Learning How To Play Guitar: The Long Hard Road

Learning How To Play Guitar: The Long Hard Road

This iteration of the final project, along with the singing, was incredibly challenging; part of it indubitably was from my insecurities and diffidence both about playing the guitar and singing. For the project, I was fortunate to make use of a family friend as a guitar teacher. He taught me some basic chords, bar chords, and power chords. At first, I could not hit/strum one note or chord without hearing the dissonant mash of flat notes. Nonetheless, even after playing for a few weeks, my fingertips have begun to harden. I don’t have any impressive callouses yet, but they are improving. With the hardening of the fingertips, you can play longer and keep your fingers on the strings longer and more precisely. Another thing I noticed was that, particularly for my left hand as I am right handed and hold the neck and the fret of the guitar with my left, that agility is heightened when you can manage to stretch your fingers adequately, which was also very tough in the beginning.

            For my song, I took a basic group of chords, which my guitar teacher taught me, and put them together to string together the main rhythm and melody. The main progression, which the words are then sang over, goes like this: A minor, C major, and E major to A minor, C major, F major bar chord, and back to the E major. The beginning picking-segment before that verse/main chord progression is slightly different; it starts with an A minor that is supplemented with the pinky finger hitting the high E string off and on, on the 3^rd fret, then the D minor chord is played with the addition of the pinky hitting the high E string off and on, on the 3^rd fret, then the C major is played with the addition of the pinky hitting the B string off and on, on the 3^rd fret, and then the E major, and then the open A string is picked, then the 2^nd fret A string, then the 3^rd fret A string, and then back to the C major. This then is followed with the main A minor, C major, E major, A minor, C major, F major bar chord, and E major chord verse progression.

            While listening to the verse progressions in myriad blues and folk songs, I realized that most of the verse sequences followed an ABAB pattern. My song does this, too, as it shifts from the A sequence (A minor, C major, and E major) to the B sequence (A minor, C major, F major bar chord, and E major). This is sometimes called the Strophic form. I probably sound a bit alien and the language of this stuff does become, at times, rather esoteric. Although I have never written, composed, or sang an original song, apart from this one, I did have some piano lessons when I was a young boy and they surprisingly came in handy as I was working on this project (especially apropos of the chord structures, melodies, verse patterns etc. because they have correlates with the guitar).

            I also chose that particular combination because I could hear how the words would work in that rhythmic context (I tried to imagine Mississippi Fred McDowell singing it or someone great like that). I also picked that sequence because of how the chords sounded together. The blend of these specific chords gave the song the tone of a lament, somewhat mournful, but also like a ballad, and I was drawn to other folk/blues songs that had that same feel. I still haven’t been able to play it really good or make it sound like I hear it in my mind, but I tried.

The A minor chord 

The C major chord

The D major chord

The E major chord

The F major bar chord