Classical Guitar for Beginners
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As you progress through the beginner stages you will most likely start searching for other instruments that provide a richer sound and more refined playability but these two guitars will serve you well in the beginning stages. Should you buy one of these instruments on the internet? In general, I would say no.
This is because even though the instruments are quite consistent there can be variations between each one even if they are the same make and model. My best recommendation would be to take someone along with you to a guitar store that can play guitar and have them try out several guitars of the same model. If you can already play a little, make sure you try each one while observing the playability of the instrument.
Sometimes the fingerboard can feel rough, or the strings are too high on the guitar, or perhaps the tuning pegs get stuck. These are all elements that vary slightly between instruments. The tricky part about thisadvise is that you are probably not able to check these things for yourself at the moment, so it can just add to the confusion.
I find that 1 taking a player along with you will most likely get around this issue and 2 the instruments I recommended really are quite good and I would be surprised if important aspects like the string action or neck shape were severely out of whack. We are even lucking with strings these days than we are with instruments! They are affordable and they are consistent. Just like the guitar, the strings will affect the sound you produce and experimenting with different strings can be a fun experience but not one I would recommend for beginners.
The high tension strings will have a little more resistance on the fingers, so if you are just getting used to the sensation of playing and your fingertips hurt, go for the normal tension. First and foremost they are affordable and high quality, secondly I know the people and the company and they contribute greatly to the musical community at large. Classical guitar technique has the guitar neck raised upwards so the hand is able to do some finger acrobatics without stressing the wrist.
In order to raise the angle of the neck we need to either raise our left leg up to support the guitar, or use any number of different guitar supports that raise the guitar without needing to raise your actual leg.
The footstool has been the method of choice for most of the the twentieth century, it is a simple device that can change height to accommodate your set up. The main issue with the footstool is that it requires you to have your left leg raised for sustained periods of time which can stress muscles in your back. It is rather innocuous for short periods, but used every day for several hours… it can cause problems.
Guitar supports have become increasingly popular because of their ergonomic benefits. There are cushions, A-frames, custom wood designs, discreet attachments, magnets, and suction cups. The common downfall among these supports is that they can be less stable than a footstool. Also, many of these devices use suction cups which can either come unstuck or damage the finish of the guitar. I would recommend using a guitar support over a footstool as it is so important to take care of our bodies.
Yes, your guitar needs a case. It will protect it from light scratches to full on punctures in the soundboard.
Cases, like many of the accessories are kind of fun because they can add a stamp of personality to your instrument. So, if you want to go crazy and get a colorful case that can withstand a jumbo jet rolling over it, go for it! For a slightly more practical approach…. If you are planning to take your instrument on public transport of any kind I would suggest getting a hard case. These can vary from simple plywood cases with three latches to sleek carbon fibre custom cases. Hiscox cases are more than sufficient for all needs and are readily available around the world.
They are a bit bulky and cumbersome but do a good job on flights.
My first look at all this. Sometimes it seems as if the two styles have nothing in common, and players of one style tend to want to have nothing to do with the other. Unfortunately, for most popular music the Classical guitar is less suited, as it lacks the zing and sustain. Is it a diet supplement or do you apply it directly to nails? The satin-finished mahogany neck is also an excellent feature and a joy to play.
The nice thing about classical guitar cases is that they can be used for different guitars. Unlike the infinite variety of electric guitars or even the various steel string guitars out there, classical guitars are fairly uniform in size and shape. Is there a case out there that will survive the gauntlet of airport baggage? I have heard of guitars being destroyed in all types of cases, so you will just have to cross your fingers.
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I have a variety of cases, as I have several guitars. Hiscox, an Eastman fiberglass case, and a no-name brand that is pretty flimsy. Another alternative is a simple iPhone app that you can use. Gotta love living in the 21st century! The classical style uses a raised angle of the neck.
This facilitates ease of access to the fingerboard and also allows the right hand to attack the string at an angle. As with everything there are wonderful examples of exceptions to this norm.
Beginner Classical Guitar Lessons | Classical Guitar Corner
I do, however, recommend that you start with the classical position and try it for at least six months before coming up with any necessary alternatives. It is stable, ergonomic and time tested so I encourage you to use it from the outset. Modern classical guitar technique uses a combination of nail and flesh to make sound with the right hand digits.
The nail surface is shaped and polished to give us a clear and versatile sound. The vast majority of players use their right hand nails as part of their technique and I would recommend this too. This is completely fine, you can still play classical guitar! There are a number of members here at CGC who play without nails and they make a wonderful sound. In fact, some will prefer the sound made without nails and also enjoy the sense of connection between flesh and string.
The use of nails on the classical guitar started around the turn of the 19th century so a lot of the music you are going to be playing would have been played by the fingertips in their origin renditions. If you are using nails, know that you are embarking on a long path of experimentation.
It takes time to find out what shapes work best for you, and that time is made even longer by the fact nails take time to grow out so you can try them all at the same time…. We all have our challenges when it comes to the body, it is going to be a matter of adaptation and compromise to find the best playing situation for you. I have received many emails asking if playing classical guitar is a possibility when dealing with X. The answer for almost everyone is yes.
Arthritis, missing tendons, missing digits, back pain, the list goes on. The key is to be thoughtful and mindful about your body, and then be willing to adapt to your individual situation. Some compromises I have used for students in the past include: I also a big believer in taking care of the body to prevent injuries.
Use Tactics, Not Strategy
So, stretch and be mindful of your body when playing. Over time you will find that, like a painters brush, you will have many right hand strokes at your disposal for different musical needs. In the beginner stages with classical guitar we tend to lump these strokes into two broad categories. Free stroke or rest stroke. Free stroke is used for almost all playing in the classical guitar repertory, and rest stroke is used for fairly specific needs like bringing out a melodic line or projecting sound. For this reason, in my method I put the bulk of my emphasis on free stroke in the beginner lessons.
The rest stroke is usually easier for beginner guitarists to achieve, so it can be tempting to use the rest stroke to start off with. In my experience it can be a hard to free stroke once rest stroke has been instilled first and it can make the student form a bad right hand position. You will find that in both hands, dexterity, strength, and accuracy will come with time. When answering this line of questioning I often tell a story about my good friend Janet Agostino. Janet and her family came to visit me in New York, and then decided to go ice skating at Rockerfeller Center… big mistake.
Four wrist fractures later, Janet had her left wrist in a cast foo about six weeks. Janet is a professional musician and she has been playing guitar for over forty years. However, when the cast came off she had lost the strength and flexibility in her muscles, ligaments and tendons. Surprisingly after the cast came off she could not even play a G Major chord in first position.
She had to develop her strength and flexibility all over again. So, you will have to be patient like Janet as your hands develop these attributes. Both standard notation and tablature TAB are visual instructions for us to make music. Neither of these forms of communication are perfect, but there are some specific benefits and drawbacks to each one. Tablature is easy to understand straight away, and it can communicate the basics of what finger where very clearly.
For simpler repertoire it can work quite well, however, it starts to show serious deficiencies as music becomes more complex and has layers of rhythm and pitch. Standard notation is also flawed, especially when it comes to the guitar! One crucial aspect is that it is a common language shared by the classical music community at large and it will allow you to interact with other musicians, which is absolutely necessary.
Furthermore, almost the entirety of the music you will be working on in the classical guitar repertory is written in standard notation, so there really is no question about whether you should learn standard notation or not. It can be a steep learning curve in the beginning, but you can do it, and it gets easier with time.
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No, you can play classical music without knowing the theory behind it… but you can learn it very easily. Theory and Analysis carry a little bit of a stigma in that it seem overwhelming, and overly complex. The truth is that anything that helps you understand the music that you are working on will add to the pleasure of your study and the quality of your performance. Analysis can be anything you want it to be, it does not have to be using a certain vocabulary and it definitely is not exclusive to scholars.
Are there two sections in this piece? Great that is some analysis that will help. Is there a repeated musical idea that surfaces several times? Great, that is helpful too. Starting off with simple observations often leads to some wonderful discoveries, and these discoveries will make your musical studies infinitely more enjoyable. Theory can be a bit more specific in that there are particular concepts that you will apply in western music. Scales, building chords, and the relationship between those chords are all part of what you will learn. In the fundamentals course I get us playing a simple melody straight away.
So in answer to this question, you can start playing a simple piece in your very first lesson! From that point it really is a case of careful structuring with your repertoire. If you suddenly dive into a piece that is too far down the path then you will get frustrated and lose faith in your ability to progress.
To counter this in the beginning stages you need to find a method book, a course or a teacher who will map out this progress for you. It is really not possible to choose your own pieces at this point because many are deceptively difficult. As I mentioned in the previous point, the number one cause of frustration is working on material that is too difficult for our skill set.
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This is much more of an issue for adults rather than kids because kids accept what they are given in a curriculum whereas adults want to jump to the repertoire that inspired them to play in the first place…. If there is one takeaway for everybody from the entire CGC site it is to be patient and mindful of advancing repertoire and technique. In addition to this well worn concept we can sometimes just hit a wall. This can happen for no reason, and I often suggest a break from the current study materials and if it is really a depressing plateau then perhaps even a week off playing to explore some other musical paths like listening, concert attendance or reading.
We all hit plateaus, so you are not alone in this. Perseverance and a bit of creativity can get your through to the next level as well as a good dose of patience. In my education I had several teachers that were less than stellar and it hindered my progress quite a lot. It is also a good idea to find examples of other students that the teacher has worked with, this can be a good indication of their effectiveness as a teacher. To be honest, there are many teachers out there who are not passionate about teaching.
Rather, they teach because it provides an income. This can lead to a lesson to lesson approach that lacks structure and will often result in working on inappropriate repertoire. Always a tough question to answer off the top of my head after workshops, so I am happy to have some time to think right now…. Some composers who have written for the guitar or had music arranged for the guitar who I would recommend listening to:. This might be the most frequently asked question in music education… and I think it is so frequent because the answer is always….
One tenet is that regular practice trumps practicing in large disparate chunks. So fifteen minutes every day is better that one hour a week. The other tenet is that you can practice for several hours and get very little done, so your practice has to be intentional and focused. As a suggestion, a very broad one, for the beginning stages I would say 30 minutes to one hour each day will provide you with steady progress. These are obviously bigger topics than a bullet point and they have all been addressed at length in the podcast and blog, but just as a reminder….
This is so good and clear Simon. The direction of travel is traced, only now for me to get actions in motion Raphaella Smits not in your list of performers? Thank you for opening up a whole new world of music for me. Your list of artists that you like is a good one, but you might want to go online and very carefully watch and listen to Ana Vidovic. As a professional musician, I would consider her technique very clean and accurate. Her expression of the music is also good, and she has an amazing amount of pieces in her memorized repertoire. It is impressive how little she looks at the guitar in most pieces.
I would suggest listening to at least 15 of her pieces, and watching her interviews. Their necks have a very different feel from other guitars. Letting go of what you know is essential.
The wood, construction techniques, and string tension all impact the sound your guitar produces. The playing response and tone of nylon strings make them indispensable. Here are a trio of our top-rated classical guitars. The Yamaha C40 Classical Guitar is a full-sized classical acoustic with a spruce top that rings up for a great introductory price.
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The Cordoba C12 SP Classical Guitar faithfully recreates the vintage beauty of a classic s design—from the solid spruce top to the hand-inlaid rosette. The budget-friendly Epiphone PRO-1 Classical Acoustic Guitar has a solid cedar top for rich tone and is designed for easier playability. For a good quality classical guitar, look for one with a solid top not laminated. The most popular tonewoods for classical acoustic guitars are spruce and cedar. Spruce produces a more articulate, clear sound and many players appreciate its greater projection.
An in-tune guitar is essential for everyone, but even more so for beginners who are learning to recognize correct notes by ear. Becoming accustomed to out-of-tune notes will sabotage your ear raining. Make sure you have an accurate guitar tuner and use it every time you play. Learn more about choosing the right model with our Tuner Buying Guide. This instrument requires a very specific upright, yet seated, position.
First, choose a firm chair that is high enough so that your shin and thigh make a 90 degree angle. Your back should be straight but relaxed.