John Hurt, B.B King, Buddy Guy, among other blues guitar legends, make the instrument seem so easy to play. However, like any instrument, a blues guitar requires patience and the will to learn. The legends learning journeys were different, and so is yours.
To make it among the legends or even learn how to play it for your family over a barbecue party, you need some tips. You need to know the guitar anatomy, chords, how to strum, and have patience as you practice. Here are some tips that will help you get better.
1) Take Online Guitar Lessons
Online courses are a great way to perfect your guitar playing skills. You can look for the best online courses on TrustyGuitar to help you make a decision. The good thing with these courses is that they are flexible and affordable
There are a variety of lessons from beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels. You will find information on acoustic and electric guitars for beginners. You also get to know which courses have gaps and scam sites to avoid.
YouTube is a great platform where you can learn many skills, but if you want to be a better guitar player, it is not the best. You will spend too much time hopping from one lesson to the next. You also get conflicting theories and different teaching methods that throw you off balance.
2) Practice
You cannot perfect a skill by doing it once, and guitar playing is no different. Time for training may be hard to allocate with a busy schedule, but you can play in sessions. You can get as little as five minutes and strum a few strings.
You can separate the sessions throughout the day, and you will have spent an hour on practice without necessarily setting aside time for it. You will be surprised how much progress you have acquired in a month.
If this does not work for you, you can set aside a specific time for practice. Specifying the time helps you to create a habit in that even when you do not feel like you can still do it. The practice journey is different for all players; you need to choose a less bumpy road to reach the destination.
3) Use Fingers
Fingers are the tools that help you strike those guitar strings and produce a melodious tune. You need to know how to fingerpick as the wrong position can mess the melody for you. It can be tricky when you are a beginner, but learning the basics will help you become better.
When starting, ensure your hand position is relaxed and natural. Your accuracy and speed depend on your hand. If there is tension, it may limit you. Therefore, avoid a bent or crooked wrist.
Having fingernails as you fingerpick is optional as both produce sounds, though with a slight difference. Long nails can produce a bright and sharp sound while the skin tips produce a mellow sound. You may notice some calluses on your fingers, but they disappear with time.
4) Memorize Intervals
Guitar intervals are the foundation stones for anything you play on the instrument, whether chords, scales, or arpeggios. Memorization of the intervals helps you avoid wasting time as you figure them out. Failure to which you may not make any proper progress in your guitar playing.
The difference between intervals and musical alphabets is that the former uses numbers while the latter uses letters. Letters change with root notes, but numbers stay the same. With intervals, you need to know the root note on your fretboard and applying the interval shapes.
As you learn the guitar, you may be striving to learn all the notes and their root, but that would take a long time. For instance, if you want to play a dominant chord but have no idea how it looks, how do you achieve it? The easiest way out is knowing the intervals and, after you learn that, you can play any chord.
5) Learn From Legends
If you want to be great, following what great men have done will put you at par or above them. You can play the blues guitar by listening to excellent great players that you adore. Freddie King, Larry Carlton, Muddy Waters, and B.B King are some of the players you can listen to.
Listening to blues guitar artists is one of the steps to become a master. You feel the emotion of the artist in the way the strings strum. You get to notice the bend and the accurate note. Knowing the feelings expressed helps you understand how to bring them out, and you need patience and more listening.
