Unfortunately due to that financial irresponsibility of my x girlfriend's that I mentioned I'm not going to be able to afford to get my guitar back. I thought I mentioned that but maybe I didn't. So I will, in fact, have to buy a new one.

Hi all,

Tuning ear is something I wouldn't recommend unless you have a fairly relative perception of correct pitch.  A good way to remember the standard tuning of a guitar is EADGBE, or, as I like to think of it, Eddie ate dynamite, good bye Eddie.  Or, if you have an enemy whose name begins with an E, replace Eddie with that name, lol.

Stairway To Heaven is a great example of finger picking.  I've learned a substantially good amount of that song, and I believe it's very fun to play.  Another aspect of guitar is hammer ons and pull offs, which requires discipline and patience to learn, I may add.

I can get really quick with those two techniques, however my finger strength could use some work.

Regarding someone's comment about not being able to play a chord using more than 2 or 3 fingers, that's either lack of strength in your 4th finger, or your finger nails are prohibiting that clean sound you want.  This is all in the introductroy tutorial I conjured up.

Oh, by the way, there is a thing out there called "Talking Tabs", which I believe is discontinued.  I found out about this about 5 years ago, and according to my 11 year old attention span, you could buy it, but not sure anymore.  Feel free to do a Google search and see what you come up with.

If anyone's interested in my introductory lesson, just shoot me a quick email at [email protected] or post on this forum.

Best Regards,

Luke

Yeah it was definitely finger strength that held me back. In fact for years people have been getting on me about that but I think in most aspects, finger strength is overrated, but in guitar playing I can see why it would be necessary.
And I can tell you, that even though i have perfect pitch which means I wouldn't have to use an external reference to tune, I always tune with a reference anyway just to make sure the pitch of everything is linked up. I remember when tuning the guitar though, I always had trouble getting my b string in tune because I was very picky on the intonation of that particular string, as I'm sure many of you guitar players are. Any time there was a third between two notes, like between the g and the b of the g chord, or the c and e of the c chord, I could never get the tuning of those right. But the guitars I was playing on were pretty cheap and I can't say anything about the strings since I don't know a thing about them.
And there are plenty of tuning strategies. Some people fret one string so they can play the same note on two strings to hear if they are out of tune. I know someone who plays harmonics on the lower strings to check the higher strings. I guess it all has to do with what type of sound you're looking for since it's never going to be perfect like a digital instrument.

Finger strength is definitely an area I could use improvement in.I tried to learn power chords and that definitely requires it.

It is for power chording though since you fret two or more strings with one finger. At least that's how the teachers I've had tried to teach me to do it.

Well, finger strength is essential in playing.  However, it isn't everything.  Your form in finger positioning must be correct in order to get that right sound.  There is no use in using more strength than you have to on fretting the notes if you don't have to.  This is introduced in the tutorial.

It'll be released tomorrow at some point during the afternoon.

Best Regards,

Luke

When you buy strings in a set, they are in the right order, so when you take out a string and it is quite thick, then it's the thickest and the next one will be the second thickest.

I've found a lot of guitar strings come in a single  plastic bag these days rather than in separate paper envelopes like they always used to do. Usually the first and second are wound together, the third and fourth, and the fifth and sixth. I think they have some colour coding, and sometimes paper tags to tell which is which, but it is possible to do it blind. If you hold one between the finger and thumb of one hand and the other between finger and thum of the other, then switch them back and forth, you soon get a feel for which is thicker, even though there's not a lot in it.

Yeah, that's why I prefer hardtail guitars and have avoided the instruments with Floyd Rose. I guess it depends on the strings. I use mainly strings by Elixir, which are more expensive, but they have a coating which makes them last longer. SO you don't have to change them so often. They are nicely organised into the paper envelopes.

Yeah I like D'Addario strings.  I use their Pro Steels on my bass and am happy with those  but for guitar I'm still kinda nitpicky.  I'm settled for the dorp C  strings for 6 string and I don't recall the ones for my 7, but  they sound good.

Yeah, I can imagine!
Bass strings are more expensive in general, that's why people end up doing all sorts of tricks with old strings, such as boiling. As I use coated strings and this method is not recommended with them, I my self have never tried this, but in this video the difference is quite huge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67pdYATnRgE