Learning to play guitar

After some deliberation, I decided to learn to play a new musical instrument - an acoustic guitar.

I researched available guitars, looking at Craigslist for used instruments, but purchased the highly rated Yamaha FG830 acoustic guitar from Amazon.com for $349.

Although I used to play the piano, I have no prior experience playing guitar, so I decided to find the best available online lessons.

I received the guitar on Friday, November 15, 2024. After unpacking it, I tried to tune each of the six strings (E-A-D-G-B-E). I tried various tuners (I was not too fond of the D'Addario Eclipse tuner). Some of my strings were way out of tune, and I had difficulty figuring out which way to tune them (up or down).

The GuitarTuna IOS app was the best acoustic guitar tuning application. It immediately showed how far each string was off its ideal frequency, and the guitar sounded beautiful after tuning.

I asked Perplexity.ai for guitar lesson advice, and it recommended the following (which I found to be excellent): 

Beginner Acoustic Guitars

• Yamaha FG830 

Beginner Electric Guitars

• Yamaha Pacifica Series PAC112V Electric Guitar

Guitar Lessons

• Guitar Tricks - Guitar Lessons  - $99 / year of lessons (Black Friday Special)
• GuitarTuna - tune a guitar to the standard E-A-D-G-B-E scale
• Guitar FBA Lite - Guitar Fretboard Trainer (a bit buggy)
• Guitar Blast - Learn Guitar Fretboard game ($6.99 for the pro version)

Voice Lessons

• Vocal Coach - Learn to sing

Music Apps

• Ear Trainer
• Notes Trainer
• Music Tutor
• ReadRhythm
• Metronome

Luthiers (for setting up guitars)

• Mike Reynolds (setup) - Mike adjusted the Tressel on my guitar to lower the strings

Fretboard Learning Technique (see this YouTube video):

1. Pick a natural note, then play it on each string (down and up) on frets 1 through 12. Do this 3 times, and move to another note. Then do this for frets 12 through 20. Once you have done all the natural notes twice, go to Exercise #2. 
2. Use a metronome at 40 BPM. Play one note per beat, and repeat Exercise #1. 
3. Repeat Exercise #2 for accidentals (sharps and flats) 
4. Choose any two notes. Play UP using one note (across each of the six strings) and DOWN on the other note (without stopping). Use the metronome @ 40 BPM. When it feels easy, go to Exercise #5. 
5. Write seven 7 notes in random order. With the metronome @ 40 BPM, play the first note going up, the next note going down, etc., for all seven notes (without stopping). When it feels easy, go to Exercise #6.
6. Repeat steps 2 through 5 at BPM speeds of 50 / 60 / 70 / and 80. You are finished when you can do Exercise #5 at 80 BPM.

Frets ("E","A","D", "G", "B", "e")

• A: 5,0,7,2,10,5
• B: 7,2,9,4,0,7
• C: 8,3,10,5,1,8
• D: 10,5,0,7,3,10
• E: 0,7,2,9,5,0
• F: 1,8,3,10,6,1
• G:3,10,5,0,8,3

Memorizing Frets at string dots (3,5,7,9):

• "e": G-A-B-C#
• "B": D-E-F#-G#
• "G": A#-C-D-E
• "D": F-G-A-B
• "A": C-D-E-F#
• "E": G-A-B-C#