Guitar Basics Lesson Video

By: Guest 9 months ago

thx, easy ... on the eyes and first step!

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By: Guest More than a year ago

very good video and lesson thx guys

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By: Guest More than a year ago

Greetings: You start out the video by saying to use an up and down motion for pick technique yet your scal demonstration shows all the notes using a down stroke pick action. Shame on you

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Guitar Basics Lesson

Hey guys! I want to welcome you to the first lesson of the series of Ten Basic Guitar Lessons brought to you by TheGuitarLesson.com. My name is Tom Fontana and I’ll just tell you a bit about these lessons. They’re designed to give you a thorough understanding of basic guitar skills and techniques that you will need to advance as a guitar player. Now, this is the first lesson, so we will be going over very basic principles, very basic techniques. We’ll just learn the name of the strings and start doing finger strength exercises as well. So let’s start with the strings first of all. Pick up your guitar and put it into a comfortable position on your lap, and just have a look at all the strings. No matter whether you have an acoustic guitar or an electric guitar, you will probably have six strings, the top one being the thickest and the bottom one being the thinnest. Some people, advanced players, they play on seven-string guitars, but I think you’ll just have a six-string guitar. Now, let’s pluck all of the strings one by one starting from the thickest one, string E, the lowest in pitch, string A, string D, string G, string D, and string E again. Good! So those are strings E, A, D, G, B, and E. And now, the reason we give them these specific letters is because these are the notes that we’ll get on the musical alphabet when we pluck the open strings in a standard turning, of course. As you know, the musical alphabet, it consists of seven letters, those are A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. But if you’re not familiar with the musical alphabet yet, I would suggest that you go up on to the website and learn a bit more about it since it’s the very fundamental part of music. So just go up to the website, TheGuitarLesson.com and have a look. So for now, just memorize these strings. Those are E, A, D, G, B, and E. A good way to memorize it really is with an acronym. I read once—a very good one—it was “Eat All Day, Get Big Easy” where the first letter of each word will be the strings’ name in order from top to bottom, so that’s just an easier way to remember your string names instead of just having the E, A, D, G, B, E. Now, some people will refer to the strings as strings one through six, and that’s okay, too. You know, one being the thinnest and six being the thickest right here on the top, but I prefer teaching with the names of the notes and so it just gives us another chance to remember the notes and where they are. Good! For now, just remember the names of the strings, that’s E, A, D, G, B, E or “Eat All Day, Get Big Easy.” Those are the names of the strings, and you get those notes when you plug them open without fretting anything. You’ll notice that there are two E strings and that’s because the low E and the high E are the same note. Only the high E is two octaves higher. Now, have a look at the little middle things on the neck of your guitar right there. Those are called frets, and you can play different notes on each string by holding your fretting hand in between these frets. So you have to not hold the middle part itself but in between them as close to the middle bar as possible, okay? So let’s just pluck the low E string. [Demonstration] Now at fret 1, fret 2, fret 3 where you have a dot, fret 4, fret 5 where you have your second dot, and so on. Now, these dots are very useful. They’ll help you easily see which fret you’re at or help you easily find the fret you’re looking for. Now, on every guitar, you’ll have a dot at fret 3, at fret 5, at fret 7, at fret 9, and two dots at fret 12. You’ll have you next dot at fret 15 and then one dot at every two frets until the end of your fret board. Now, this guitar has 22 frets. You may have more or less on yours, but don’t worry about it. Just count how many you have. We’re going to learn all the notes you’ll play and all the strings in another lesson. You’ll have to know the notes on all the strings to become a good guitarist, but don’t worry about it. I’ll show you an easy way to remember them, okay? But I just don’t want to get out of myself right now. We’re just getting familiar with the guitar at this state, so everything comes in due time. So now that we know the string names and have become familiar with the frets, let’s just play a C Major scale, okay? Now, this scale is just the notes of the music or alphabet played without any sharps or flats, but let me just show you. [Demonstration] And back to your starting note, the E sends—it’s the low E string. [Demonstration] So this is the first skill we’ll learn. You’ll see that it’s a lot of fun and it will start strengthening your fingers and start getting used to the notes. You can play with these top frets right here. But before I show you the exact notes on the scale, I just want to show you how you should be plucking the strings. It’s really important that you learn this right in the beginning so you don’t acquire any bad habits and just develop the correct technique right from the beginning, okay? So I want you to use alternate picking when you pluck the same string more than once in this scale. So when you pluck the same string, you don’t just pluck down all the time. Rather, down, up, down, up like this. So let’s just practice this a bit. [Demonstration] So just practice that slowly for now but really build speed when you feel like you can, and remember that it’s more important to play correctly than fast, so just practice it at your own pace and when you feel like you can increase the speed, then just do it. Good! So let’s have a look at the C Major scale finally. Now, I want you to get into position with your pluck by the low E string and your fretting finger is above the first three frets. And let’s just begin. Now, I’m going to tell you which string and fret to pluck, and also which finger to fret it with. It’s really important that you use the correct fingers since it’s the first step in developing the finger strength and coordination, okay? So first, pluck the low open E string fret 1 with your first finger, fret 3 with your third finger. Now, the open A string, A2 with your second finger, A3 with you third finger. Now, the open D string, and fret 2 of the same string with your second finger, D3 with your third finger. Now, the open G string, G2 with your second finger. Then string B and plucking it open, then fret 1 with your first finger, fret 3 with your third finger. Now, the open E string, the high E string of course, now fret 1 with your first finger and fret 3 with your third finger, and then you can play this backwards as well. [Demonstration] So going up and coming down. I want you to practice that everyday all day—okay, not all day but at least a couple of minutes a day, whenever you just feel like picking up the guitar. This should actually be your first practice around that at this state, so whenever you start practicing, just start off with the scale, okay? Just getting back to those notes, I don’t know if you noticed but this really shows how great an instrument the guitar is, in that keeping your hand in one place and by plucking the different strings at the different frets, you can cover every note on more than two octaves from one single hand position, so just look. [Demonstration] Okay, so you will be playing it like that. We’ll get there with good enough practice and you’ll be playing anything you want. We just have to take everything one step at a time. Learn the basics first, strengthen your fingers, build up that coordination, and you’ll be playing anything, whatever you want. I guarantee that. And really on that note before we finish this lesson, I just want to show you a great finger walking exercise that will improve your finger coordination, your finger strength and just get you familiar with every note on the fret board. It’s really fun and only one exercise package basically. This is what we’ll be learning. [Demonstration] So this exercise will utilize all of your fingers, your fretting fingers, and it’s basically just walking up and down the strings and frets. So it’s easy to remember but a lot of fun. So I won’t be saying which finger at which fret this time since I want you to line up your fingers one to each fret side by side like this, and pluck each fret with a different finger. So start with E1 with your first finger and E2, E3 with your third finger, and then E4 and just do that on every string. So string A fret 1, then fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. Now, string D fret 1, then fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. Then one string higher to string G at fret 1, then fret 2, fret 4. Then string B, keep it up, so B1, then fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. High E string fret 1, fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. Good! So all your fingers are on different frets all the way through and I just slide up one fret, so you won’t be using fret 1 this time. I just did the same only backwards, so frets 5, 4, 3, 2. [Demonstration] You can do this forever actually, just move up a fret after every walk, something like this. [Demonstration] And remember to use alternate picking, that’s very important. So just practice those walks, remember to use alternate picking and just get used to holding the guitar at this stage. You know, you can practice whenever, even while watching TV. The point is just to practice those finger exercises everyday. Now ideally, you will practice this everyday, at least twice, and your fingers will hurt like crazy but don’t worry. That’s normal. It will go away in a couple of weeks because you’ll start developing calluses which are hardened skin tissue from the intense friction that the strings cause. So just practice as much as you can. If it starts hurting, then just stop, rest a bit, continue on later or on the next day. The point is to have fun and develop your finger coordination and strength in the process, okay? Don’t worry, at first, your fingers won’t go where you want them to. They’ll just be all over the place, but who can blame them? They’re not really used to this kind of precise moving. I mean, I went through this. Eric Clapton went through it. Everybody did, so everyone started out as a beginner. Just keep practicing and it will become really easy soon. All it takes is some practice. Good! Actually, that’s the end of the lesson for today. This was your first basic lesson of the ten lessons brought to you by TheGuitarLesson.com. I suggest you watch them all. They are all focused on developing your basic guitar technique, so just go up to the website, download the rest of the basic lessons—progressives, you can, and I’m confident that they’ll set you on to the right path in becoming a great guitarist, okay? Good! So with that, I’ll leave you. Go back and practice and I’ll see you in the next lesson. Bye!

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Hey guys! I want to welcome you to the first lesson of the series of Ten Basic Guitar Lessons brought to you by TheGuitarLesson.com. My name is Tom Fontana and I’ll just tell you a bit about these lessons.

They’re designed to give you a thorough understanding of basic guitar skills and techniques that you will need to advance as a guitar player. Now, this is the first lesson, so we will be going over very basic principles, very basic techniques. We’ll just learn the name of the strings and start doing finger strength exercises as well.

So let’s start with the strings first of all. Pick up your guitar and put it into a comfortable position on your lap, and just have a look at all the strings. No matter whether you have an acoustic guitar or an electric guitar, you will probably have six strings, the top one being the thickest and the bottom one being the thinnest. Some people, advanced players, they play on seven-string guitars, but I think you’ll just have a six-string guitar.

Now, let’s pluck all of the strings one by one starting from the thickest one, string E, the lowest in pitch, string A, string D, string G, string D, and string E again. Good! So those are strings E, A, D, G, B, and E. And now, the reason we give them these specific letters is because these are the notes that we’ll get on the musical alphabet when we pluck the open strings in a standard turning, of course. As you know, the musical alphabet, it consists of seven letters, those are A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. But if you’re not familiar with the musical alphabet yet, I would suggest that you go up on to the website and learn a bit more about it since it’s the very fundamental part of music. So just go up to the website, TheGuitarLesson.com and have a look.

So for now, just memorize these strings. Those are E, A, D, G, B, and E. A good way to memorize it really is with an acronym. I read once—a very good one—it was “Eat All Day, Get Big Easy” where the first letter of each word will be the strings’ name in order from top to bottom, so that’s just an easier way to remember your string names instead of just having the E, A, D, G, B, E. Now, some people will refer to the strings as strings one through six, and that’s okay, too. You know, one being the thinnest and six being the thickest right here on the top, but I prefer teaching with the names of the notes and so it just gives us another chance to remember the notes and where they are.

Good! For now, just remember the names of the strings, that’s E, A, D, G, B, E or “Eat All Day, Get Big Easy.” Those are the names of the strings, and you get those notes when you plug them open without fretting anything.

You’ll notice that there are two E strings and that’s because the low E and the high E are the same note. Only the high E is two octaves higher. Now, have a look at the little middle things on the neck of your guitar right there. Those are called frets, and you can play different notes on each string by holding your fretting hand in between these frets. So you have to not hold the middle part itself but in between them as close to the middle bar as possible, okay? So let’s just pluck the low E string. [Demonstration] Now at fret 1, fret 2, fret 3 where you have a dot, fret 4, fret 5 where you have your second dot, and so on.
Now, these dots are very useful. They’ll help you easily see which fret you’re at or help you easily find the fret you’re looking for. Now, on every guitar, you’ll have a dot at fret 3, at fret 5, at fret 7, at fret 9, and two dots at fret 12. You’ll have you next dot at fret 15 and then one dot at every two frets until the end of your fret board. Now, this guitar has 22 frets. You may have more or less on yours, but don’t worry about it. Just count how many you have.

We’re going to learn all the notes you’ll play and all the strings in another lesson. You’ll have to know the notes on all the strings to become a good guitarist, but don’t worry about it. I’ll show you an easy way to remember them, okay? But I just don’t want to get out of myself right now. We’re just getting familiar with the guitar at this state, so everything comes in due time.

So now that we know the string names and have become familiar with the frets, let’s just play a C Major scale, okay? Now, this scale is just the notes of the music or alphabet played without any sharps or flats, but let me just show you. [Demonstration] And back to your starting note, the E sends—it’s the low E string. [Demonstration]

So this is the first skill we’ll learn. You’ll see that it’s a lot of fun and it will start strengthening your fingers and start getting used to the notes. You can play with these top frets right here. But before I show you the exact notes on the scale, I just want to show you how you should be plucking the strings. It’s really important that you learn this right in the beginning so you don’t acquire any bad habits and just develop the correct technique right from the beginning, okay?

So I want you to use alternate picking when you pluck the same string more than once in this scale. So when you pluck the same string, you don’t just pluck down all the time. Rather, down, up, down, up like this. So let’s just practice this a bit. [Demonstration] So just practice that slowly for now but really build speed when you feel like you can, and remember that it’s more important to play correctly than fast, so just practice it at your own pace and when you feel like you can increase the speed, then just do it. Good!

So let’s have a look at the C Major scale finally. Now, I want you to get into position with your pluck by the low E string and your fretting finger is above the first three frets. And let’s just begin. Now, I’m going to tell you which string and fret to pluck, and also which finger to fret it with. It’s really important that you use the correct fingers since it’s the first step in developing the finger strength and coordination, okay?

So first, pluck the low open E string fret 1 with your first finger, fret 3 with your third finger. Now, the open A string, A2 with your second finger, A3 with you third finger. Now, the open D string, and fret 2 of the same string with your second finger, D3 with your third finger. Now, the open G string, G2 with your second finger. Then string B and plucking it open, then fret 1 with your first finger, fret 3 with your third finger. Now, the open E string, the high E string of course, now fret 1 with your first finger and fret 3 with your third finger, and then you can play this backwards as well. [Demonstration] So going up and coming down.

I want you to practice that everyday all day—okay, not all day but at least a couple of minutes a day, whenever you just feel like picking up the guitar. This should actually be your first practice around that at this state, so whenever you start practicing, just start off with the scale, okay?

Just getting back to those notes, I don’t know if you noticed but this really shows how great an instrument the guitar is, in that keeping your hand in one place and by plucking the different strings at the different frets, you can cover every note on more than two octaves from one single hand position, so just look. [Demonstration] Okay, so you will be playing it like that. We’ll get there with good enough practice and you’ll be playing anything you want. We just have to take everything one step at a time. Learn the basics first, strengthen your fingers, build up that coordination, and you’ll be playing anything, whatever you want. I guarantee that.

And really on that note before we finish this lesson, I just want to show you a great finger walking exercise that will improve your finger coordination, your finger strength and just get you familiar with every note on the fret board. It’s really fun and only one exercise package basically. This is what we’ll be learning.

[Demonstration]

So this exercise will utilize all of your fingers, your fretting fingers, and it’s basically just walking up and down the strings and frets. So it’s easy to remember but a lot of fun. So I won’t be saying which finger at which fret this time since I want you to line up your fingers one to each fret side by side like this, and pluck each fret with a different finger. So start with E1 with your first finger and E2, E3 with your third finger, and then E4 and just do that on every string. So string A fret 1, then fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. Now, string D fret 1, then fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. Then one string higher to string G at fret 1, then fret 2, fret 4. Then string B, keep it up, so B1, then fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. High E string fret 1, fret 2, fret 3, fret 4. Good!

So all your fingers are on different frets all the way through and I just slide up one fret, so you won’t be using fret 1 this time. I just did the same only backwards, so frets 5, 4, 3, 2. [Demonstration] You can do this forever actually, just move up a fret after every walk, something like this. [Demonstration] And remember to use alternate picking, that’s very important.

So just practice those walks, remember to use alternate picking and just get used to holding the guitar at this stage. You know, you can practice whenever, even while watching TV. The point is just to practice those finger exercises everyday. Now ideally, you will practice this everyday, at least twice, and your fingers will hurt like crazy but don’t worry. That’s normal. It will go away in a couple of weeks because you’ll start developing calluses which are hardened skin tissue from the intense friction that the strings cause.

So just practice as much as you can. If it starts hurting, then just stop, rest a bit, continue on later or on the next day. The point is to have fun and develop your finger coordination and strength in the process, okay?

Don’t worry, at first, your fingers won’t go where you want them to. They’ll just be all over the place, but who can blame them? They’re not really used to this kind of precise moving. I mean, I went through this. Eric Clapton went through it. Everybody did, so everyone started out as a beginner. Just keep practicing and it will become really easy soon. All it takes is some practice. Good!

Actually, that’s the end of the lesson for today. This was your first basic lesson of the ten lessons brought to you by TheGuitarLesson.com. I suggest you watch them all. They are all focused on developing your basic guitar technique, so just go up to the website, download the rest of the basic lessons—progressives, you can, and I’m confident that they’ll set you on to the right path in becoming a great guitarist, okay? Good!

So with that, I’ll leave you. Go back and practice and I’ll see you in the next lesson. Bye!

Transcription by: Scribe4you Transcription Services

Guitar Basics Lesson

Guitar Basics Lesson -

Guitar Basics Lesson -