org/course/guitar

"By the end of this course, you’ll know how the guitar operates, you’ll have an understanding of the correct techniques for playing it, and you’ll be able to apply basic music theory concepts to your playing."

YouTube.com

looks pretty sweet. wonder what the time frame is for assignments. is it work at your own pace?

Thanks for that link, gonna take the class.
Sounds like assignments will be evaluated by fellow classmates in some cases.

my first time doing this so:

Each week, a new lesson will be released on Monday at 12:00 p.m. EST/EDT. Each lesson comprises a series of video lectures, quizzes, and a peer review assignment. The assignments will always be due on Thursdays, 10 days after the lesson's release. You will have an additional three days to work on the peer review—in other words, the peer review evaluations will be due on Sundays, following the assignment due date.

not a bad schedule. it isn't so intense as to interfere with a busy work schedule. nice.

Looking for some headphones for my practice amp to save me from angry neighbours and keep me sweet with g/f. Should I be looking for a specific kind of headphones or will any do?

Couple weeks ago my gf saw a Groupon for Center Stage Guitar Academy, an online guitar teaching site. It was like $15 for a year long membership so I figured why not try it out. I've been through about ~15 lessons so far and am really enjoying it. I find the lessons to be much more enjoyable than justinguitar. I didn't find Justin's system of learn 3 chords, how to switch between them, and play a simple song very engaging. CSGA mixes things up lesson to lesson, which maybe isn't the best for learning, idk, but it's more fun for me.

Yes, YouTube is the most awesome tool for any beginning guitar player these days.

Just grab this.

In general, I'd pay special attention to bending up to pitch. A lot of beginners are still developing their ear and are a little lazy with bends, and as a result the notes are flat and out of tune when bending.

When you're starting out work on bending with your ring finger the most as that's used for that task the most. You can support it by using your index and middle fingers behind it to add strength.

Real simple exercise here, just to get your feet wet. Just a few notes. First the timing is in triplets, which you count to yourself like this:

TRIP a let TRIP a let (etc)

nice and even, you can accent "TRIP" to keep it straight. This will come natural to you in no time.

As far as what to play, it's a simple repeating pattern where you bend & hold notes a full step. (Full step = the pitch is equal to the pitch if you played the note 2 frets higher).



The arrows mean bends. The first three notes fall on each syllable - 9 12 9 are fretted in time with "trip a let" as you say it. The bent note you hold for an entire "trip a let". The timing stays the same in the second measure although there's a different note you're bending.

For now you can do this using only your index and ring finger. Pinky bends and all that you can work on later.

This is an extremely standard and common type of pattern that is good to work on slow and sounds great fast, you'll use it forever. Like with everything else you practice focus on your timing, and pay careful attention to make sure you're hitting the correct note when you bend up.

When bent fully, the first bent note should be the same pitch as the first fretted 9. In the second measure, the bent note should be the same pitch as the second fretted 9. If you don't bend fully it will sound flat in comparison.

Again use your 3rd finger on the bends, and back it up with your index and middle finger for more strength. Bend and hold is really the goal but for now just to to get there.

To harp on this just a little more, a lot of players (including experienced ones) can be pretty lazy about bending to pitch. It almost always sounds amateurish no matter what else they can do and many don't even realize they're doing it. You have to get your ear trained to catch that so you don't develop a bad habit, and never let your fingers decide when they're done working because they're lazy.

[There's a time for slight and partial bends done intentionally, but you'll figure that part out as you go.]

EDIT: Damn didn't realize I was responding to an old post

That is true. There are loads of guitar tutorials there. The trouble is though that it can become confusing for someone just starting out as they 'flit' from one to another.

I think it is always preferable to have a systematic approach to learning the guitar to get the fundamentals under your belt. After that, the various videos will make more sense and the 'artist' can then branch out into whatever genre they prefer.

I feel as though learning by tab or being told exactly what to play is good for short term learning but not always the best route for equipping yourself with guitar knowledge. Youtube lessons and the like are sort of a stepping stone I feel.

The real treat with computers is the ability to rewind, or even loop certain parts, slow them down, to learn them by transcription or whatever. Although very time consuming, it allows you to learn how guitar players think or use the fretboard based on sound alone. Training your "ear-hand" coordination is probably the best thing you can do.

I just wish I had more time to practice this way. I'm so terrible at lifting music it's sad. I've been trying to transcribe the solo to Pink Floyd's "Time" for like 1.5 years, not very diligently but still, it's embarrassing and frustrating. Maybe I'll try mixing in some whisky to see if that helps.

Behold the power of Google and Youtube you can find lots of free online guitar lesson by just being patient using these online tools.

I myself found this forum and grab the chance if there are any site here that has the best free online guitar course.

So. I'm thinking of buying a guitar. "Played" in middle school, never did anything beyond that because lol I didn't want to score with the wommenz.

Anyhoo, here are a few options I'm thinking of:
Yamaha C40, $150
Yamaha F325, $150
Yamaha F335, $160
Yamaha FG700S, $200

Any real differences I would notice, now or later, among these? I recall someone mentioning setup is important. Would it be lame to take it someplace for setup after buying online or can I just live with factory "settings?"

Hi guys I'm trying to learn the guitar riff in "Party in the USA"

I'm having troubles getting it to sound good? I mean that I am hitting the right notes but it doesn't sound very good, like a low quality robot was playing them. I took a video, any advice?

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

Try playing along with the song and concentrating on the rhythm more than the notes. The pauses make it a lilttle tricky, but you need to feel the beat of the song in those situations.

I can tell from the video you are sort of just waiting mechanically before the last chords near the end there.

Yamaha makes great acoustics for a good price. I don't own one quite in that budget range but the FG series have been solid budget guitars for as long as I can remember.

How essential a setup is varies by each individual guitar, some are just going to be better out of the box than others will. Your best bet is to go to the store to buy one and try the things out.

If you want to do it right though, find $100 an an experienced tech to at least cover the basics. Even a modest guitar can be made to play great if set up properly. And I don't mean like the monkeys at Guitar Center who just play with the saddles a little and set intonation as is, I mean someone who knows how to cut the nut and do some fret leveling. $100 won't get you much but an honest pro will maximize that well.

Agree with Baumer. Play along with the record long enough doing what you're doing and you'll start to sound like the record.

For now, just practice it slow. Getting between the chords and playing it cleanly is half of it, get that first at whatever speed you can. Once you're good there, you just have to play along with it in a loop until the rhythm becomes natural and it will.

I tried to play it and the first difference I notice is that my picking hand is strumming in a constant motion up and down in steady 16th notes, at least most of the time. Some strokes I'm hitting a chord, some are clicks (at which point I'm just muting sloppy and not holding a chord), some I'm just swinging hitting nothing. It seems to fall in place and sound right between upstrokes and downstrokes so that's probably how the original guitarist did it. Also wtf this song is awful.