Storm Guild Electric Guitar

Slotted Guitar Nut

Learning To Play Guitar - Know Your Guitar

So, you’ve decided to learn to play guitar. Congrads! You’re going to love it. The first step in learning to play is getting to know the components of your guitar.

The guitar is an iconic instrument. In the hands of masters like the Romero Family, it can sound like a piano, drum, violin or, God forbid, a guitar! It takes years of practice to get to that point as you might imagine. That being said, you may get there sooner than you think. Why? Playing the guitar is very addicting. It is all over once you learn that first song, so be warned!

The key to avoiding frustration is to take things slowly at first. Build a good foundation and you’ll play for a long time and happily so. Try to learn Eruption by Van Halen the first day and you’ll be giving up the instrument pretty quickly. Okay, so where do we start? The first step is to know the components of the instrument.

The Body

The body of the guitar is not the entire instrument. Instead, it refers to the area where you strum. On an acoustic guitar, this is the hollow wood area. The body comes with a bridge, which the strings run across and connect to the guitar near the hole. That hole in the body is known by the sophisticated name of “the hole”. When you are first learning to play, it is known as the pick eater because you might develop a tendency to drop your pick in it!

The Neck and Head

The strings run up the “neck” of the guitar from the body to the “headstock”. The metal pieces running perpendicular on the neck are known as frets. Pressing the strings before, after or on the frets creates different tunes. At the top of the neck, you’ll find a white piece of material running perpendicular to the neck. This is known as the nut. It slots the strings and stabilizes them for the run up to the tuners. What are tuners? They are the little devices on the headstock that you attach the strings to. As you turn the tuners, you tune the guitar to the desired sound.

That’s it. Some guitars will have additional items on them, but these are the basic elements. Now you know the anatomy of the guitar and it is time to start playing!

About the Author

Mark P. Warner writes for WhoInventedtheGuitar.com - where you can find out who invented the guitar and get free lessons to learn how to play.

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