This article will explain what to look for when choosing a guitar course or lessons that are advertised on the internet. As you may already be aware there is an absolute mine field of courses out there and which one do you choose? I am going to list specific pointers that hopefully will guide you on the right path and safe you time and money as you start out as a beginner guitar player. A crucial point in your guitar playing career.
The internet has now become the perfect medium for sourcing all sorts of useful and not so useful information and as such more and more companies and individuals are listing their products. Here lies the problem. How do you choose between the many thousands of courses and guitar lessons that are becoming available to the beginner guitar player. You basically have two choices to make:
Online or Offline?
Years ago people only had one option and that was to book a lesson with a guitar tutor and turn up at a predetermined time to have the guitar lessons. Or on the odd occasion the guitar tutor would come to your home. In this day and age it's all changed, we have many more options open to us. With more choices comes more chances to make costly mistakes, hence why you should try to get it right first time.
Before making your decision on which type of course to go for I would like to go through the advantages and disadvantages of both online and offline courses as it will hopefully help you in your final decision. We'll start with online guitar lessons.
Online Guitar Lessons or Courses
What do we mean exactly by an online guitar course? You have basically two methods of accessing online guitar courses and these are by download or by streaming (accessing the material while it is downloading). The downside of this type of course is that the quality tends not to be as good as hard copy DVD courses. The downloadable courses can take quite a while to download if you do not have a super fast internet connection.
Another consideration is to go for guitar lessons you can archive easily. This is quite easy with say a course of lessons on DVD but not as easy with online lessons. Having an archive of easily accessible material is a MUST HAVE for any course. You must be able to put your hands on a particular part of the course instantly in order to refer back should you need to at a later date. Also look for a REAL address and telephone number as this suggests a legitimate trustworthy company. DO NOT go for a course that just lists a PO Box and no telephone number.
Offline Guitar Lessons or Courses
What are offline guitar courses?
Offline guitar courses or guitar lessons are lessons that are conducted by a live tutor who either comes to your home or you go to them and they charge you a fee for their services. Finding the right tutor for the job in your area can be a real challenge in itself as there are probably only a handful to choose from and are they any good?
Another problem with live guitar tutors in my opinion is that most will give you only just enough information to keep you coming back and charge you as much as they can possibly get away with. Not the best scenario.
Here are some disadvantages of going for regular guitar lessons.
* The problem with either traveling for a guitar lesson or having a tutor come to your home is you have to have the lesson at a predetermined time. This will probably screw up your day and everything else has to work around it.
* Your tutor may not necessarily be into the type of music you love to play which means that you'll not enjoy your lessons as much as you could, which in turn means that your learning will not progress as quickly as it should.
* When learning to play an instrument you will come across something that you are not too sure about and need to ask a question or find the solution. With regular guitar lessons you will need to wait until your next lesson in order to get your questions answered. Ideally you want your answers NOW so you can get on with your progression and move to the next stage...
* Most people when sitting in front of a tutor and playing back what they've learned in the week will feel a little if not quite a bit intimidated or nervous. They will feel under pressure to get it just right in front of their tutor. What happens in most scenarios is the student will make mistakes when at home they have played the piece very well. The best scenario would be to repeat back the lesson in their own home with no pressure in familiar surroundings...
So Where Does That Leave YOU?
Do not fear! There is an alternative to both these methods yet encompasses both.
The only alternative and the best alternative in my opinion is to use a system that encompasses both methods. Here it is: You order your product over the internet allowing you to shop around WORLDWIDE. You order your course of guitar lessons on hard copy DVD that is delivered direct to your door. The DVD's will be of very high quality, you will have an instant archive of material you can refer back to over an over again, and the lessons will be in a chronological order giving step by step lessons all by the same tutor.
So if this is my recommendation, which course do you choose???
If you take my advice which I hope you do, then the lessons MUST meet the following criteria:
* A FAST Structured Progression that is VERY EASY to follow and understand.
* A course of lessons created by someone who has a vast experience in the music industry, is a professional (gets paid for playing the guitar and hasnt got a job on the side), knows what he is doing and is not some wizz kid who has learned the guitar, played for about 3-4 years and trying to cash in and make a fast buck.
* A course you can study and take part in, in a nice relaxed environment with no pressure put upon you, helping you to progress at lightning pace because you are in a cool, relaxed frame of mind.
* A course of lessons that you know you CAN afford and you know will be great value for money ensuring you'll not get ripped off.
* A Solid, Cast Iron, No Questions Asked, FULL Money Back Guarantee. Just ask your guitar tutor for your money back once he has given you your lesson! It's not repeatable what he'll say!!!
* A course of lessons that doesn't beat around the bush and gives you what you are looking for straight out of the tin bringing you on as fast as possible...
* Lessons that you can refer back to over and over again that will inspire and motivate you with audio, video, illustrations and downloadable teaching aids
* All The Fast Track Short Cuts That The Professionals DON'T Want You to Know.
My advice for anyone wanting to learn the guitar is take your time and do your research. There are many, many guitar courses out there some are very good and some very bad. Use the pointers Ive listed above and this should help you to sift through them to find one that suits your needs.
If there is another piece of advice I can give you it would be this:
Once you decide on a guitar course and you have received your first couple of lessons which you are happy with, stick with the same tutor. This way you will progress more quickly as you will get tuned into one guys teaching methods and not flipping from pillar to post spending fortunes using different tutors methods, books and DVDs which do not carry on from one lesson to the next in a chronological order.
Well that's about it for this article. I hope you use the information I have listed above wisely. I will be posting some articles in the near future on guitar lessons that take the beginner through to accomplished player in the shortest possible time.
The internet has now become the perfect medium for sourcing all sorts of useful and not so useful information and as such more and more companies and individuals are listing their products. Here lies the problem. How do you choose between the many thousands of courses and guitar lessons that are becoming available to the beginner guitar player. You basically have two choices to make:
Online or Offline?
Years ago people only had one option and that was to book a lesson with a guitar tutor and turn up at a predetermined time to have the guitar lessons. Or on the odd occasion the guitar tutor would come to your home. In this day and age it's all changed, we have many more options open to us. With more choices comes more chances to make costly mistakes, hence why you should try to get it right first time.
Before making your decision on which type of course to go for I would like to go through the advantages and disadvantages of both online and offline courses as it will hopefully help you in your final decision. We'll start with online guitar lessons.
Online Guitar Lessons or Courses
What do we mean exactly by an online guitar course? You have basically two methods of accessing online guitar courses and these are by download or by streaming (accessing the material while it is downloading). The downside of this type of course is that the quality tends not to be as good as hard copy DVD courses. The downloadable courses can take quite a while to download if you do not have a super fast internet connection.
Another consideration is to go for guitar lessons you can archive easily. This is quite easy with say a course of lessons on DVD but not as easy with online lessons. Having an archive of easily accessible material is a MUST HAVE for any course. You must be able to put your hands on a particular part of the course instantly in order to refer back should you need to at a later date. Also look for a REAL address and telephone number as this suggests a legitimate trustworthy company. DO NOT go for a course that just lists a PO Box and no telephone number.
Offline Guitar Lessons or Courses
What are offline guitar courses?
Offline guitar courses or guitar lessons are lessons that are conducted by a live tutor who either comes to your home or you go to them and they charge you a fee for their services. Finding the right tutor for the job in your area can be a real challenge in itself as there are probably only a handful to choose from and are they any good?
Another problem with live guitar tutors in my opinion is that most will give you only just enough information to keep you coming back and charge you as much as they can possibly get away with. Not the best scenario.
Here are some disadvantages of going for regular guitar lessons.
* The problem with either traveling for a guitar lesson or having a tutor come to your home is you have to have the lesson at a predetermined time. This will probably screw up your day and everything else has to work around it.
* Your tutor may not necessarily be into the type of music you love to play which means that you'll not enjoy your lessons as much as you could, which in turn means that your learning will not progress as quickly as it should.
* When learning to play an instrument you will come across something that you are not too sure about and need to ask a question or find the solution. With regular guitar lessons you will need to wait until your next lesson in order to get your questions answered. Ideally you want your answers NOW so you can get on with your progression and move to the next stage...
* Most people when sitting in front of a tutor and playing back what they've learned in the week will feel a little if not quite a bit intimidated or nervous. They will feel under pressure to get it just right in front of their tutor. What happens in most scenarios is the student will make mistakes when at home they have played the piece very well. The best scenario would be to repeat back the lesson in their own home with no pressure in familiar surroundings...
So Where Does That Leave YOU?
Do not fear! There is an alternative to both these methods yet encompasses both.
The only alternative and the best alternative in my opinion is to use a system that encompasses both methods. Here it is: You order your product over the internet allowing you to shop around WORLDWIDE. You order your course of guitar lessons on hard copy DVD that is delivered direct to your door. The DVD's will be of very high quality, you will have an instant archive of material you can refer back to over an over again, and the lessons will be in a chronological order giving step by step lessons all by the same tutor.
So if this is my recommendation, which course do you choose???
If you take my advice which I hope you do, then the lessons MUST meet the following criteria:
* A FAST Structured Progression that is VERY EASY to follow and understand.
* A course of lessons created by someone who has a vast experience in the music industry, is a professional (gets paid for playing the guitar and hasnt got a job on the side), knows what he is doing and is not some wizz kid who has learned the guitar, played for about 3-4 years and trying to cash in and make a fast buck.
* A course you can study and take part in, in a nice relaxed environment with no pressure put upon you, helping you to progress at lightning pace because you are in a cool, relaxed frame of mind.
* A course of lessons that you know you CAN afford and you know will be great value for money ensuring you'll not get ripped off.
* A Solid, Cast Iron, No Questions Asked, FULL Money Back Guarantee. Just ask your guitar tutor for your money back once he has given you your lesson! It's not repeatable what he'll say!!!
* A course of lessons that doesn't beat around the bush and gives you what you are looking for straight out of the tin bringing you on as fast as possible...
* Lessons that you can refer back to over and over again that will inspire and motivate you with audio, video, illustrations and downloadable teaching aids
* All The Fast Track Short Cuts That The Professionals DON'T Want You to Know.
My advice for anyone wanting to learn the guitar is take your time and do your research. There are many, many guitar courses out there some are very good and some very bad. Use the pointers Ive listed above and this should help you to sift through them to find one that suits your needs.
If there is another piece of advice I can give you it would be this:
Once you decide on a guitar course and you have received your first couple of lessons which you are happy with, stick with the same tutor. This way you will progress more quickly as you will get tuned into one guys teaching methods and not flipping from pillar to post spending fortunes using different tutors methods, books and DVDs which do not carry on from one lesson to the next in a chronological order.
Well that's about it for this article. I hope you use the information I have listed above wisely. I will be posting some articles in the near future on guitar lessons that take the beginner through to accomplished player in the shortest possible time.
About the Author:
About Mike Jones: Mike Jones. Mike has been teaching and playing guitar as a pro for more than twenty years. Over this period of time he has developed a unique speed learning system bringing the beginner through to accomplished player in the shortest possible time. For some FREE tips and tricks and to find out more you may like to visit his website at: Mike's Guitar Lessons
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