If you want to play guitar or music or would like your child to play you need to consider your environment. Anyone can become a great musician given the right environment. Let us say you are an adult and you decide to take up guitar. You work 5 days a week, have an active social…

I often get asked what it takes to become a professional guitarist. I would begin by asking what your goal is as there are many options. Do you want to be a recording artist, a studio guitarist, a touring guitarist, a teacher, a composer and so on? Guitar as a career can be very seductive….

Recently I was asked by a friend why I play guitar. Why don’t I use that time to do something more constructive? After all playing guitar doesn’t save lives or make you rich (unless you are lucky of course) or make you physically fit.  I said it might be better to rephrase the question by…

Having played guitar for many years I occasionally have these moments where I realise I am taking it all too seriously. Although these moments are rare they seem to have a tendency of creeping up on me. It usually comes in the form of frustration with a new skill I am attempting to master or…

What is mindset? Here is the Google dictionary definition. ‘mentality: a habitual or characteristic mental attitude that determines how you will interpret and respond to situations’. Mindset is a hot topic among today’s psychologists, teachers and coaches because it plays such an important role in achieving a successful outcome in life. My aim in this blog…

Its surprising how much we underestimate our own predictable behaviour. Numerous well known studies have been done which prove that we simply don’t know ourselves as well as we think. In fact perfect strangers know us better than we do. Consider the fact that in categories such as IQ, driving ability and even looks the…

When it comes to learning guitar your best option is to use a structured method because a method will contain a clear goal with specific steps. The idea of any guitar method is to essentially save you time and to avoid common mistakes. A method of course is a system and effective systems are designed…

I personally find the best students are those who like a challenge. Its not so much about being able to play guitar but being able to overcome the obstacles. Its an attitude. Learning guitar is like climbing a mountain. You have to be prepared for lots of hard work before you can enjoy standing on…

A common question with a simple answer. It’s never too late but age does make a difference. A fact all beginner adults need to consider is the speed at which young children learn is nothing short of miraculous.  In a sense if you started after the day you were born you started late. Our brains…

Let’s face it. The reason we learn guitar is to play songs. No one in their right mind takes up guitar to play boring old exercises. In my first few years as a young teen I learnt many songs and most sounded pretty bad. I couldn’t understand why the kid down the street (let’s call…

In Seth Godin’s book ‘The Dip’ he gives a very good analogy on achieving true success which fits perfectly with guitar. The dip is basically the period between the initial enthusiasm of starting a new challenge and achieving your ultimate goal. Almost every imaginable challenge involves a dip. The make or break period if you like. Those…

Understanding scales may at first seem daunting mostly because of the overwhelming number of possible scales. The trick is to start with one or two and when you feel confident move add a new scale to your repertoire. Also keep in mind that certain scales are used the majority of the time. Some blues players…