Beginner Guitar Lesson 10 - "Blister in the Sun"

I’m really enjoying teaching you the basics of playing guitar. I want to hear from you someday in the future telling me how you’ve mastered the guitar and that I had some part to play in it. Remember, 15 minutes a day is much better than 1 hour every 4 days, so keep trying to pick up that guitar every day! Regular practice is the difference between your guitar dreams coming true, and you regretting your wasted time. So keep doing it!

Before we start today's lesson, a few students have asked what I recommend as the best online training system for the guitar. Now, as far as online references, you can't go wrong with Jamorama – www.affiliatelinkhere.com If you do decide to become a member of Jamorama, I guarantee you will rapidly accelerate your guitar learning, and you will be playing all those famous songs that you want to play in a very short amount of time. I won't talk too much about it as you can get info by visiting their website, but I highly recommend you invest in this course if you are truly serious about learning to play fantastic guitar.

Now back to today's lesson... Today we’re going to continue our practice of finger picking, along with reading guitar tablature. You’re going to learn the following short riff from "Blister in the Sun," by the Violent Femmes:

|------------------------|-----------------------|--------------------------|-----7---|

|--------0----1----0-----|-----0-------1----0----|-------0----0h--1p--0-----|-----8---|

|*--0---------0-------0--|--L-------0------------|--0--------------------0--|---------|

|*-----------------------|-----------------------|--------------------------|---------|

|------------------------|-----------------------|--------------------------|---------|

|------------------------|-----------------------|--------------------------|---------|

(note that -0--|--L- above means that the note carries over for half a beat into the next bar, i.e. it lasts for 1.5 beats)

Press the play button to hear what it sounds like:

Insert Camtasia here: camtasia\blisterriff3

Practice this riff until you are comfortable playing it on your own. Once you feel comfortable with this section (note that I am assuming you are picking with a downward motion), we are going to introduce picking with an upwards motion. This time, as you pluck each string, try to alternate between picking with an upward motion and picking with a downward motion.

It is a very good habit when picking with a flat pick to pick in this alternating manner, because when you learn more complicated picking patterns in future, it will make it a lot easier for you to pick back and forth with speed. Alternating picking up and down will also make it easier to keep track of where you are on the guitar so you don’t pick the wrong strings. It can take quite some time to build up this sense of where you are on a guitar (both on the fret board and picking between strings).

Your homework tonight is to practice picking this riff with an alternating upward and downward motion. If you can, go back to the riff from the last article and practice it with an upward and downward motion as well. Remember, keep chasing that dream. You only live once, so don’t look back and regret anything. Keep practicing!!