Understanding Guitar

One Beginners’ Efforts

My wife and I got back from vacation last weekend.  We had gone to Mexico for 8 days and for the entire 8 days I didn’t touch a guitar. I had a surprising desire to play and fiddle on a guitar. Ultimately, I did make it the entire eight days without going though guitar withdrawal.

Now that the vacation is over, I’ve been trying to get back in to the groove of daily guitar practice. Even though while I was on vacation I wanted to play guitar, it has been a challenge to go back to my guitar routine (not to mention my work and general-life routine).

I started by re-practicing most of my “harder” material. I only had to go back a few pages in my book. I started with a slower tempo and was able to play though the Ode To Joy without a problem. The Ode To Joy was a milestone marker for me. I quickly worked the tempo back to what I was playing it at — 95 BPM.

After Ode To Joy, I picked up where I left off. I progressed further and I’m now in to playing the High E, B, G and D strings while sight reading whole, half, quarter and eighth notes. That is amazing progress for myself. A few weeks ago I had huge trouble with just the High E and B strings (while sight reading)… I was always fumbling either my fretting or picking hand and screwing something up.

I am also suppose to memorize the following pattern as it is suppose to help with finding chords and other musically important information.

A C E G B D F

In upcoming posts, I’m hoping to be able to explain why memorizing this pattern is useful. From what I understand right now, it has to do with chord theory. Keep an eye out for more in this.

I was right! Guitar and music in general does reduce one’s stress! Check out the article at Dy-sphoric:

http://dy-sphoric.blogspot.com/2008/12/guitar-music-and-stress.html

As I announced…

…a while back (see blog post), I decided to “start over” as it were. I felt that my practice wasn’t going anywhere and that I needed to reestablish my learning pattern. In my “re-effort” (is that a word?) I eventually stumbled upon (and blogged several times) about GuitarCardio.com.

This site eventually lead me to start researching scales and that presented the question “what was the most effective scale or group of scales to learn”. I eventually came upon something called “the box position.”

What I learned about the box position, to my surprise, is that it was not a set of scale patterns that one learns. It appears to be a description of playing within a single position. That single position doesn’t necessarily need to be the same pattern nor the same type of scale.

For example, the A Pentatonic Major scale in three different positions would be playing in the box position. Additionally, so would playing the A Pentatonic Major scale in 5th position and then the A Pentatonic Minor scale in 5th position.

The Box Position

I spent time researching and trying to understand what exactly is meant by “The Box Position” (a.k.a “The Box Pattern”). My conclusions is rather simple and straight forward.

There is not a fixed set of scales that make up the box pattern; every source or book can (and will) have their own method and scales. Take, for example, the link I’ve provided before on this topic previously: http://www.myguitarsolo.com/sc_box.htm

Their method of presenting the box position includes learning six scales in a specific order (I’m not yet sure if there is significance to the order); while another source, a book this time, shows the box pattern in all Pentatonic scales in different positions on the neck.

Both seem valid, and I have no reason to believe otherwise. That plus in all my research, I’ve not found consistent presentations of the box pattern. This lead me to the conclusion that there is no fix set of scales to make up the box pattern.

The Box Position using The Pentatonic Scale

I was in a bookstore looking to pick up a reference book on guitar scales. I stumbled upon a book titled “Practical Pentatonics” by Askold Buk. It is a small 44 page book about how flexible the Pentatonic scales can be and what can be done if applied, umm, creatively.

Now, obviously, due to copyright laws ( ) I can’t give away or post any of the examples they have in the book. That isn’t the point of the post, anyway. I want to share, in my own words, what I’ve learned and discovered from this book. Of course, if you become interested in this topic, I’d encourage you to purchase this book or a book like it (though, I’ve not found others like it).

Examples

Below are some basic examples. First, I’m going to start out with a basic Pentatonic Minor Scale in the key of A. [If you can not see the rest of the post, please view the post on UnderstandingGuitar.org. Most RSS readers will not display the following content properly.]

Read the rest of this entry »

So, I wrote a very simple chord progression. It is the “start” of a song that I’ve been wanting to write for my wife. Points! Anyway, it is a simple 12 bar blues progression in the Key of G.

At this point, the chords involved (I’ve yet to dress it up at all) include G Major, C Major and D Major. However, I’m experiencing a problem that I think most beginners have or will experience… I’m having trouble switching between the chords quickly enough for the pace I’ve set the progression at – that is, I’m not switching between the chords fast enough.

I’ve been practicing the progression with little improvement and keep in mind that I’ve been playing these chords for at least the last 4 months — almost daily!

To be honest, it started to aggravate and frustrate me… I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist. But I’m also very analytical, so I decided to do some research via Google search to find some tips.

I found two tips; the first one more helpful than the second one but the second one is worth looking at.

The first tip to change chords quickly: http://www.cyberfret.com/chords/changing/index.php

What the above article explains is an exercise to learn how to form the chord before you actually place your fingers down. The exercise is basically to form the chord and raise your hand off of the fretboard a 1/4 of an inch or so… Then, put it back (you’d stay on the same chord)… Repeat this process and your hand should (theoretically) learn the new chord’s form.

The article explains that putting the entire chord shape down at once is much quicker than individually positioning your fingers. (That, obviously, makes sense.. In practice, however, it is a lot easier said that done…)

The second tip comes via YouTube:

Update: [5/1/2008]: Acoustic Guitar Magazine published a great article along the same lines as this topic. Check it out!

I just signed up for a service called Blog TopList… Being that this is a new blog, I’ve been trying to get some exposure. Though, the primary content for this site comes from myself, I’ve always considered that a good portion of the content would be derived by the readers (either through questions or comments). And in order to add content due to readers, I simply need more of them!

If you find this blog is helpful, even in the smallest way, please click the button that says “Vote For Me.” Clicking that button, will simply give me a bit more exposure on the www.BlogTopList.com website, which is a list of Blog sites sort of like this one.  The thing is, is this blog has a very specific audience and will never have the follow-ship of some of the more general blogs. So, any little bump will help!  Thank you!

In general, I practice at least once a day. Sometimes, I practice twice a day. However, this week my wife and I are in Atlanta, GA. Beautiful city and it seems to have a drive through Guitar Center (It seems to have a drive through, not sure if they use it or if that is what it really is…)

Anyway, the point of this quick post is that I’ve not been able to practice since we’ve left early Saturday morning. The flight was at 7am CST, and we’ve been here ever since. We get back mid-day this coming Sunday.

I never realized how much I actually needed to practice. That is, had a strong desire to practice. I always knew I enjoyed practicing and playing. But, indeed it has become something of a habit for me to pick up a guitar and strum around on it after work and such. (I’m working remotely from Atlanta. My wife’s employer is based in Atlanta, and I was invited with.) It truly is very relaxing to just bounce around on the fret board…

Until next time, Regards!

Aside from getting this blog up and running, my all of my guitar practice sessions have included rhythm practice. After about 5 weeks in to playing, I had realized that I hadn’t been practicing rhythm guitar at all! To no fault of my instructor – He was giving me plenty of chord progressions to practice rhythm, however I ended up focusing on chord forms and ignoring the rhythm aspect of my practice.

As a result, I ended up with very little ability to keep time or rhythm. My pace was set by how fast I could change to specific chords; this is not a good method to practice guitar or music in general.

An Exercise

Here is an example of a simple “chord move” exercise which I’ve been using to practice rhythm [I do this exercise with various chords -- please feel free to use chord you are familiar with but do not forget to "push" yourself a little and try new chords]. This exercise is pretty straight forward.

I feel that it is extremely important to play this against a metronome. I feel that this is the best way to ensure that your timing is consistent and even.

I suggest that you start out slowly. There is no need to rush this at all. Get the feel for the chord change and please keep in mind that part of this exercise is to change to the next chord smoothly and without dropping a beat or rushing a beat (strumming before you are suppose to). Then gradually increase your metronome (perhaps in increments of 10 beats?)

Thus far, I’ve been able to successfully (within correct time, no beats missed, or chord-form mistakes) play through this particular exercise at a 80 BPM — I had started at 40 BPM a day ago.

Also, experiment with different chords – perhaps a couple of new chords that you picked up from a book or your instructor.

As always, I hope that this is a useful piece of information that benefits you in some way. Please feel free to leave comments, suggestions, questions, etc!

Welcome to UnderstandingGuitar.org – One beginner’s efforts to learn guitar and music.

This blog catalogs my time learning how to play guitar. The aim is to provide tips, exercises, encouragement and general information about the guitar and playing guitar.

Although I’m the main blogger – and this blog catalogs my time learning the guitar, the site overall is for anyone who wants to learn how to play guitar. And because of that, I highly encourage any and all community interaction. I will try to address any and all questions and I would love to hear other peoples opinions in response to my opinions. (Note: You do not need to “log in” to this website to leave a comment)

And finally, I want to express my sincere appreciation for your visit to this site and I hope that you return as a contributing reader!