Thread: Time taken to learn to play the guitar?

I think it depends on how much you really want to learn....in this computer age it is much easier....you can use Ultimate Guitar...911 tabs...and a variety of other websites to help you learn ...and find your favorite music...Playing guitar is a great therapy...and fun...Go for it...what do you have to lose....!!!

I agree with SecretSquirl-the outcome of one's actions is directly proportional to the intensity of one's desire.

@ InsanePinoyBoy: That you for posting the inspiring videos. It surely got me back to practicing my chords!

@Majid:All the very Best, buddy!

Mackenna

Look Majid, it all depends on what you really want. It took me about 2 years. But, do you want to play the guitar just to have some fun and chill out, or do you have some higher goals and want to become pretty good. If it's just for fun, it'll take you a few weeks/months - depending on how talented you are. And don't worry, you don't really need to know how to read notes, just need to have some feel for rhythm. But if you want to learn to play it well, it's going to take at least two years, and then you should take lessons, just to make sure you don't acquire any bad fingering, bad way of holding your hands, etc.. cause it's very easy to become kind of a sloppy player. However, it shouldn't take you long if you only want to play along with some songs strumming some chords. You can already play a huge amount of songs by only using the most frequent major and minor chords, being A C D G E, Am, Dm, Cm, Em. These are really easy. Also, I noticed there's a lot of material to be found at Myanonamouse (if you're not a member yet, I have invites). There's also many good lessons/tutorials on YouTube. But I'll leave you with some inspiring guitarists:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmE3QaGetn4&feature=channel]YouTube - Andy McKee - Art of Motion - Guitar - www.candyrat.com[/ame]
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNw9YaXemlM&feature=related]YouTube - Antoine Dufour - Spiritual Groove - Guitar -www.candyrat.com[/ame]
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhR04kmcSXU&feature=related]YouTube - Tommy Emmanuel - Angelina[/ame]

Good luck, my friend :)

Edit: My first song was Dust in the wind, just because I really like that song and it's very easy to play. :)

I think theres many ways you can go about learning guitar. Look at many of the "greats". Some of them use bad fingering habits still, but are able to play just fine. I think it just depends on what you want to learn. Like what people have been saying if its just to have fun, I wouldn't worry too much about all that technical stuff. I am more or less self/TAB taught. A cousin of mine showed me how to read TAB and then proceeded to show me how to play Peaches by the PResidents of the USA lol. Within a week or two i could play it decently! Then from that point on, I was searching for songs I had wanted to learn on the internet and following the tabs(some bad tab versions, some good).

I do think there is some value in learning some theory if you are wanting to do composition and things of that sort. If you are just wanting to play other songs and maybe have friends sing along around a camp fire, I'd say just learn the basic chords and you can play most songs(sometimes more simplified versions than the actual recorded song, but still recognizable).

I've been playing about 6 years. I'd say it took me about a year too be able to play reasonably comfortably and i practiced often. The biggest challenge was learning to play barr chords for me - took about 2 years and even now i don't play them as fluently as i would like!

I would say if you want to be good, try to practice everyday, even if it's for 20 mins. Keep pushing yourself too - don't get stuck playing the same three-chord songs over and over.

With just Youtube tutorials and random tablature sources online, it took me something like a month to comfortably play very simple chord and strumming patterns, although, I do know how to play the piano and know a decent amount of music theory, so that may have expedited my learning.

Regardless of your current level of knowledge of music, it is VITAL to learn chords (a collection of musical notes) to successfully play the guitar. I highly suggest taking a look at Guitar Chords @ Chordbook.Com for chord patterns on a standard-tuned 6-string guitar. Key beginner chords to learn are:

A-minor
A-major
C-major
D-major
E-minor
E-major
G-major

Once you learn some of the above chords and some strumming patterns, you'll be able to play something like 50+% of all pop songs out there (a statistic that I pulled out of nowhere of course), since so many popular songs use cookie-cutter chord patterns.

Good luck!