{"id":203220,"date":"2022-12-02T06:00:19","date_gmt":"2022-12-02T14:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/?p=203220"},"modified":"2024-09-07T02:52:13","modified_gmt":"2024-09-07T09:52:13","slug":"beginners-avoid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/beginners-avoid\/","title":{"rendered":"What You DON&#8217;T Need to Know as a Beginner Guitarist"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Many people think that they need to know a whole list of important information before they can begin to play the guitar.<\/p>\n<p>A lot of us have a list like this lurking at the back of our minds. It will be a list of what we think are the essential guitar-playing tricks. Concepts we are sure we need to know right from the start, and that everyone else knows. And tricks that will ensure our success, if only we could just master them first.<\/p>\n<p>The truth is, <a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/welcome-beginner-guitar-player\/\">in the beginning stages<\/a>, we don\u2019t need to know all the items on that list. They won\u2019t help us. They might even get in the way.<\/p>\n<p class=\"centerc\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fufndC2-bEs?rel=0&amp;modestbranding=1\" width=\"700\" height=\"393\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">What We Think We Need to Know (Which We Don\u2019t)<\/h2>\n<p>Guitarists are often self-starters. We\u2019re keen. We want to learn. So we explore the guitar world and make a list of things we need to do first.<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019ve learned about these from other players or teachers. We may have read about them in tutor books or watched them on videos.<\/p>\n<p>Our list could include:<\/p>\n<h3>Fretboard Knowledge<\/h3>\n<p>We\u2019ve all seen diagrams in books and printable templates online. There seems to be no end of tricks we can use to match notes with frets and strings. \u201cIf we can learn the first 72 note locations,\u201d we think, \u201cwe\u2019ll be off to a flying start.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Chord Names<\/h3>\n<p>How can we play a chord if we don\u2019t know what it\u2019s called? Especially if it\u2019s an out-of-the-ordinary, unusual, jazzy chord. We want to know why it sounds like that. We feel we should know the theory.\u00a0 But at the moment, we may only need to <a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/chord-tab\/\">remember where our fingers go<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3>Note Names<\/h3>\n<p>We\u2019re led to believe that to read music, we need to learn all the note names all at once. We need to sit around chanting Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge before we even touch our guitars.<\/p>\n<p>Then when we\u2019ve done that, we think we have to know the names of every note in every chord. How can we play a chord otherwise?<\/p>\n<h3>Scales<\/h3>\n<p>Major, pentatonic, harmonic and melodic minor, modes with names like Hobbits \u2026. We just need to <a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/first-scale-beginners\/\">learn these first<\/a> (don\u2019t we?), and then we\u2019ll be able to play a piece of music.<\/p>\n<h3>Left-Hand Patterns<\/h3>\n<p>(See Scales!)<\/p>\n<h3>Right-Hand Patterns<\/h3>\n<p>Composers and teachers have been publishing right-hand studies for two hundred years. Many of these are in books for <a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/welcome-beginner-guitar-player\/\">beginners<\/a>. It makes us feel that we need to be competent in 120 arpeggios before we can start to play pieces.<\/p>\n<p>The truth is, we don\u2019t need to know most of these things at the early stages.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">We Don\u2019t Need to Know this Stuff to Get Playing<\/h2>\n<p>This <a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/music-theory-guitar\/\">music theory is interesting<\/a>. Fascinating even. But in the beginning, we don\u2019t need to know it.<br \/>\nIt doesn\u2019t help us to play guitar at an early level.<\/p>\n<p>We don\u2019t need to know every note on every fret before we can play. Not knowing a chord name doesn\u2019t stop us from playing it. We don\u2019t need to know all the right-hand patterns in the world.<\/p>\n<p>We just need to know what\u2019s in the piece of music in front of us and work on that.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">We Only Need to Focus on the Task In Front of Us<\/h2>\n<p>It would be better (at early levels) to ignore nearly everything on our list. Instead, we should <a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/positive-agenda\/\">pay attention<\/a> to the task right in front of us. That\u2019s the exercise or piece we\u2019re working on now.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s more important to get our hands moving. Moving fingers make progress. It\u2019s more important to play than to spend time analyzing the reasoning behind it all.<\/p>\n<h3>Avoid Distraction in Guitar Practice<\/h3>\n<p>We like to understand what we\u2019re doing. We\u2019re inquisitive. We\u2019re curious. That\u2019s wonderful.<\/p>\n<p>But it can get in the way. It can slow us down if we\u2019re distracted by trying to learn the theory instead of practicing.<\/p>\n<p>We can research modes (or the rest) after practice if we want.<\/p>\n<h3>Allow Yourself Not to Know<\/h3>\n<p>We need to stop ourselves from getting bogged down in all that knowledge. Inevitably, we\u2019ll begin to learn more, and we\u2019ll realize that there\u2019s always more to know.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">Take One Step at a Time<\/h2>\n<p>The way to climb a mountain is one step at a time. And if we can focus on our next step, we\u2019ll succeed.<\/p>\n<p>Later, it might be helpful to know what happens in a descending melodic minor scale, for example. We\u2019ll find them in our pieces and we\u2019ll ask questions. And then, after our practice, we can go and look up the answers.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">Build Up the Knowledge Later<\/h2>\n<p>We\u2019ll start to see that something we learned about in one piece crops up in another. These become recognizable nuggets of knowledge that will help in the long run.<\/p>\n<p>But we don\u2019t need to know them in advance.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">Don\u2019t Get Sucked In, Get Playing<\/h2>\n<p>So to start off with, don\u2019t get sucked into this ever-broadening chasm of knowledge. Instead, <a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/classical-guitar-lessons-beginners\/\">we should focus on playing<\/a>. On our muscles and the feel of the strings under our fingers. We should focus on the sound we\u2019re making, and the progress we\u2019re achieving, step by step.<\/p>\n<p>We need to put the list of things we think we ought to know aside and get playing.<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re serious about playing guitar, it helps to follow a proven program.\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/my.classicalguitarshed.com\/membership\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Click here to learn more about The Woodshed\u00ae Classical Guitar Program.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Many people think that they need to know a whole list of important information before they can begin to play the guitar. A lot of us have a list like this lurking at the back of our minds. It will be a list of what we think are the essential guitar-playing tricks. Concepts we are sure we need to know &#8230; <\/p>\n<div><a href=\"https:\/\/classicalguitarshed.com\/beginners-avoid\/\" class=\"more-link\">Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":203216,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434,20],"tags":[364,26,378,372],"class_list":["post-203220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-main-content-parent","category-practicing","tag-beginners","tag-guitar-practice","tag-practice-organization","tag-practice-planning"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.8 (Yoast SEO v25.8) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>What We DON&#039;T Need to Know to Learn Classical Guitar<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In your beginning guitar lessons and practice, you don&#039;t need to learn everything at once. 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