Hi, my name is Al and thanks for visiting today.
Why this Blog?
I’ve been a passionate hobby guitarist for over 25 years, fitting my guitar playing around University, work and family!
I’ve had successes, I’ve made mistakes, I’ve wasted time and money, occasionally, I’ve become disillusioned.
My aspiration for this blog Is to help those with limited time to cut to the chase and get more enjoyment out of playing and taking care of their beloved guitar (or guitars – if you’re anything like me, you have more than one of the little beauties).
Time is Limited
If you’re reading this, you’ve probably got limits to the amount of time you can spend with your guitar due to work, family, study or a multitude of other reasons – in other words, you have other priorities and the guitar is a hobby for you.
But yet, you love your guitar and want to have quality time with it when you get the chance. Maybe you would like to go to occasional jam and open mic nights; maybe you’d like to play guitar with friends and family; maybe you want to give busking a go!
The thing is, that’s me as well. I’ve been through various phases in my love affair with the guitar –
I’ve taken some lessons, I’ve spent hours trying to play as well as some of my favourite guitarists, I wanted to play fast, I wanted to buy the ultimate guitar in the hope it would make me play better. And, yes, I’ve had times where I don’t touch a guitar for weeks on end.
Sound familiar at all?
I Just Want to Enjoy Playing
Like me, you’ve probably spent hours watching Youtube video lessons that tell you you need to know 100’s of ways to play a C major chord, that you need to be able to play every mode of every scale and that you need to master this in every position on the fret board.
I’m here to tell you, as hobby guitarists, we don’t – we’re not trying to be session musicians are we?
Let’s keep the enjoyment going and evolve at our own speed.
What I’ll give you here is bite-size articles about playing and caring for your guitar, about gear and accessories; about guitar related topics.
Phobia of Theory
All of these articles will be designed to tackle a single aspect related to the guitar and, in the case of playing tips, easily digestible snippets that you can start using straight away in your playing.
I will include some music theory and technique pointers, but they will be clearly marked for you so that you can decide whether they interest you in this particular phase of your journey with the guitar or whether you would prefer to leave the theory side of things for later on.
The main focus here will be on electric guitar, but there will be tips on elements of acoustic guitar playing as well where it is pertinent to the topic being discussed.
In short, I want you to benefit from my hard-earnt knowledge and my mistakes and get back the enjoyment when you are “rocking out” – but still get a sense of improvement if that is what you want.
(Yeah, that really is me with those guys. I was fortunate enough to attend a 4-day clinic in New York and it was the most fun I’ve had in years!)
We, as hobby guitarists are unlikely to ever play as well as Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, John Petrucci, Steve Morse, George Benson, Pat Metheny, Tommy Emanuel, Allan Holdsworth or Robben Ford and Eric Johnson (to name just a few of my favourites).
But, we can sound a little bit like them sometimes can’t we? And, have a lot of fun doing it.
Jimi Hendrix once said “You don’t play the blues, you feel it” – and that pretty much sums up the ethos I want to adopt here.
I’d love to hear from you and learn more about your journey with the guitar, so please feel free to drop me an email.
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All the best and keep on rockin’
Al