Best Guitar Books Available

Best Guitar Books

Here's the best advice you'll ever get. I own every guitar book on Earth and have been playing since 1968. Obtain the following books, they're the best, and study them/do everything they tell you and you'll soon be winning friends and influencing people with your guitar: The Guitar Handbook by Ralph

Guitar Chords & Scales, An Easy Reference for Acoustic or Electric Guitar from Hal Leonard Publishing Music Theory, Everything You Ever Wanted to Know But Were Afraid to Ask by Tom Kolb The Art of Contemporary Travis Picking by Mark Hanson The Art of Solo Fingerpicking, How To Play Alternating-Bass Fingerstyle Guitar Solos by Mark Hanson Flatpicking Guitar Essentials, Folk and Bluegrass, from Acoustic Guitar Magazine's Private Lessons series The Flatpicker's Guide by Dan Crary Once you've mastered those books, you'll know what you want to do. Hell, you might even have a recording contract, you'll be so darn good! Those are all the books you need to self teach. If you get stuck on some point, skip it and come back later. But finish the books. You'll thank me. Then go buy a Maton and get into that Tommy Emmanuel thing (I'm thinking you're from Oz here, otherwise you'll have to go after Chet Atkins...)

Q: Out of the picking books (what's the difference between fingerpicking and flatpicking? Sorry, I'm a noob as well!) which would be best to start with?

A: Fingerpicking would be using the thumb and first three fingers of your strumming hand (sometimes even throwing in the pinky where necessary) to play the strings

in a sort of rolling continuum. Go over to amazon.com and under music search up Chet Atkins, Leo Kottke, Earl Klugh, or Tommy Emmanuel, or more popularly, some Harry Chapin, James Taylor, etc., and listen to some sound samples. Flatpicking would be using a pick (plectrum) to pick the strings one at a time, very rapidly, best typified by bluegrass music (although there are other types of flatpicking). Over at amazon.com, listen to samples of Clarence White, Tony Rice, The Kentucky Colonels, etc., as well as most jazz guitar. Both styles would apply to rock and popular sorts of music, not just the stuff I listed. You can Google "flatpicking guitar" and "fingerstyle guitar" as well and have a look at what comes up. Now if I have you understanding the diff, you can choose between either: "The Art of Contemporary Travis Picking" by Mark Hanson followed by "The Art of Solo Fingerpicking, How To Play Alternating-Bass Fingerstyle Guitar Solos" by Mark Hanson if you want to play fingerstyle, or: "Flatpicking Guitar Essentials, Folk and Bluegrass, from Acoustic Guitar Magazine's Private Lessons series" followed by "The Flatpicker's Guide by Dan Crary" if you're more interested in bluegrass style or other sorts of flatpicking with your pick. If you are undecided and want to sound good and make a big impression on people real quick, start with "The Art of Contemporary Travis Picking" by Mark Hanson and when you finish that, then work through "The Art of Solo Fingerpicking, How To Play Alternating-Bass Fingerstyle Guitar Solos" by Mark Hanson. If you practice and study, Hanson will have you fingerpicking very quickly. You'll be startled at how fast you started sounding good on your guitar. Once you can do a basic fingerpicking pattern and know some chords, you can go over to http://www.chordie.com (Warning - MANY wrong transcriptions exist on that site. Use your ears to decide if they're right!) and get a few songs to fingerpick. Flatpicking is a bit trickier, but also sounds amazing once you master it, and if you're good at it, you can make jaws drop. But for a beginner, I think starting out with fingerstyle will provide you with quicker results. More "bang for your buck". But to become a well rounded guitarist, after you've mastered Hanson's two books, continue through the flatpicking books and the other books. Those seven books will very quickly provide you with a fine guitar education. They're a small investment for what they provide, and from there, you'll know where you want to go. All those books are available at amazon.com if you can't find them elsewhere.

Hope this helps and explains things. If you have any further questions, let me know. Either I or someone else around here will know the answer. Stick with it, through those sore fingers!