Friday, April 04, 2008

Using the Internet to improve your playing

Posted by Jon in • Guitar Instruction

Guitar Instructor
When I started playing guitar way back in 1988 learning how to play was limited to either paying a teacher, buying instructional books and videos (and I’m talking VHS back then) and columns in guitar magazines. I had no formal training until I went to Birmingham Conservatoire in 1992 and then only in Classical guitar but I was playing rock and metal from the age of 12 so I relied on TAB books of my favourite albums, watching Live Without A Net over and over analysing Eddie’s techniques and reading ‘Guitar For The Practicing Musician’ columns from Alex Skolnick and Joe Satriani among others.

Now all of these options are still very relevant today and there are even more magazines and videos (ok DVD’s!) on offer these days offering lessons on technique and theory but the advantage of learning guitar in 2008 is the amazing amount of material on the internet. First of all there are the free resources, the free tab sites, the personal sites with lessons, the YouTube videos. These are all great but sometimes a little hit and miss. If you do your research you can find teachers online who offer that little bit extra like the excellent series by Mark McGuigan called Master That Riff where Mark takes popular rock tracks and teaches you the main riff in detail with tab available for download free of charge which is very generous for such an accomplished musician but of course it does serve as a fantastic advert for his private teaching services in Edinburgh, Scotland. Recently Mark has also extended his series with Master That Melody which became an instant favourite of mine as I was introduced to the phenomonally talented Guthrie Govan with Mark’s transcription of the main melody from ‘Fives’ which is great fun to play!

Inevitably if you want great tuition you have to pay for it and there are a few sites already on the net which offer pay as you go tuition. This is the area I find most exciting and something I think is invaluable for beginners and advanced players! When I was a young teenager learning guitar I had no job and no way that I could afford instructional videos, if I had access to sites like GuitarInstructor.com and iVideosongs.com I think my playing would have improved at a much greater rate. The two sites I have mentioned are in my opinion the best that I have found so far and out of the two GuitarInstructor.com seems to have the upperhand at the moment because not only do you have complete video songs with on screen tab to help you learn your favourite tracks you also have tab transcriptions and video lessons. The video lessons are where this site excels, it has lessons from professional guitarists with amazing technique such as Eric Johnson, Joe Bonamassa, Troy Stetina and Wolf Marshall - now I know iVideosongs.com also has artists themselves teaching songs but I was always more fascinated in learning about guitarists’ techniques and tips so these artist lessons really appeal to me. Video lessons and video songs are $1.99 each which is incredible value when you think that you are getting an 8 minute 1-on-1 lesson in a specific area. You now have a choice of who teaches you what technique, want to learn arpeggios? Check out Wolf Marshall or Troy Stetina’s lessons, want to learn some Jazz licks? How about a lesson from the legendary Larry Carlton? It is still early days for these websites but they already have a formidable arsenal of instructors just check out this list!

I have to admit I’m a little jealous of kids picking up the guitar for the first time right now!

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on 04/04 at 01:56 PM

Hi Jon
This is a great post for folks trying to sort thru the wheat and chaff of all the learning options available at the moment.  Some of the stuff out there is good, much of it is very sketch, so it’s helpful to get your take on it.
I would offer the thought though that for a lot of folks, learning a complete and accurate song is the new news and real attraction—as you point out, there’s been technique and riff oriented instruction available for a long time and in lots of formats.  Legally accurate and complete songs on the Internet is the real breakthrough. Even though it is still in beta, iVideosongs has a lot of songs including from the Beatles (!), some guitar icons like Alex Lifeson and younger artists such as Switchfoot.
Disclosure—these guys are my friends and I do some work with them.
thanks

Jon on 04/04 at 02:37 PM

Hi Robert, thanks for stopping by. Yes most people do want to learn entire songs, Learning guitar is a very subjective thing and I have always enjoyed working songs out and using TAB when I get stuck on trickier runs. Having people like Alex Lifeson as guest instructors on iVideosongs.com is a massive deal and a very exciting breakthrough. I forgot to mention another site http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/ who also have lots of great video lessons!

James on 04/04 at 07:09 PM

I think the preference for songs vs techniques probably changes under circumstances and experience. Nowadays I’d rather learn some cool technique and try and apply it myself, and merge it into my own style. When I started playing I wanted to play whole Iron Maiden, Van Halen and Metallica songs! And that was cool, because that’s how I learnt to play.

I guess if I was gigging in a cover band then full song instruction would be very useful, but with my guitar playing time ever decreasing a nice little nugget is most useful to me now.

Tony hogan on 04/04 at 09:40 PM

Hi jon

this site is stealing my whole posts, have you had aproblem with it?
findlefthandedguitars .  com/

Tony

Jon on 04/05 at 08:05 AM

Hi Tony, I haven’t seen that site before but I’ll have a look through and see if there are any of my posts on there! I would contact the site if they are stealing content and tell them to remove the posts though.

Matthew Cook on 04/08 at 04:58 AM

I started learning from private guitar lessons and books and dvds.  I still watch live without a net to see eddies guitar playing technique.  A few years ago I saw him play live here in Canada!

Toronto Condos on 04/20 at 12:47 AM

Nowadays I’d rather learn some cool technique and try and apply it myself, and merge it into my own style. When I started playing I wanted to play whole Iron Maiden, Van Halen and Metallica songs! And that was cool, because that’s how I learnt to play.
Toronto condos

Jon on 04/20 at 06:13 PM

Yes me too, I pretty much learned guitar from learning Iron Maiden’s “Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son”, Metallica’s “And Justice For All...” and Van Halen! In fact, its a bloody good recipe for guitar tuition!

for sale canada on 05/13 at 11:23 PM

I learnt purely from the net. Have never picked up a guitar book in my life. It’s defiantly the best way, just search on youtube for vids.

Jon on 05/14 at 07:51 AM

Well everybody is different there is certainly a lot of information, lessons and videos on the net and it is becoming increasingly useful but I still love using books too.

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