Need some serious help from you peeps.

[Reverend Timmy]

Try to make it fun.I know that sounds silly,but if he is just a little motivated and its fun,he will want to do it.I started when I was six and hated it because the teacher was a dick...............

[OnlineStageGear]

Start the same way an instructional book for beginners would. Teach him the different parts of the guitar, how to hold it, pluck a string and how to tune it and send him home with atleast one song to play like Smoke on the Water or TNT by AC/DC but on one string.

Matt

[zeegler]

Some good advice here. I think, since I had no lessons at all until I was already well on my way, I'm going to start by teaching him the things I wish I knew right from the start.

I've already gone over the parts of the guitar with him, and what they do. I'm going to make up some diagrams to help him remember them. I'm not going to inundate him with technical stuff though. At 8 years old, he's going to want to learn to play a song, otherwise he will lose interest real quick. We did come across a bit of a snag. He's left handed, and I don't have any lefty guitars, so his mom is going to buy him a 3/4 size acoustic, and I'll convert it to left handed for him.

I'm not going to worry about chords to start with. I'll get him to the point where he can fret single notes properly first, and have him learn some basic scales, and a couple of easy songs. Smoke on the Water is a good one. Anyone got any other ideas for easy but cool songs? He's a big Guitar Hero fan, so maybe I'll start with a song that he knows from that.

[Bengal]

Zeeg,
High horse? OK, last time I do that...

Remember it was you that said you have no idea how to teach someone guitar, Right? You did say that. So I think my advise is spot on. Do it wrong and you'll kill any love he might have for the instrument. I've seen it happen. Do you think I'd try to teach my sons how to play if and when they want to? No friggin' way. I know my limitations...

Also, don't ask for advise if you can't take the recomendations...

EDIT: Last piece of advise for you. You can teach a left handed person to play right handed. I would recomend that. My buddy from Slipknot is left handed but plays right handed. His teacher did that so he would have more opitions when buying a guitar. I would try to go that route...

[Spivonious]

The first songs I learned were Enter Sandman (Metallica), Smells Like Teen Spirit (Nirvana), and Sunshine of Your Love (Cream). Nice easy riffs and the songs are very simple in structure so it's not too difficult to get the entire song down. That definitely helped my morale early on.

Does he have any experience playing other instruments? I had played piano and trombone before I picked up the guitar. If this is his first, then the entire first lesson should be very basic things like correct fretting and picking. Send him home with some strength-building exercises ( 1-2-3-4 chromatics, alternate picking on each open string) and maybe a basic song like Smoke on the Water. The goal at first is to get him interested in sounding good and to keep him motivated by giving him a song that he can play after a week of practice. The next lesson, have him play the exercises and give some suggestions on how to improve his technique. Show him a basic rhythm figure and then maybe jam together a little. Playing is always more fun when you're in a group.

Find out what music he likes and listen to it yourself. Pick things out from some songs that would be good at teaching basic concepts like rhythm, articulation, etc. If he likes the Beatles, play Come Together. Fun song and super easy to play.

[hippietim]

Teach him songs. Simple songs. Songs that he'll give a crap about learning. My youngest son is a big fan of Jimi Hendrix. So I started him out with Hey Joe. My son is also left handed. I bought him a Baby Taylor acoustic guitar. They're under $300 and made in the USA - this instrument is a keeper.

If you want to teach him something easy from Guitar Hero, go with Surrender - great tune and it can be his introduction to barre chords.

[hippietim]

Oh my son was also 8 when he started (9 now). We sent him to proper lessons initially and he hated it because it was the Mary had a Little Lamb crap and those "half" chords (just using the E,B,G strings). Not surprisingly, he quit and lost interest. A few months later he started taking interest again so we started just doing this casual. He's working on Fire and also makes up his own riffs.

[Tekky]

I bought my nephews guitars for Christmas and gave them a lesson before they went home. Besides guitar anatomy and tuning, I showed them both a couple of excercises that helped them with fretting and training their brains to syncronize the right hand picking with the left hand fretting. With someone at the age of 8, small hands are going to be an issue. Showing them some of the very basic stuff, though a little boring, can go a long way to helping that student to learn.

[zeegler]

Zeeg,
High horse? OK, last time I do that...

Remember it was you that said you have no idea how to teach someone guitar, Right? You did say that. So I think my advise is spot on. Do it wrong and you'll kill any love he might have for the instrument. I've seen it happen. Do you think I'd try to teach my sons how to play if and when they want to? No friggin' way. I know my limitations...

Also, don't ask for advise if you can't take the recomendations...

EDIT: Last piece of advise for you. You can teach a left handed person to play right handed. I would recomend that. My buddy from Slipknot is left handed but plays right handed. His teacher did that so he would have more opitions when buying a guitar. I would try to go that route...

Well, seriously, I don't believe there is right or wrong with teaching. Everyone responds differently to different methods. It's certainly not black and white. I had a guitar teacher once. He was a professional teacher and session musician, and all he did was bore the shit out of me, and tried to make me memorize the entire fretboard, note by note. So that pretty much throws that theory out the window.

[Norton]

I think you should start with a few basic chords. Am,E,Em,Dm and G. and the C major scale. Cause EVERY person knows what the C major scale is, even if they can't name it. So these two things would be good for the first one or two lessons.

When he becomes rather fluent in playing and passing between these chords,teach him the F major so he's gonna be able to play barre chords.And this is a milestone in playing, imo. After that, he'll be able to play a lot of simple heavy metal stuff.

After he becomes able to play some power chords, you should tell him to start working 1234-4321 stuff. After a while, he'll be ready to learn some simple pentatonic stuff, and from that point he probably can go on by himself.


And of course, teach him simple songs after you teach the chords. It's really going to help him memorize the chords. And after he learns the barre chords, don't forget to teach him how to play Paranoid . Seriosuly, it would help his palm muting a lot.

[Bengal]

Well, seriously, I don't believe there is right or wrong with teaching. Everyone responds differently to different methods. It's certainly not black and white. I had a guitar teacher once. He was a professional teacher and session musician, and all he did was bore the shit out of me, and tried to make me memorize the entire fretboard, note by note. So that pretty much throws that theory out the window.

Well, that's fine and all, but posting the oposite doesn't equate to a "high horse". You yourself admitted you didn't know what you were doing. If you had said the parents couldn't afford the lessons in the first post, mine would have been totally different. I just went on what was said. I wouldn't want my son taking lessons from someone who didn't know what they were talking about...

My first teacher was the best guitarist I've ever heard. Classical playing guy. His lessons were boring as all hell but did I learn? You bet. It's the "Nintendo Generation" that has to be wowed at every turn in life. Sometimes things are boring, doesn't mean they are not nessassary...

But I only took 6 months of lessons from the guy and self taught everything else. I've been playing 28 years now and I would never think of myself as any kind of teacher. Just because I can play, doesn't mean I can teach...

But I do think it's cool you are trying to help the kid...

[Jacksonchick]

Wow, thats a hard one and I don't know the answer to it. Good luck though.

[mm2002]

Hey Zeegs, maybe contact that guy on TV with the black hat and sunglasses, what's his name? I can't remember now, but he is a guitar virtuoso, and can also sell you a premium quality instrument with real wood for dirt cheap just if you buy the lessons. It looks like a good deal to me. I've seen on TV he also teaches kids.

[El_Kabong]

Good work Zeeg, I'll bet you are a cool dad.

[zeegler]

Well, that's fine and all, but posting the oposite doesn't equate to a "high horse". You yourself admitted you didn't know what you were doing. If you had said the parents couldn't afford the lessons in the first post, mine would have been totally different. I just went on what was said. I wouldn't want my son taking lessons from someone who didn't know what they were talking about...

My first teacher was the best guitarist I've ever heard. Classical playing guy. His lessons were boring as all hell but did I learn? You bet. It's the "Nintendo Generation" that has to be wowed at every turn in life. Sometimes things are boring, doesn't mean they are not nessassary...

But I only took 6 months of lessons from the guy and self taught everything else. I've been playing 28 years now and I would never think of myself as any kind of teacher. Just because I can play, doesn't mean I can teach...

But I do think it's cool you are trying to help the kid...

Hey it's all good. I apologize for the high horse comment. I must have been on the rag that day.