If you’re one of the many thousands of people looking to start learning guitar, you’re no doubt assessing the different options and starting to scratch your head at the wide array of opportunities available to you.

When I first began learning guitar, I relied heavily on friends of mine who were at a more advanced level of playing. I was still at school at the time and used to spend break times in the music room with my pals going over scales, riffs and chord progressions from all our favourite songs.

This was a great way to get started because it was cheap and I was on a limited budget. Several of my friends were also classically trained musicians so they knew what they were talking about.

Not everyone has the luxury of musical friends to give their early playing career a boost in the right direction, though. So what would I have done if I had no-one to turn to for informal coaching?

Why Online Guitar Lessons are the Best Start

Well, I have to say that, knowing what I know now, I would probably have started off with some online guitar lessons. There are a good number of free online guitar lessons available which can get you off to a great start.

Just search around on Google and you’ll quickly see there are thousands of enthusiastic guitarists out there willing to share their knowledge with you.

If you follow along with some of these lessons, you’ll quickly get up to speed on the basics of how to hold your guitar, how to hold a pick, learn some basic chords and even basic scales. Before long you’ll be playing along to your favourite songs.

This is a great way to get your fingers stronger and allow you to hit the ground running when you get face to face lessons.

Why I recommend Face to Face Lessons

Online guitar lessons are a great way to learn certain techniques and theory etc, as is a good guitar textbook. However, you really can’t beat face to face lessons with a qualified guitar teacher.

The reason for this is that they will give you immediate feedback on how you’re doing. If your technique is not correct, they will tell you. If the intonation of your string bending is not spot on, they will also tell you.

But most of all, they can tailor the lesson to your individual requirements. This is why I think they are good value despite being much more expensive than online lessons.

So, for the best results, start with online lessons to get the hang of things and so that you get the best value out of your lessons with a tutor. Once you’re starting to get the hang of it, head along to your local guitar teacher for face to face lessons where you’ll get tuition that will make a big difference to your playing ability.

Try this website for a good beginner’s guide to learning the guitar – http://www.guitar-instructions.org/.