A question for guitar players

Hello, JustMe!

I don't play myself. I did have two Friends here who did play. Unfortunately, they don't post here anymore.

A couple weeks back I ran across somebody with a beautiful guitar avatar. I just sent her a PM, asking if she plays, if she wouldn't mind taking a look at your thread. She doesn't post every day, but hopefully she'll be back soonish.....

Fingers.....you know Jerry Garcia? Grateful Dead? Just happens to be my all-time favorite! Anyway, he was missing most of his middle finger on his right hand, due to a childhood accident. He always said it made him a better guitar player!

But you keep your fingers.....just the way they are, JustMe!

If I run across any more guitar players, I'll be sure to send them over here.

j8a

Hope I can offer some insight here since I'm far from being an official "guitarist".

Just so you know where I'm coming from: I studied piano for 8 years starting at age 8, played trumpet for 1 in high school and started teaching myself electric guitar (my dream instrument) as an adult. I took a few community classes but never got around to privates.

1. Guitar is very similar to piano in that they're percussive strings and in their ability to carry both melody and harmony. This similarity can vary depending on what style of music you want to play. I had no problems understanding chords, but tablature drove me friggin' NUTS. I refused to use it. Since so much guitar music is based on that, I really limited myself. You don't need a specific kind of fingers to play piano...long ones give you a better span (very important), but shorter ones do tend to be faster. It's all in what you want to do. Same with guitar.

2. Are you playing acoustic or classical? I'm really only familiar with the world of electrics, but I don't believe the string material changes the spacing. You can use either nylon or steel on an acoustic depending on your preferences, nylon being easier on the fingers.

3. You're right, acoustic doesn't give you a lot of options when it comes to carrying the melody...this isn't to say you can't solo, you just won't find a lot of music for that purpose. What I picked up from guitar though, is that versatility is key, so studying both rhythm and lead will just make you better.

4. Again, I'm an electric girl (check the pic) but I believe Flamenco is intented to be played on a classical as opposed to acoustic guitar. Either way though, with practice, you might not be recording an album, but I believe you can pick up the technique to play well.

Good luck!

Hi Justme!

I'll try to start out by just answering the questions you've posted to the best of my ability!

1. Nope, you definitely don't need a specific type of fingers to play the guitar. It is very common, and was so in my case as well, that when you begin playing, and until you build up some finger strength and agility, your fingers will undoubtedly touch the adjacent strings to the ones you are trying to play and lead to a dull, mushy kind of sound.

It was extremely frustrating to me, and much more prevalent on certain chords. It does take quite a bit of time to build the strength and agility, so please don't get frustrated. It is a common occurrence for most when they begin playing.

2. I have a steel string acoustic guitar. I have never played on nylon strings, so I'm not familiar with the difference. I do know that your friend is right about the steel strings, though. I would say 6 months of consistent playing and daily practice is a very accurate estimation of the time it takes to build some pretty good callouses!

3. Alas, unless you want to take several more years and learn the clawhammer style of finger picking the guitar (think Mark Knopfler, Tommy Emmanuel, Chet Atkins, etc...), you will be destined to playing mostly accompanying chords, or harmony. Once you learn the scales that the chords are built on, you should be able to play a little more "solo" type stuff, but most of the music you will find for the acoustic is meant as accompaniment.

4. I know zip, nada, nothing about playing flamenco. I hope someone else can help you with that answer!

I don't know your age, and if you're considerably younger than me this might not appeal to you, but I found that the music of the Eagles was all pretty straightforward, and each song only contained from 4-6 chords throughout. Being able to play these "actual songs" relatively early on in my playing at least gave me the encouragement to continue when it might have been otherwise too frustrating.

I really hope this helps a little, and if I can answer anything else, please let me know!

I'm no expert guitar player, but I manage to do alright for myself.

1) I have kinda fat fingers, and I manage to do alright. I think once you've been playing more regularly for a while you will find your fingers find there way into the right places a lot easier.

2) I have both a steel string electric and a nylon string classical guitars. Nylon strings are much easier on your fingers however they also require more pressure to push down to get a clear sound. It really comes down to preference and what type of music you want to play. I personally am planning to pick up a steel string acoustic sometime in the not to distant future.

3) I don't really have any suggest songs. I just learn to play songs that I enjoy. Also, depending on your skill level and what style you're playing, you can play both a melody and a harmony/chords at the same time.

4) If you practice hard enough, I'm sure you'll be able to play some decent flamenco on a few years.