My teacher was...

[Lucky Boy]

I was responding to PetPeeves and it made me think of a topic. What was your Guitar Teacher like? Are you self taught?

 

I can remember Mr and Mrs Guma started teaching me in 6th grade. When we weren't in school, I had to take my nylon string guitar (I had to pause writing that) to Werlein's on Canal St in New Orleans for my lessons. They really impressed me though, they'd put a needle on a record and start playing it on their acoustic and writing the chords on paper. And for someone in 6th grade they blew my mind. After Grammar school, I started taking lessons from Thomas Gibson for a few months, then I went on my own.

 

And you????

[jesse92]

I have Self Taught Myself everything... almost my Uncle John Helps Me with Some Stuff

[Always_Black]

Good Thread Topic Lucky Boy !

 

I recall Mr. Castaign coming into my 5th-grade class and blowing everyone away with "Tom Sawyer." I was already into guitars at that time, but never really took it seriously until that day. I signed right up for his Saturday classes and away I went. Over the years, my lessons were supplemented by my Uncle Ed (fricking unbelievably talented musician) - the guy has never had a lesson in his life, yet can play ANYTHING ! He truly is amazing.

 

Once I got my '84 V though, I was all on my own....figuring out the '80's metal riffs that just made playing electric the darn greatest thing to do on the planet. Now, it's just me and my acoustics. Fartin around, learning bits and pieces here and there.

 

Geez, nostalgia really is something. I can still smell the sweet, soft fragrances of all the spruce and laminate woods that filled the room during those 5th-grade lessons....

 

Great thread....=D>/

[TWilson]

I'm also self taught but picked up things here and there sitting around with others with similar acoustic musical tastes. I used to bug people to show me things over and over and over 'til I could play it to my satisfaction. I haven't got together with other folks for years now and miss it. My playing isn't up to the standards of those who have taken advantage of lessons but at least my singing sucks! lol

[guitarstrummer]

Self taught, as well.

[L5Larry]

Self taught. I was fortunate enough to have had a nylon string guitar and tenor ukelele (and piano) around the house as a small child. All abandoned leftovers from my older sisters. I started off playing the uke, and when my hands got big enough started plunking around on the guitar. The stringed instruments came complete with "Learn To Play..." books from Mel Bay.

 

I was also lucky in the fact that I lived in the same small town in Missouri as Mel Bay. He had a little retail store in town, and when we had a guitar playing question, we just went up to the store and asked Mel himself. He would always pull a guitar off the shelf and give you a little lesson and recital right there in the middle of the store.

 

When I started playing with others it just became a matter of stealing all the licks and chords I could from those better than me. A policy I still use to this day.

[davidbg63]

I was self taught up until about 7th grade and then took lessons for a few years.....played in the High School jazz

band and with other local bands now on my own doing solo stuff. Now 30 years later I'm still learning songs

off the internet..you tube, guitar tabs etc. I have said before, I wish we had the internet when I first started playing.

I am currently learning Texas Flood by SRV acoustically...sounds pretty good.

 

 

Now my youngest son at age 13 is self taught, I show him stuff and he is taking lessons. I will admit though,

I do think the Guitar Hero video game has helped him with his hand / finger coordination.

[ksdaddy]

I took a few lessons from a guy named Stephen Sharpe, supposedly a studio musician. I think he and his family were just trying to stay one step ahead of some entity or organization (or representatives thereof) so they left town one night. I stole a few licks from my brother, who grew up in 60s garage bands, complete with blue Mustang and Heathkit amp. I didn't interact with anyone else until Reggie Michaud, an old school hotrodder ("let's chop the top and put that Cadillac engine in this '34 Ford") who drank hard and played a lot of Chet/Merle on various Gretsches that didn't get dropped down the stairs or hocked. I stole a bucket load off him.

 

Other than that, I'm self taught, ergo my suckiness.

[onewilyfool]

Self taught......however picked up a lot from jamming with others......any of you pickers and grinners want to Jam in the San Francisco area? Let me know....keep playing.....have fun...

[ballcorner]

I learned from books by Hal Leonard and then learned by buying sheet music and plugging away at it until I learned the song I selected.

 

More recently, I have taken structured lessons, but I would say the most influential book in awakening my musical aspirations was Rise Up Singing which I acquired in Rochester, Michigan in 1990. Almost everything in the book is either in C or G - so it forces you to be creative if you are going to establish your repertoire from this volume.

 

The best learning tool I ever acquired was my BR-600 digital recorder. I never liked playing leads to other people's music - for whatever reason - but completely and instantly understood where to go when I could play over my own songs. This digital recorder was equivalent to 20 years of lessons within a year.

 

Still, my real inspiration for being musical was Gladys Pearcey - my choir director from St. Paul's Anglican Church (In the US, Anglican is Episcopalian) in Victoria, BC, Canada. Having two parents who could only play a radio and a tone-deaf sister meant without Gladys I would never have taken any interest in the craft.

 

The absolute answer to the question is different again. I learned to play guitar because I was compelled to find something that made me feel this good.

[tioga_man]

self "taught"... if you want to call it that.

 

no friends that play; nobody in my family plays; no natural talent at all.

 

but I love the sound and I have a guitar in my hands many hours a day on weekends and maybe a half hour to an hour on weekdays typically.

 

first book and a half of Mel Bay 30 years ago, maybe 5 lessons in my life, and a few instructional tapes and dvds.

 

I really need a teacher. I'm trying jorma kaukenon's site www.breakdownway.com

we'll see if I have the discipline needed to learn the songs.

I typically watch him, get inspired, and then go off on my own similar chord progression.

I need to do better.

[Space Pup]

A combination of self taught, Books, and jamming with others.

 

That would seem to explain a few things about my playing too...

[peiplayer]

I’m self taught…except for a 3 week stint in the summer of 06 when I thought it would be a good idea to take some lessons from a very good jazz guitarist and I signed up for a 12 week course. I wasn’t looking to start learning scales and theory, just some finer points of strumming, some catchy base runs, a few riffs, stuff that could make my average playing a little more interesting. Anyway, he wasn’t interested in the music I liked, I had to try to learn his stuff which I hated. Practicing quickly became a real drag. He told me I sat wrong, held the guitar wrong, held the pick wrong and I shouldn’t be wrapping my left hand around the fretboard. When I politely pointed out that everybody I played with and everybody I saw in videos appeared to be doing exactly what I was doing, he told me I was wasting his time. Naturally, I quit. He’s still trying to recover fees for the nine other lessons I refused to attend!

[Sitric]

I was at a festival recently, and one of the participants stated his teacher was fear.

When the phonecall came asking could he do this or that he said "yes, of course" - at times putting himself in very awkward situations.

However, the pro that he is, he always delivered.

 

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