Electric Guitar Tutorial

Chapter 1 Preliminary Knowledge

Scenery

When learning an instrument, there is one extremely important aspect that is always overlooked Ignore, that's what happens during training. Strive to create an almost constant space for your music study or creation: a comfortable chair, a reading lamp and a music stand are essential items that will make your studies more efficient. Here is a picture of a reasonable practice set. When you are sitting in a chair, you should be able to adjust speakers, radios and other equipment by reaching out.

Names of the parts of the electric guitar

Electric guitars come in many different designs, styles and colors. But they are all made of the same parts. This is a picture of an electric guitar with all major parts labeled.

Connect the plug

The electric guitar must pass through an amplifier (i.e. speaker) to produce sound. So before playing, you must have an electric guitar cable to connect the electric guitar to the amplifier. An electric guitar cable is actually a length of cable (containing two thin wires) with a 1/4-inch plug at both ends. The ideal electric guitar wiring is made with a shielded cable that minimizes hum, buzzing, and radio signals that are easily picked up by unshielded cable. Even high-quality electric guitar cables need to be reinforced near the two plugs to prevent the wires from breaking in these two stressed areas.

Plug one end of the electric guitar cable into the output jack of the electric guitar, plug the other end into an input jack on the amplifier, turn on the amplifier, adjust the volume and tone knobs, and select what you need tone and volume.

How to hold the electric guitar.

The electric guitar is a physical device made up of many different but interrelated parts. Hold the guitar effectively so that your body and guitar are in harmony with each other. Let's look at this.

In guitar playing, each of your hands has a certain job to do. How you hold the piano properly can make these tasks easier or harder.

The job of the right hand is to hold a pick and strum the guitar strings. Sound is produced from this. The job of the left hand is to find the right spot on the neck to fret the strings to produce the desired pitch.

The most effective way to do this is to hold the guitar against your upper body so that the neck is at an upward angle of 30°. If you support the guitar in this way, the guitar will not slide. Note: It is forbidden to use your left hand to prevent the guitar from sliding in any way. The left hand must be completely free and unencumbered to do its job: finding notes anywhere on the fingerboard.

While sitting, the guitar rests on your left leg (the left leg should be slightly raised). Both legs support the guitar at the same time, with the chest and right forearm above it. The arms cannot be used to support the neck. When you want to play standing, simply adjust the strap before standing up so the guitar stays in place. Pay attention to consistency: Whether you are sitting or standing, the position of the guitar relative to your upper body should remain the same. This way, no matter which position you use, you can perform the same movements with your hands. This makes playing much easier!

Beginners and intermediate students are asked to strictly follow these requirements. Of course, as your level continues to improve, your ability to control the piano will also continue to improve, and your posture of holding the piano will gradually become freer. Right-hand technique

Modern electric guitarists almost always play with picks. Picks are made of plastic or a material called "celluloid" and come in various shapes, sizes and thicknesses. Pickles of different shapes and materials will produce different sounds and feel differently. Equally important is consistency. Once you find a pick that works for you, keep using it. (It’s also a good idea to occasionally experiment to see if there is a pick that suits you better.) If you are used to using heavy (thick) picks, a light (thin) pick will distort your music. vice versa.

This is the correct way to hold a pick: gently pick it up between your thumb and index finger. The pick should be resting on the side of your index finger and aligned with your thumb. Draw an imaginary line through the skin of your thumb. This line should be perpendicular to the direction of the tip of the pick. The first joint of the finger must be aligned with the tip of the thumb. When you play, the movement should come from the elbow, not the wrist or fingers. The wrist should stay relaxed and move with the elbow.

Left-handed skills

In normal times, you often do things with your hands, so your hands are more flexible than you think.

Try this exercise: Take a thick book, hold it with your right hand, and put your left thumb on it. Close your eyes and try to align your thumb with your ring finger on the other side of the book. Open your eyes and check it out. You succeeded! Even with a thick book that puts your thumb and ring finger far apart. You can still place your thumb and ring finger directly opposite each other. This awareness demonstrates that your hand can use your thumb to determine the position of the other fingers. The same applies to guitar playing, where your thumb position determines the position of your other fingers. This consistency allows you to play smoothly, clearly, and quickly. Put your left thumb behind the guitar neck like this. The thumb (when the neck is exposed) can be bent like this, but not like this. When pressing the strings, the finger tips should be pressed firmly behind the frets, and the left hand should be kept naturally bent. To achieve consistency with your left hand, you must master the correct posture in each position. A position on the guitar refers to a set of four connected frets, with each finger responsible for one fret. The number of frets where the thumb and index finger are located determines the grip position. Therefore, this is the second position. This is the fifth position. This is the eighth position.

On the guitar, the fingers of the left hand are numbered as follows:

Index finger=1, middle finger=2, ring finger=3, little finger=4

When a position is played by the index finger When numbering the frets, what really determines the position is the position of the thumb, so as long as the thumb doesn't move, you don't have to change the position. For left-hand consistency, the thumb should always be on the back of the neck opposite the index or middle finger, depending on your habits and finger condition. But note: no matter what hand shape is determined, don’t change it. So if you can maintain a fixed relationship between your thumb and fingers as you change positions, you can play freely and clearly in any position on the guitar.

Coordination exercises

The exercises here begin to develop the control of your left hand and the coordination of your left and right hands. Place the guitar in the correct position of your body, hold the pick correctly with your right hand, and place your thumb behind the second fret. Now we start playing in the first position. Guitar strings are marked as follows: Use your index finger on the first fret of the 1st string to pick the strings. At the beginning, the pick is above the strings, and then the wrist moves downward naturally, driving the pick down to pluck. This is a down dial, indicated by the symbol. Now, keep your left index finger still on the first fret of the 1st string, press your left middle finger on the 2nd fret of the 1st string, and pick with a pick. Similarly, without moving any finger of your left hand, press your ring finger on the 3rd fret of the 1st string and pluck with a pick. Finally, while keeping the three fingers of your left hand still, press the little finger of your left hand on the 4th fret of the 1st string and pluck with a pick.

Repeat the process on the 2nd string, 3rd string, 4th string, 5th string, and finally the 6th string.

This exercise emphasizes three rules:

1) No unnecessary movement (this is why keeping your fingers pressed against the strings does not move; lifting them is an invalid movement) ). 2) Always move the shortest distance (that is to say, when the right hand is playing the strings, the smaller the movement range of the pick, the better. Similarly, when the left hand is changing the strings, the closer the fingers are to the frets, the better.)

3) Always do the most relaxed moves, tension will make everything harder and slower.

The above rules will help you play more harmoniously!

Chapter 2 Guitar Tuning

Tune the guitar every time before playing it. There are several ways to tune strings.

You can compare the open string notes with the corresponding notes on the timpani

The timpani is a harmonica-like device composed of 6 metal reeds, each A metal reed corresponds to the sound of an open string on the guitar. If you want to tune a certain string, you blow the corresponding reed and compare the open string sound to the reed pitch.

You can compare the open string notes to the corresponding notes on the piano.

You can tune the strings using the pitch relationship between the strings, that is, each string is tuned according to the previous string, which is already tuned. For example, if the 5th string (A tone) is tuned based on the 6th string (low E), the open string tone of the 5th string should be the same as the pitch of the 5th fret of the 6th string.

The better method is as follows: first play the 5th fret tone of the 6th string (already set), and then immediately play the open 5th string tone to let the two strings sound at the same time. When the two strings sound at the same time, without letting go of your left hand, use your right hand to adjust the 5-string knob so that the pitch of the open string on the 5th string is consistent with the pitch of the 6th string and the 5th fret. When the pitches are consistent, the two notes will blend together. One body.

Repeat the above process and play the open string on the 4th string according to the tone of the 5th string and 5th fret.

Next, adjust the open string on the 3rd string according to the tone on the 4th string and 5th fret.

Then, according to the tone of the 3rd string and 4th fret, tune the open string of the 2nd string.

Finally, adjust the open string on the 1st string according to the tone on the 5th fret of the 2nd string.

Since some tuned strings may go out of tune when you tune other strings, it is best to repeat the tuning process again

You can use an electronic tuner instrument to tune the strings. Plug one end of the electric guitar cable into the guitar and the other end into the tuner input jack. Turn up the guitar's volume knob and play each string individually. You'll see when the string is at the correct pitch on one of the tuner's meters or illuminated diodes. In addition to an input jack, the electronic tuner also has an output jack that can be used to connect an amplifier. This way your electric guitar can be connected to the amplifier through the tuner.

For professional electric guitar players, this is the most common method.

Chapter 3 Terminology

Definition of Terms

In this book we will cover positioning, fingering, and movement on the guitar neck. Here are some terms that will help you better understand the content of this tutorial.

Moving up and down the neck

Moving up the neck means moving your left hand along the fretboard toward the pickup Moving in the direction; moving down the neck means: moving the left hand toward the saddle. These directions of movement are called "up" and "down" because the notes become higher or lower when you move them

Treble strings and bass strings

Similarly The same principle applies to describing each string: the treble string is the string with the higher pitch. Although they are actually closest to the ground. The bass string is the lower string.

Plucking direction

We have learned the down-struck method (symbol representation) of moving the right hand down (towards the floor) to pluck the strings.

When you move the pick in the opposite direction (toward the face) to pluck the string, this is called up-picking, represented by the symbol.

When playing, rhythm guitarists tend to use downpicking because it is more powerful and the sound is more calm. The alternate use of down-picking and up-picking is called alternate picking, and is used to play the smooth main melody part.

Chapter 4 Music Score

Standard music score (i.e. staff)

Music score is a written symbol on paper that represents the sound of music. Guitarists are lucky to have two complementary systems of notation to describe the notes they play; standard notation, the staff, and notation, the tablature.

Standard music notation, that is, staff notation, is the most commonly used music notation system for piano, violin and orchestral instruments. It consists of five lines and a symbol called the treble clef.

The position of the note head on the staff determines its pitch (represented by a letter), and the shape of the note (note head, stem, and tail) determines the rhythm (sound length).

The composition of notes

The pitch of a note is determined by its position on the staff. Whether the note head is full or not indicates its sound length. The presence or absence of the stem indicates the length of the sound. The presence or absence of a tail indicates how short the sound is.

When more than one note in the same line has tails, these tails are replaced by beams, and the lengths of the beams and tails are exactly the same. This makes it easier to read music.

Symbol notation (i.e. six-line notation)

Symbol notation uses six lines, each line representing each string on the guitar. The top line represents the guitar's 1st string, and the bottom line represents the guitar's 6th string. Putting numbers on the line can represent the tone of a certain fret of a certain string, and the number 0 represents the open tone of a certain string. For example: For guitarists, the obvious advantage of six-line notation over five-line notation is that it can tell you where to play a specified note correctly. For example: This note (high E) can be played in five different positions on the guitar:

The tablature is particularly convenient for indicating the position of the note. It graphically tells you where to change it. Strings, when to switch positions, and staff notation cannot handle position switching like six-line notation.

Digital notation (i.e. simplified musical notation)

It mainly uses Arabic numerals to represent notes, which is simple and clear.

With the combination of the above three notations, you should have a very clear idea of ??how and where to look for notes on the guitar, as well as the length of those notes. All notation examples in this book will be written in five-line notation, simplified notation, and six-line notation.

Rhythm. Music has two main components: rhythm and pitch. Rhythm refers to how notes sound in time and relate to each other.

Each note has a certain sound length relative to the music beat. Beat is the basic unit of music, also called beat. When you clap your feet to music (that is, when you tap your feet), you are moving to the beat.

Tapping your feet regularly in time with the music is a skill that should be developed. This will allow you to actually feel the beat, and your hands can be free to play on the guitar to the beat of your feet. This allows you to feel the relationship between the notes and the beat.

Beat usually repeats in "groups". In musical notation, we divide the music into these repetitive groups. The time occupied by a group is called a syllable (commonly known as a measure). The boundaries of each section are represented by vertical lines, which are called section lines.

The beat symbol at the beginning of the score indicates how many beats there are in each measure and what note counts as one beat. In this example, the music is in 4/4 time. This means there are four beats in each measure, measured as quarter notes. The quarter note is named after it occupies 1/4 of a measure in 4/4 time. 4/4 beat is widely used, so it is also called ordinary beat. Most rock and pop music are in 4/4 beat.

Note duration

The following are the basic note durations in 4/4 beats:

=whole note - 4 beats. A whole note occupies one measure or 4 beats

= half note - 2 beats A half note takes up half a measure or 2 beats. Two half notes occupy one measure, which is equivalent to the duration of one whole note.

=1/4 note - 1 beat, a 1/4 note occupies 1/4 measure or 1 beat.

＝1/8 note-1/2 beat. A 1/8 note occupies 1/8 measure or 1/2 beat. Two 1/8 notes are equivalent to the duration of one 1/4 note. Eight 1/8 notes make up one measure. This is how the duration of each note is measured.

In order to master rhythm well, you must know how to count beats. Try the exercise: Start tapping slowly with your feet. Keep a steady, pendulum-like rhythm so that the intervals between each beat are exactly the same. Count while tapping your feet, counting in 4/4 beats. After counting to 4, repeat, like this: 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4.

To ensure that your counting sounds are synchronized with the foot taps, make sure that the interval between 4 (the end of one syllable) and 1 (the beginning of the next syllable) is consistent with the interval between any two beats . In other words, there is no break between beat 4 of one measure and beat 1 of the next measure.

Other ways to express rhythm

You can use dots, dashes, and rests to change the length of a note. A dot extends the duration of a note by half.

A connecting line is a curve that connects two notes of the same pitch. The tie line instructs you to play only the first note, which lasts for the combined duration of the two notes.

The rest between notes is represented by a rest. Rests, like sounding notes, have lengths and lengths. A rest indicates that a certain period of time is silent (no playing, no sustained note sound).

Pitch

The pitch of a note refers to the pitch of the note. In the staff, pitches are represented by letters: A, B, C, D, E, F and G. The pitch of a note is represented on the staff by the line or space on which the notehead falls. In the musical notation, the pitch is represented by Arabic numerals: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

These seven natural notes can be changed by using sharp and flat symbols. A sharp (#) raises a note flat - the distance of one fret on the guitar. A flat B lowers a note a semitone (one fret). A changed note can be called a sharp or a flat. For example, the note played on the 1st fret, 3rd string could be called G# or Ab depending on the situation.

Rhythm Pattern

When playing rhythm guitar, it is easier to just read the rhythm without paying attention to the pitch. This way there are only chord pronunciations, which can be marked with rhythm patterns. The pronunciation of chords is represented by a diagram like this (called a chord diagram):

The circles in the diagram indicate the position of your fingers, the letter 0 on the chord diagram box indicates the open string to be played, and the × on the diagram box Indicates a string that is not played. The number in the circle indicates which finger of the left hand is used to fret the strings.

Rhythm patterns look like notes without heads but with notches. The note heads, stems, and ends still represent the rhythmic duration of the pattern, but instead of reading a set of notes over and over, you just read the chord markers and play according to the rhythm pattern.

But an easier and better way is to give you a chord diagram and tell you the pattern of this rhythm. This makes it much easier to read!

Chapter 5 Heavy Metal Rhythm

Power Chords

In heavy metal (also known as hard rock) playing, the most basic and most basic A commonly used chord is the power chord. This chord gets its name from the loud sound it produces. Much rock music is written in the keys of E and A because these keys reflect the strong bass and open string tones of the guitar.

The following is the left-hand fingering method for the two-note E5 power chord.

Remember, when pressing the strings with your left hand fingers, they should be as close to the frets as possible, but not on them.

If you press the strings with your fingers away from the frets, the notes will be noisy or silent.

If you press the strings with your fingers on the frets, the notes will be muted or out of tune.

If you press the strings close to the frets, the notes will be clear and realistic!

Use your fingertips with your left hand to press the strings, and keep your fingers as close to the frets as possible to keep your fingers bent.

Press E5 and use your right hand to pick the 5th and 6th strings downward at the same time (note the X in the chord diagram)

Never touch other strings.

Once you can play this chord clearly, you can play it further in rhythm. Let's start by practicing playing an E5 chord for each measure. The diagram is as follows:

Try practicing: clap your feet and count as before. Once you have a stable speed by tapping your feet and counting, you can add guitar playing. Each time you count to "1," play the E5 chord with your downpick. After the chord sounds, continue your count and keep the same speed as your foot tap. As you progress, you will find that you are playing faster and faster. Avoiding this tendency and playing at a steady tempo is a very important skill. Rock and heavy metal music owes its power and effect in part to a high degree of skill and steady tempo.

A5 power chord

The following are diagrams and tablature examples of the A5 power chord.

This chord is more difficult than E5 because all the strumming falls on the inner strings. (The 1st and 6th strings are the outer strings, and the other strings are the inner strings.) You have to be very careful with the pick to avoid touching the 6th string. When playing this chord, you should only play the 5th and 4th strings (both strings should sound at the same time).

Now play the A5 chord in the rhythm, just like we did the E5. Do your best to maintain the consistency of your right-hand strumming. The sound of each pluck must be consistent with the sound of every other pluck. Remember, you have to tap your feet (not necessarily audibly) and count (internally) while playing.

Now let's try changing the chords. Play E5 first, then A5, repeat this exercise until you feel good, and then change the chords in this rhythm:

First, you want to play each with the same rhythm. Once you have mastered a chord, try to make changing it as natural and smooth as possible.

You want to pronounce the first chord as long as possible, and then quickly change to the next chord so that there is no interruption in the sound. This requires you to use minimal movement to change the chord. When changing chords, keep your fingers as close to the frets as possible. Don't raise your fingers high!

Once the chord changes feel more natural, you can play more chords in each measure. Try practicing:

When you can play it , you can do this exercise again

Finally do this exercise:

When doing the above exercises, you should pursue smooth and smooth chord changes and consistency in playing with your right hand.

D5 Power Chord

The last open power chord we will learn is the D5 chord:

Practice this chord with all the rhythms you have ever encountered .

When you have a good grasp of this chord (make sure you only play the 4th and 3rd strings at the same time), practice changing from A5 to D5. When this exercise becomes a breeze, try practicing the E5 to D5 swap. This exercise is a bit difficult because your left hand must cross the 4th string when changing chords.

Here are three exercises to help you practice transitioning between these three chords.

Practice Guide

This type of exercise works great if you practice it every day. If you don't practice every day, the effectiveness of your practice will be greatly reduced. The more you practice, the faster you will improve. Coordination exercises should be done every day before you start practicing as it will put your hands in ideal condition.

On days when you don't have time to practice, if you can carve out five minutes for coordination practice, it will help solidify your improvement.

Remember: The most important thing you have to do during practice is to develop good playing habits. Habits are actions you perform unconsciously. "Repetition develops habits", so if you play repeatedly with good technique and correct posture, it won't take long for you to develop good habits. This way you can shift your focus to playing and other issues that need attention.