Are you taking guitar lessons?

Mesa you say!! And don't mesa with me.
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I am with a session guitarist colleague not long ago, at Pasadena's Guitar Sinner, and we are looking at some cymbals and a few other items for his home studio. This young guy is trying one guitar after another - mostly the top shelf (expensive) Gibson's, then onto Jackson and down the line from there. We passed by on our way to the register as an associate asked him if he could help him and his response was "I don't know what I need."

My colleague (British born) chuckled and said quietly, "Bloody lessons..." :)
 
Robert Herndon said:
I am with a session guitarist colleague not long ago, at Pasadena's Guitar Sinner, and we are looking at some cymbals and a few other items for his home studio. This young guy is trying one guitar after another - mostly the top shelf (expensive) Gibson's, then onto Jackson and down the line from there. We passed by on our way to the register as an associate asked him if he could help him and his response was "I don't know what I need."

My colleague (British born) chuckled and said quietly, "Bloody lessons..." :)
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PRICELESS!!!!!!!!!
 
eSGEe said:
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And then there's me...."Excuse me, Sir, but can I take this Marshall stack into one of the sound-booths so I can really concentrate on it's tonal qualities???"

Yes, I did that when I was genuinely in the market, but I don't do it just to see people move merchandise. I am always really quiet and low key when I am checking out a piece of gear....
 
I've taken lessons on & off, but it never went anywhere.
I'm with gball, you just have to get out and play with people, in front of other people.
That's what brings out the desire to rock and not just suck wanking on too many notes with too much gain.
When you play with others you're constantly trying to up your game.
No one wants to strike out and let the team down.
This, for me is the push it takes to reach for new things, to learn and discover.
Something "lessons" could not accomplish.
 
When I was 8 in 1973, i learned from Mel Bay Book 1. I learned "Over the meadow" and "Down the lane". It was all the hits from the 1800s. I never learned what a chord was. Within 6 months, I had enough.

When I was 13, lesson 1, I learned a few chords that were used in several songs I actually new. I continued lessons for 6 years. During that time, I changed teachers because I got too good for the first one. She couldn't teach me more complicated stuff that I wanted to learn. She was smoking hot so I forgive her. My second teacher was a working musician. We worked on classic rock songs to jazz chord progressions. That and a bit of theory gave me the foundation I needed.
 
Kerry Brown said:
The house band for my weekly jam is like that. Someone will ask them if they know a song. The bass and guitar player will huddle together for a couple of minutes. Next thing they are teaching us the song. In five minutes they figure out a song, show the rest of us, and we are playing it. I don’t have a hope of doing that.
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I have this exercise that I have been doing for many years. I put on a radio station (or these days a Pandora station) of music I am probably not going to be too familiar with and challenge myself to "learn" the song before it ends. Obviously I can't get the nuances on one play-through but usually by the second verse I have the key changes worked out and by the bridge I can anticipate where the song is going. I find that doing this is very helpful for playing with other people and learning/creating with them. One of the main things I try to do is nail the first couple of chord changes in my head before I start playing, and I can usually get it right on the first try about 75% of the time.
 
You tube song lessons, internet music theory course I have to get back to.

Just started this "Music of the Beatles" free Coursera course.

I would like to take a round of real / instructor lessons if for nothing else than to help me with mechanics.
Help me smooth out my picking hand motion that is like Bigfoot swinging a club.
 
gball said:
I have this exercise that I have been doing for many years. I put on a radio station (or these days a Pandora station) of music I am probably not going to be too familiar with and challenge myself to "learn" the song before it ends. Obviously I can't get the nuances on one play-through but usually by the second verse I have the key changes worked out and by the bridge I can anticipate where the song is going. I find that doing this is very helpful for playing with other people and learning/creating with them. One of the main things I try to do is nail the first couple of chord changes in my head before I start playing, and I can usually get it right on the first try about 75% of the time.
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I actually did that once with the intro / verse to Bob Seger NIght Moves, 3 chords G F C I figured out myself by ear.
Looked it up and boy was I impressed with myself for that small victory.
I cant make the chord changes to speed though, the G to F mainly.

Reminds me to work on learning that song.
 
gball said:
I have this exercise that I have been doing for many years. I put on a radio station (or these days a Pandora station) of music I am probably not going to be too familiar with and challenge myself to "learn" the song before it ends. Obviously I can't get the nuances on one play-through but usually by the second verse I have the key changes worked out and by the bridge I can anticipate where the song is going. I find that doing this is very helpful for playing with other people and learning/creating with them. One of the main things I try to do is nail the first couple of chord changes in my head before I start playing, and I can usually get it right on the first try about 75% of the time.
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I do that with the Stingray blues channel on cable but most blues songs are pretty easy once you figure out the key.
 
Chubbles said:
When I was 8 in 1973, i learned from Mel Bay Book 1. I learned "Over the meadow" and "Down the lane". It was all the hits from the 1800s. I never learned what a chord was. Within 6 months, I had enough.

When I was 13, lesson 1, I learned a few chords that were used in several songs I actually new. I continued lessons for 6 years. During that time, I changed teachers because I got too good for the first one. She couldn't teach me more complicated stuff that I wanted to learn. She was smoking hot so I forgive her. My second teacher was a working musician. We worked on classic rock songs to jazz chord progressions. That and a bit of theory gave me the foundation I needed.
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A kid on the next road over taught me to play a couple of AC/DC songs about 1976. Everything was just two-string phrases, but it was enough to play along to the albums and become the rhythm player in his band of friends who lived nearby...
 
The closest thing I ever came to taking guitar lessons was wen my buddy (from whom I bought my first electric guitar) showed me how to play proper barre chords. Other than that I've always learned by ear and from magazines and books. I used to spend hours and hours just playing along to records. If I had a dollar for every time I had improvised solos over "Live at the Fillmore East", I could certainly have afforded proper lessons for the rest of my life... These days I use the internet, of course.
 
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