When choosing an electric guitar online you will often be faced with quite a lot of information about the guitars you are looking at. I have written this article to try and help explain a few of these details in the hope that it will make your decision an easier and more confident one.

 I will start by briefly describing some of the more commonly used timbers. The main body of the guitar will usually be made of agathis, alder, basswood, mahogany, or more recently paulownia. Mahogany is used for a wide variety of guitars known for its dark properties as well as its light weight both of these combining to create a warm, rounded, hugely sustainable tone. Alder is used on top quality guitars and produces a brighter tone than other woods (like mahogany) and provides a resonant, well rounded tone with excellent sustain. Agathis is a good quality timber and is used for its good resonating qualities and low price of production. In the past basswood was usually used for less expensive models but due to its better resonance at mid and high frequency, and better sustain than alder it is now more commonly in use for higher quality guitars. Paulownia is a soft, light and warp resistant wood that is commonly used as a body material in high end custom guitars, it is used for its light weight, pale appearance, and its good resonance, it is highly sought after.

 The neck of the guitar will usually be made of mahogany, sometimes basswood, or maple. A neck made from maple would give a harder and brighter sound than one made from mahogany, and a maple fingerboard would have a brighter sound than a rosewood one.

 Finger boards are normally made of rosewood, maple and in some cases ebony. Rosewood is a term that refers to any of a number of richly hued timbers, often brownish with darker veining and usually of good quality. Ebony is a dense black wood and is used on some of the more expensive guitars.

 When choosing an electric guitar online you should pay attention to the pick ups, electric guitars commonly use two type of pick up, single coil and humbucker. One problem with single coil pick ups is that they pick up not just the sounds you are playing but a bit of mains hum as well. The humbucker was developed to over come this, a humbucker is basically two single coil pick ups of opposite magnetic polarity working together, the result is doubled output and a fatter, less trebly tone. Humbucker pickups can also be wired so that they are working in parallel, this produces a significantly cleaner sound but is fairly rare. When shopping for an electric guitar online information of the pick up configuration will usually be displayed like this: S-S-H , the S referring to a single coil pick up, and the H referring to a humbucker, the order of the letters from left to right is the order that the pick ups are on the guitar from the neck to the bridge.

 The last (and in my opinion the most important) thing you should consider when shopping for a guitar is the style – do you like the look of it?

J Weddell

Gibson electric guitars hold the claim for being the first commercially successful electric guitar introduced into the market in 1936. from this model, many more were fashioned, the most popular being the Les Paul series named after the accomplished jazz musician, Les Paul, who was an electronics inventor and one of the pioneers in solid body guitar technology. The Les Paul series is the most famous line of Gibson electric guitars.

Gibson electric guitars have many signature features and characteristics, starting with an asymmetrical neck profile making it one of the most comfortable and playable necks ever offered. This neck also features a larger neck tenon for maximum wood contact between the neck and the body. Gibsons are also recognized for their glued-in necks, a contrast to Fender’s bolt-on neck joints. The Gibson solid body electric guitar has a more traditionally curved body shape as well. Other characteristics unique to Gibson include the fact that the Les Paul strings are mounted on the top of the guitar body, not through the body. One of the easiest ways to identify a Gibson electric guitar is simply by picking it up and holding it. Gibsons are knows for their heavy weight. The Gibson electric guitar is one of the thickest solid body styles ever made. The company claims that the thickness of the guitar along with the kinds of woods used contribute to its weight, a factor they say creates a warmer tone than other electric guitars.

Spanning from their signature Les Paul series that originally included two models, the regular model and the custom model, the Gibson Company produced numerous additional models. The Les Paul series models were targeted for every level of payer and every level of price except for the true beginner. The novice guitarist market was filled with the Melody Maker model and then the Junior design. Other well-known models include the Standard series, the Deluxe and Studio series, and even the Gibson Robot guitar, a model that can tune itself by simply pulling out the master control knob and strumming the strings.

Famous Gibson electric guitar players include Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, Peter Green, Jimmy Page, Scott Gorham, Brian Robertson, Duane Allman, Ace Freshley, Pete Townsend, Angus Young, Frank Zappa and Tony Iommi, to name just a few! If you choose a Gibson electric guitar, you will definitely be in good company!

The only real disadvantage to having a Gibson electric guitar is with the plethora of copies and imitations that have saturated the market. If you want to stay true to the Gibson name and own a guitar that is authentically a Gibson original innovation, then you must be aware of copies and imitations. You can usually spot a “fake” if you know the features of a “true” Gibson electric guitar and carefully inspect any guitar before you buy it.

Peter Suhm

Being able to read guitar sheet music can prove an invaluable asset in today’s market. We all know that becoming a pro guitarist means entering a very competitive field. You need every advantage you can get, and then some. Before we go any further let’s first answer one basic question: isn’t being able to read guitar tabs good enough? If you’re looking to make a name for yourself or earn a living as a guitar player then the answer would be “no”. This by no means negates the importance of tab, but in a world that is often oversaturated with guitar players, knowing how to read guitar sheet music can make the difference between success and failure. Let’s break things down so we can understand them better.

Guitar Tab

While tablature or tab seems to be a rather recent invention that came along with the electric guitar, the truth is that it has been around for hundreds of years. Even before the invention of the instruments we know today as “guitar”, we see examples of tablature being used usually with fretted instruments such as the lute. Examples of tab in the Western world today date as far back as the 1300’s. In Asia tabs was used even before that.

In today’s world guitar tab is composed of six lines that represent the six guitar strings, four in the case of the bass guitar on which numbers are placed which correspond to the frets on the guitar. Most tabs, tablature, tab formats today do not show you the rhythm. The information presented gives you a clear picture of what strings and frets should be played. The tablature format does not give you information in regards to the notes (pitches) that are being played.

Sheet Music

The sheet music for guitar on the other hand provides you with rhythmic as well as note (pitch) information. This is very important becauseit is like getting a detailed blueprint of a hotrod car. It allows you to see “inside” and understand exactly how the parts work. This is fantastic because you can use this information to fix your hotrod if it breaks down, or build yourself a new one. In much the same way, knowing how to read sheet music allows you to understand and break things down, analyze your favorite artists or composers and use those techniques when building your own material, songs.

The ability to “see” inside the music gives you a huge advantage by allowing you to manipulate and direct the musical flow of your ideas in such a way as to achieve maximum impact. To put it plainly, the ability to understand sheet music will allow you to create and juggle musical ideas with skills far beyond what other musicians posses.

In reality, I don’t think that all can be reduced to a question of guitar tablature versus notation. Traditional guitar sheet music does have its problems when it comes to marking strings and frets to be used. Traditional notation for the guitar does allow for the string to be identified. This, when used in conjunction with the indicated note gives you the fret number. However this tends to fill up the visual space making the notation much harder to read and follow. A combination of sheet music with tablature attached seems to be the best answer. Notation will also allow for the indication of the finger that needs to be used for certain note.

While a combination of notation and tablature will yield the best results, we will focus more on sheet music in this article because of the simple fact that most guitarists know how to read tablature, so it’s the learning of sheet music notation that will set you apart from the rest of the herd.

Learning to read notation… hell or heaven sent

If you understand the benefit of being able to read sheet music but are intimidated by the look and feel of sheet music notation, then take a deep breath and relax because always seem worse than they are. I know the feeling of looking at notation and feeling like you are looking at ancient hieroglyphs. In truth music is not nearly as complicated as it seems at first glance. It just takes a little patience and perseverance to learn but the results are definitely worth it.

You might be thinking that you will never be able to crack the code of notation. Guess I’ll just have to prove to you that it’s not nearly as difficult as you may think by showing you some notation basics right here and now.

Say hello to the musical notes

Sheet music is usually written on staff made up of five lines. You can write notes either on the line or in between the lines. One easy way to remember the notes that are on the lines of the staff is by recalling the following acronym: Every Good Boy Does Fine (E G B D F). This corresponds to the notes on the lines of the staff as read from the bottom up. In order to remember the notes that are in this space is between the lines, just remember FACE (F A C E as read from the bottom up). So now, if you have to tell me what note resides on the fourth space of the staff, as read from the bottom up, you can easily think of FACE and figure out that E is the note we were looking for. There you have it, less than a minute and you already know all the notes that are on the staff. If you just put a blank staff in front of you and quiz yourself over what note lies on a particular line or space, you’ll soon be able to recall them without thinking of the acronyms listed.

Final note

So as you can see learning how to read music is not that difficult, and while it may take a little bit of time to take it all in, the benefits are huge. Stick with it and you will soon see yourself standing head and shoulders above the crowd of guitarists out there.

Ben G. Dressen
http://www.articlesbase.com/art-and-entertainment-articles/guitar-sheet-music-and-guitar-tab-which-one-is-better-1214913.html

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To be a good guitar player, one has to learn the guitar properly and master all its key parts in order to identify them while playing. For this to be possible during the first few days in guitar electric lessons there are various key places you must visit. These include

• Guitar code library
• Easy song tabs
• Top beginner acoustic guitars

How to read tabs webs from Jamorama

The most popular learning songs taught in the guitar electric lessons shortly after the first lessons are Christmas carols on guitars since they are easy and their notes are easy to master.

The category of the lessons once the learner has gone through the basics is as follows: (a) tabs, chords and lyrics; (b) guitarists who have made it; (c) styles of guitar playing; (d) types of guitars; and (e) use of amplifiers and Song writing.

Should you be wondering where to begin if you have been looking for a place to learn guitar electric lessons, then you will not be disappointed by trying the online lessons which are free and readily available from your home. Here you’ll find comprehensive reviews of all the top online guitar home study courses. You will be provided with in-depth analysis, screenshots, special offers, and much more!

The guitar electric lessons comprise of many guitar courses and are well analyzed and rated – research has revealed that there are many guitar training courses out there but before you embark into registering with them, you should mind your money, your time and the quality of the lessons. You will be surprised that guitar electric lessons online are exceptional and very intuitive.

Jamorama is one webpage that would offer you the best knowledge on guitar lessons. You can download a manual that informs you on how to manage your guitar. This is a simple manual on what are the key components of your guitar. This is a manual that also contains other tips on how to play electric guitar well enough. You can be a pro in a very short time without much cost.

And you will get a whole difference.

Learning on the guitar electric lessons will be more interesting if you involve a friend or someone who can listen to you as you make your practice. It will be thrilling, entertaining and will make you learn very fast!

Maxwell Power

If you have been thinking all your life about learning how to play the electric guitar and you’ve decided to put your dream into action you need to start looking for an electric guitar. Many seasoned guitar players recommend that you never buy new guitars or equipment. There are bargains to be found online and in the music stores, and there are so many new guitars that are of dubious quality that it is better to make it a policy to become better informed about your musical instruments so you can choose from the range of second hand guitars and equipment.

If you are forced to make buy a new electric guitar most of the top brands like Fender, Ibanez and Gibson have basic low price range models for beginners. Bear in mind that some cheap model guitars are difficult to keep in tune and this could take away from any advantage in price. You could take the route of simply getting the same kind of guitar as your favorite artist.

The Vox Pathfinder is a great choice of amp for the new electric guitar player with gain and tremolo built in and enough loudness to satisfy any garage band. The basic guitar effects you need are reverb and distortion. There’s a pedal named Big Muff that does the job nicely and you won’t need to pay a fortune.

For transporting your guitar a hard shell case offers the best protection even though they cost a lot more than gig bags. When you buy your guitar, also get a range of picks in varying thicknesses.

Once you get your guitar and amp home and set up you will then realize that you are not a natural born guitar player and that you are in need of a lot of practice over a fairly considerable amount of time. You have about seven or so chords that you will consider the basic essential chords for the electric guitar player so start learning them and the songs that you can play using them. Also don’t forget to have fun fooling around with trying your chords in different positions on the guitar neck  and making up tunes using your chords.

You need to strike a balance between learning other people’s music and creating music that feels good for you. Your own personal style can emerge from day one of electric guitar playing but it will undergo constant change as you learn more over the months and years ahead. But do not let anyone tell you to put your own style of playing on hold.

Whether or not you think that music theory and sheet music are boring and difficult, the truth is that no electric guitar player who has gone through the effort of learning that side of music has ever said, “gosh, I wish I hadn’t done it”. If you learn guitar without learning theory you will still end up being a guitarist but the sad fact is you will miss out on some gigs if you can’t read music.

When you learn to play electric guitar don’t be afraid of a challenge. Setting yourself goals to learn riffs and solos you like will keep you getting better. Keep in mind that you want to improve your technique and the way to do that is to try to play stuff that is a little beyond you at the moment. Part of working on your guitar technique is to keep your fingernails on your left hand short. Long nails stop you from fretting notes. To warm up for a practice session spend a few minutes going up the guitar neck in the first position playing frets 1 2 3 4 and then down 4 3 2 1 using alternating up and down strokes with the pick.

Gyorgy Huba

acoustic guitars use the hollow resonating chamber of the body of the guitar to amplify and resonate the sound of the strings being plucked, but on an electric guitar, this isn’t the case. The body of an electric guitar is usually entirely solid, and the sound of the strings being struck is picked up by something called a pickup, which basically measures the amount of vibration of a particular string, and transmits this frequency to an amplifier. The amplifier then magnifies this frequency to create a sound which is not only audible, but also usually modified or distorted in some way to create the distinctive sound of an electric guitar. Without a pickup or an amplifier, the sound of an electric guitar is less than impressive, and is by no means merely a quieter version of what you would hear with an amplifier.

The pickups work by detecting the amount of vibration of a string, because the amount of vibration is directly equivalent to the frequency, and it is the frequency of a string’s vibration that generates the note. By holding a string down against one of the frets on the fret board or neck of the guitar, the length of the string is reduced, and as a result, the string’s natural vibration of frequency is changed, and this in turn affects the note. There are different types of pickup that work in slightly different ways, but the most commonly found variety is an electromagnet. The electromagnetic pickups are bundles of copper wire wound very tightly into a small coil, and these are then positioned right underneath the strings. When the string is struck, it moves, and this generates a very small electric field measurable in volts, and this voltage is the signal which is sent to the amplifier.

Effectively such electromagnetic pickups work in the same way as an electric generator. These coils of copper wires are either found as single coils or as doubles, with the advantage being that double coil pickups are less likely to pick up noise from other nearby electric fields. In the 1950s the double coil humbucker was developed, and this used two separate copper coils, with one placed in the opposite polarity of the other, and this effectively cancelled out any problem as far as stray electrical field noise was concerned. These double coil humbuckers do create a different sound and tone to the single coil pickups, generally considered to be a much heavier sound, whereas the single coil pickups are used by those players looking for a much brighter sound, and usually with a much broader range.

Today the style of pickup is generally tailored to suit the type of sound that the player wants to try to achieve, and the general rule of thumb is that the smaller the amount of copper wire used in the coil, the brighter the sound, whereas the more coils used, and the more wire used in the pickup, the heavier the overall sound will be. There are also sometimes options to have the coil wired for extra switching, so that effects can be achieved by altering the way the coil works, and thereby changing the sound of the note dynamically. These effects usually require the guitar to have battery power to achieve the changes.

Although double coil pickups are usually the maximum, there are exceptions, and the Fender Stratocaster is one very well known example. The Fender Stratocaster actually uses three coil pickups, and this is what gives this particular model of guitar such a distinctive tone. In complete contrast, there are also piezoelectric pickups which use crystals positioned under each string, and when the string is struck, its vibrations very slightly alter the shape of the crystal. As the crystal changes shape, a very small voltage of electricity is produced, and by amplifying this, the sound is achieved.

Victor Epand

What is a left-handed electric guitar? Can’t you just flip a regular electric guitar over, string it backwards, and call it a left-handed guitar?

Well, maybe south paw acoustic guitar players can do that, but for any serious guitarist, that is sacrilege. As for the left-handed electric guitarist, however, that is simply asking too much. Due to the positioning of the electric pickup control knobs, simply flipping and restringing an electric guitar is not an option. The knobs that control the electric qualities of the guitar are situated on the body near the bottom of the strings. The placement of these knobs is relevant to comfort and convenience so that the musician can manipulate them with only a slight movement of his strumming/picking hand. Therefore, simply restringing a right-handed electric guitar will not result in a satisfactory instrument for the left-handed musician, even if he did concede to sacrilege.

How is a left-handed electric guitar any different from a regular electric guitar?
A left-handed guitar is one that is strung in the opposite order of a regular guitar because, as the chords and picking styles are designed to move from lower to higher notes, the thicker strings are placed at the top of the instrument’s body (as it is positioned against the body of the musician) and the thinner strings at the bottom. A left-handed guitar is held with body of the instrument in front and to the right of the musician, the neck reaching out to the left. The fingers on the left hand are then used to press the strings against the neck so that when the strings are strummed or picked with the right hand, the desired notes are produced.

Until only the past couple of decades, left-handed guitarists were encouraged to learn to play regular guitars simply because of a very limited availability of left-handed instruments, and even fewer chord books designed for left-handed guitars. It was also considered to not be very important since playing the guitar is ultimately a 2-handed art. People just accepted that no matter whether you are right-handed or a “lefty”, you would have to develop strength, flexibility, and speed with both hands, so there must not be much need for a specially designed guitar for lefties.

Lefties are strong-minded, though, and so the market finally had to respond to the need. Left-handed musicians no doubt spurred the growth of custom designed instruments also filling the market. Even though there are many more companies today manufacturing left-handed electric guitars, the fact remains that when you are out in the world of guitars, you are more likely to find awesome electric guitars that are not made for the south paw. Don’t let this discourage you though because even a quick web search will bring up thousands of retailers, one of which is bound to have your dream left-handed electric guitar!

Peter Suhm

If you want to learn to play Flamenco guitar you will find that the basic left hand techniques are the same as the ones you would use in other guitar styles. The right hand techniques for Flamenco playing are more challenging, especially if you have not done any finger style playing before.

Your right hand technique need not be particularly advanced to allow you to add the Flamenco sound to your playing but you should always aim for a clean sound. You will find many amateur, and some professional Flamenco guitar players that you might find on YouTube or on Flamenco records from the nineteen sixties do not pay a hell of a lot of attention to clean notes. There is a school of thought that rough technique is okay if the passion is in the playing. This might apply to guys who have been playing Flamenco all their lives, but if you are fluffing notes it means you haven’t practiced enough.

Let’s think for a minute about where you are going to find Flamenco guitar lessons. The answer is YouTube or similar video sites. The Flamenco guitar videos available on the internet will vary in quality of playing but most of the lessons that focus on specific techniques are generally quite useful to beginner Flamenco guitar players.

The techniques you will be learning are Picardo which is the picking style Flamenco players use to play scale passages, Tremolo which allows the guitar player to play solos made up of long notes while playing bass accompaniment at the same time and Rasqueado which covers the aggressive and expressive strumming techniques which help give Flamenco guitar playing its unique sound.

Some of the professional guitarists you should be listening to are Paco De Lucia, Vicente Amigo, Sabicas, Diego Del Gastor, Serranito and Paco Pena. The lessons available are often given by guitarists whose names don’t sound very Spanish but if you can get a technique that you like from some guy named Hung Li O’reilly what’s the harm? One Flamenco guitar teacher you will find giving good advice and material in the form of video Flamenco guitar lessons is Sal Bonavita.

Back in the nineteen sixties and seventies there were a few guitarists giving “Flamenco” concerts all over the world to big audiences. Their publicity announced that their greatness but they were regarded as nowhere near the class of the guitarists I mentioned above, and have nothing to offer the Flamenco student. So if you come across videos featuring Carlos Montoya, Manitas De Plata and Juan Serrano, don’t waste too much time on them. I don’t want to badmouth artists who have given many people pleasure through their concerts and records but sometimes newbies waste time trying to learn material that will not benefit them in any way.

If you are looking for instruction books on Flamenco guitar, you should look for Toques Flamencos by Paco Pena. In spite of what I wrote above, if you find one of the guitar tutors by Juan Serrano they will at least give you a good grounding in the basics.

Ricky Sharples
http://www.articlesbase.com/music-articles/learn-to-play-flamenco-guitar-743084.html

If you want to learn to play Flamenco guitar you will find that the basic left hand techniques are the same as the ones you would use in other guitar styles. The right hand techniques for Flamenco playing are more challenging, especially if you have not done any finger style playing before.

Your right hand technique need not be particularly advanced to allow you to add the Flamenco sound to your playing but you should always aim for a clean sound. You will find many amateur, and some professional Flamenco guitar players that you might find on YouTube or on Flamenco records from the nineteen sixties do not pay a hell of a lot of attention to clean notes. There is a school of thought that rough technique is okay if the passion is in the playing. This might apply to guys who have been playing Flamenco all their lives, but if you are fluffing notes it means you haven’t practiced enough.

Let’s think for a minute about where you are going to find Flamenco guitar lessons. The answer is YouTube or similar video sites. The Flamenco guitar videos available on the internet will vary in quality of playing but most of the lessons that focus on specific techniques are generally quite useful to beginner Flamenco guitar players.

The techniques you will be learning are Picardo which is the picking style Flamenco players use to play scale passages, Tremolo which allows the guitar player to play solos made up of long notes while playing bass accompaniment at the same time and Rasqueado which covers the aggressive and expressive strumming techniques which help give Flamenco guitar playing its unique sound.

Some of the professional guitarists you should be listening to are Paco De Lucia, Vicente Amigo, Sabicas, Diego Del Gastor, Serranito and Paco Pena. The lessons available are often given by guitarists whose names don’t sound very Spanish but if you can get a technique that you like from some guy named Hung Li O’reilly what’s the harm? One Flamenco guitar teacher you will find giving good advice and material in the form of video Flamenco guitar lessons is Sal Bonavita.

Back in the nineteen sixties and seventies there were a few guitarists giving “Flamenco” concerts all over the world to big audiences. Their publicity announced that their greatness but they were regarded as nowhere near the class of the guitarists I mentioned above, and have nothing to offer the Flamenco student. So if you come across videos featuring Carlos Montoya, Manitas De Plata and Juan Serrano, don’t waste too much time on them. I don’t want to badmouth artists who have given many people pleasure through their concerts and records but sometimes newbies waste time trying to learn material that will not benefit them in any way.

If you are looking for instruction books on Flamenco guitar, you should look for Toques Flamencos by Paco Pena. In spite of what I wrote above, if you find one of the guitar tutors by Juan Serrano they will at least give you a good grounding in the basics.

Ricky Sharples
http://www.articlesbase.com/music-articles/learn-to-play-flamenco-guitar-743084.html