How To Play Electric Guitar

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By: Mike Hammil

When learning how to play electric guitar, there are a few tips and tricks which, by doing, allow you to improve at a much greater pace than you ordinarily would. Not only that, but these make the entire experience considerably more fun than just sitting down and learning theory. While theory learning is important, it's certainly not all there is when you want to learn how to play electric guitar. So, here are the tips to follow :

1)Listen to music
You should be doing this already. But, now that you've decided you want to know how to play songs on electric guitar, music listening will take on a whole new level. When you listen to your favorite stuff, listen to the guitars (that probably made you want to buy a guitar) and take note of the subtleties. Watch DVD's as well and take careful notice at how the notes are being played. One of the things you should see is that hacking is out – guitar playing generally sounds louder than it actually looks. You don't need to hack the guitar to get a good sound out of it, but there are definitely certain dynamics involved with 'dirtier' and 'cleaner' sounds.

But, you should also listen to OTHER kinds of music now too, and take in the fresh styles and different ways of playing guitar. Learning these styles will actually even improve how you play your own favorite style.

2)Practice! Practice!
There are numerous ways of practicing.

Firstly, you should practice along with your favorite CD's to develop a good ear (being able to pick up notes easily.)

Secondly, you should practice your THEORY. Yes, this is where most people find it boring, but when you see how amazing your theory improves your guitar playing you'll not only find it worth it, but you'll find it fun. If you want to learn to play electric guitar, you must practice SCALES, CHORDS and CHORD PROGRESSIONS mostly. Scales are particularly important because they help you to improve on improvisation, lead soloing and also help your ear to pick up notes easily. Scales will also help you to write songs, along with chord progressions. Knowing chord progressions allows you to play any song in any key, so you can easily transpose if you need to. Lastly, LEARN the notes on each fret on each string. It will take some time, and it gets easier as you learn your scales. Start with the major scale, and learn the Pentatonic (or Blues) scale for jamming purposes.

3)Jam! Jam!
Yes, this is the fun part. Get together with some musicians, and JAM. Scales will help you to jam better, but here you can also experiment. And experimentation is the key to learning. At first, you may be nervous to jam with other guys. Get over it, and enjoy yourself!

4)Learn Theory
Although we've already mentioned playing scales and chord progressions, it's important that you learn your theory along with practicing it. Some things you can't really practice much, like knowing how to build chords and how to transpose. Start with intervals, scales and chords. These will probably keep you busy for the rest of your life (especially as you start learning more exotic scales etc.)

Theory is important. Yes, it's true that many legends like Jimi Hendrix didn't really learn theory, but not all of us are as natural with the guitar as he was. Theory also helps you to converse with other musicians, aids greatly in the studio, and helps you to make guitar playing more serious if you want to.

So, if you want to learn how to play electric guitar, do these things constantly and you'll find yourself improving drastically.