Beginner Archives - GUITARHABITS

How to Create Unshakable Guitar Habits

June 13, 2019 By Klaus Crow 6 Comments

Guitar habits, we want them, we need them, and we have to give them a place into our daily lives in order to reap the rewards of our efforts, to discover the boundless possibilities on the guitar neck, to learn the endless shapes and sounds and fulfil our vocation to the musicians life.

Guitar habits give you purpose, structure, growth and fulfilment. Its the habit that changes your life instantly, Its all about the process. You have to learn to enjoy not just the beauty and victory of your practice efforts, but also the struggle of the challenge you face. You have to enjoy the practice itself. Cultivate pleasantness in finding your way to make the guitar sound the way you want it. Be mindful, calm and focused on tiny improvements. It’s all about the tiny improvements that add up and move you towards an accomplished guitar player.

The Guitar habit sticks when not the goal but the proces has become your greatest friend. When you find a way to enjoy the process to the fullest, and learn to love and appreciate every aspect that comes your way you have created a friend for life. A beautiful, deeply embedded, musical and rewarding friend. The guitar habit.

How to Play The Major Scale Guitar Guide for Beginners and Intermediate

March 28, 2019 By Klaus Crow 5 Comments

The major scale is often called the MOTHER OF ALL SCALES, because all other scales, modes, intervals, chords and harmony in western music can be derived from it. It’s your main reference for all things making music.

If you want to makes sense of what you are actually playing and learn to understand, analyze, create, and be able to play any chord, progression, solo, song or anything else that involves your guitar playing you need to know the major scale. It’s equally valuable for the rhythm guitar player and lead guitar player.

The major scale is also a perfect warming up and dexterity exercise to start your guitar practice with. Two for the price of one.

MAJOR SCALE SOUND
We all know the famous “Do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do” melody you learned in preschool. This is the actually the major scale we are talking about here. And it’s important that you know what it sounds like, recognize it, and know how to sing it along.

MAJOR SCALE CONSTRUCTION
The major scale contains 7 notes starting with the root note (1) and the scale is followed by the octave of the root note: 1(root) 2 3 4 5 6 7 + 8 (8 is the octave and is the same note as the root, only an octave higher, so 8 equals 1). Every other western scale, chord or progression formula is compared to and can be derived from the numbering system of the major scale: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

WHOLE HALF NOTE SCALE FORMULA
To form a major scale on a single string we use the Whole-Half step formula: “W-W-H-W-W-W-H”, where “W” = Whole step (2 frets) and “H” = Half step (1 fret). So going one fret up the neck is a half step, and going up two frets equals a whole step. You can construct a major scale on any note, and on any string using this formula.

For example: Let’s start on a G-note (Low E-string/6th string, 3rd fret), now go up a whole step to an A (note), then up a whole step to B, up a half step to C, up a whole step to D, a whole step to E, a whole step to F# and finally up a half step to G. So the notes of the G major scale are: G A B C D E F# G ( 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8/1).

If you want to know how to find any note on the fretboard check out
Learn the Guitar Fingerboard Thoroughly in 16 Days

OPEN G MAJOR SCALE
An open major scale means you are playing a major scale that also uses open strings. It’s the perfect scale for beginners, but also the intermediate player has to have this one memorized. See TABS below.

The New Guitar Regimen: Feel Great, Superfit and Improve Your Playing Faster

December 5, 2018 By Klaus Crow 10 Comments

To improve your guitar playing you have to practice regularly. That’s a no-brainer. To make sure you actually do that you must have time, motivation, energy and focus.

Time is one thing (if that is not enough), but motivation, energy and focus are equally important and really need to be in place to make your guitar regimen rock solid.

For some this may look unattainable, but it can be done.

Let’s take a look at the key ingredients to make this work:

Prepare
Yes, prepare, prepare, prepare!
1 – Write down in your calendar at what days, what times and for how long you’re going to practice (30 or 60 min).
2 – Schedule another 30 min extra time before practice (I’ll explain in a minute).
3 – Inform family and friends your practice time is sacred and they can’t disturb you while you’re at it.
4 – Find or create a quiet and private practice space, where nobody will find you :)
5 – Set up your equipment, your guitar(s), sheet music, and necessary tools (pick,capo,tuners,etc.) the day before practice, so you are ready to roll.
6 – Make sure nothing comes in between you and your practice regimen. Make it so.

Table of Contents
Next, write out the table of contents for your practice workout. How are you going to spend those valuable 30 to 60 minutes of full blown practice?

Make sure it contains everything you love to play and things that drive you to get better and better. Choose, print and write down the scales, licks, exercises, chords, progressions and solos you want to work on. Get your nice blues jamtracks ready for improvisation, find some ear training exercises, and music theory to study, and above all, select the songs you love to play.
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Top 20 Easy Blues Guitar Songs For Beginners

May 18, 2018 By Klaus Crow 2 Comments

For me guitar and blues are like salt and pepper, or like Yin and Yang. They are strongly connected to each other and found in every style of music, whether you’re playing rock, country, jazz or metal. So it’s a good thing for every guitar player to learn some vital blues skills.

Well, today we have a Top 20 Easy Guitar Songs for Beginners. While these songs are a really good fit for the blues beginner, they are just as perfect for the intermediate or advanced guitar player. After all, it’s all about the songs.

The Top 20 starts out with some basic blues chord songs and 12 bar blues shuffles, and at the end of the list there’s room for some nice beginner blues soloing. They are all excellent songs to start out learning to play the blues. Pick your choice.

If you find that some song intros are still a bit too challenging you can just skip the intro and start with the verse. You’ll learn the challenging parts later when you’re up for it. Now just have some fun playing some nice blues classics.

As with all things guitar, you need to invest some practice time to figure out and learn each song thoroughly. Some are easy, and some require a bit effort depending on your skill level. So if you’re really just starting out you might want to use some of these handy tools to figure out the guitar parts.

Each song title in the list contains a link to the song on Youtube. The “Chords and Tabs” links will give you the chords or tabs to the song and the “More Chords/Tabs” links will show you the official transcribed chords/tabs if you want to learn more songs of the same artist.

Enjoy the songs!

1 – Kindhearted Woman Blues – Robert Johnson – Chords – More Tabs

2 – Manish boy – Muddy Waters – Tabs – More Tabs

3 – Sweet home Chicago – Robert Johnson – Tabs – More Tabs

4 – Blues stay away from me – Delmore Brothers – Chords

5 – Take Out Some Insurance – Jimmy Reed – Chords

6 – Boom boom – John Lee Hooker – Tabs – More Tabs

7 – T bone shuffle – T Bone Walker – Tabs

8 – Smokestack Lightnin’- Howlin’ Wolf – Tabs

9 – Suitcase – Keb Mo – Tabs – More Tabs

10 – Life by the drop – Stevie Ray Vaughan – Tabs – More Tabs
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