The development of an acoustic guitar player

[Pitar]

Modify this development summary to suit your experiences/sensibilities:

1. Want to play acoustic guitar.
2. Buy a particular brand of guitar. We don't need to know which one and why. But, assume loyalty has been established due to money spent on it.
3. Join an acoustic guitar forum. Hell, join'm all, I don't care.
4. Read crap reviews of your chosen brand/model. Get defensive. Keep in mind you still don't know crap about playing at this juncture.
5. Become a figurative member of said brand fan club and brainwash yourself to it's defense come hell, high water and/or poor forum speak against it.
6. You're a serious noob and skills are beginning to develop, including hand and ear, and suddenly you begin string experimenting. Why only just now?
7. There seems to be a change in the tone of your guitar (evidence in 6, above). Inexplicable to you, you turn to the forums for help.
8. You learn about RH, set-ups, bone vs poly-razz-ma-tazz, strings, holding your mouth wrong, the whole suite.
9. Your sensibilities have now been tampered with and you wonder if changes in (8) are fixes. You don't want to throw money around needlessly.
10. You decide to go to the GC (type) store and do a little tone-work. You come away enlightened and feeling your leather has just been tested.
11. You know the answer lies in the guitar itself. You can feel it, hear it and most importantly, generally sense it. Now, what to do?
12. Back to the same store for a contrasting A/B of different brands/models. You can do this now. You've gained the requisite skill set.
13. You decide on a brand/model that piques your interest and, damn, can it nicely represent your skills or what? It costs a lot. Now what?
14. Back to the forums for more advice. Now when you read you can cut through the BS in the responses and filter out the good stuff. It all sounded spot on before didn't it?
15. You learn of other brands/models similar to your grail in (13) and check them out. Yep, sure enough you're happy at a fraction of the grail's price.
16. You take a beating on your trade and get that new guitar.
17. Be really happy. I mean r-e-a-l-l-y happy, until you gain additional hand and ear skills.
18. Repeat steps 7 through 17, inclusive, until you become a (19).
19. Reach the pinnacle of frustration after trying all factory produced guitars that do not satisfy that damnable nuanced ear you've developed.
20. Begin a sampling of private luthier-built guitars and realize that's where your grail has been all along. Kick self for wasting thousands of dollars on junk.
21. You have been learning for quite some time, have quite the skill set and have acquired a decent financial posture. You reward yourself with a particular luthier-built, so-called boutique guitar.
22. Apply (17) here. It's been a long time coming and you have reached Maslow's Self Actualization. But, what about the other side of the comma in (17)?
23. You are now totally and admittedly confused. You now have the skill set capable of a sonic equivalent of picking pepper out of fly {censored} and failed the grail.
24. You realize that there isn't such a thing as a grail. Your mind and community are laughing at you now. What to do...
25. Skills. You begin to wonder if....nah......well maybe.....
26. You go back to GC and pick up a cheapo lammy and go for it. Okay, it sounds pretty good. You work your skill set over and into it. Pretty damned good!
27. You find a $xxx.xx Pac Rim guitar that gives you everything you can get from that boutique build and there you are feeling like an unwrapped sucker.
28. You aren't a stupid person and finally realize it's skills that make the guitar sing and nothing else really matters.
29. You buy the guitar in (27) and keep your boutique build.
30. You don't own a beater guitar.

[americansinner]

lol

ya. I been through all of that. I still own the beater though. let my nieces "play" it.

[d03nut]

While my own "trajectory" has (at times) been different, # 27 is where I'm at......

[Pitar]

Me too, 3.

[Bullettoothtony]

I've probably been all the way through it, what I do know is that it brought a much needed smile to my face and when I read "...the sonic equivalent of picking pepper out of fly {censored} " I very nearly spat my coffee all over my keyboard.

[10ae1203]

1. Get a small cash bonus. Realize that the lack of music in my life was a dark spell, and with money burning a hole in my pocket,

buy a {censored} guitar from a little shop. Not a cool little shop, but a crummy one. With crummy overpriced plywood guitars.

2. Play this one for a while, learn the requisite three chords and a pentatonic shape.

3. Buy a different guitar with a solid top from a guy selling his guitars on the side of the road. Win-win. He got to eat supper and I got a pretty good hundred dollar guitar.

4. Sell the {censored} guitar on ebay for pocket change.

5. 6 thru 8 from above

6. While fooling around in a music store play a D-15, fall in love, buy it.

7. Start lessons to get good enough to merit an eight hundred dollar guitar.

8. Realize that I didn't actually want to play country blues.

9. Trade the $800 guitar for a $500 classical guitar.

10. When that chinese guitar started to blow up, buy a different cheap chinese guitar to make do.

11. Buy a guitar that cost more than my car is worth.

12. Am still at your 17 above. Reeeeeeeallly happy.

13. I felt this way about that Martin once, also.

14. This makes me a little queasy realizing this.

[Opa John]

My development when kinda like this.

1 - Picked out a guitar.

2 - Learned to pick a few tunes in a matter of days, but not very well.

3 - Liked what I heard and stayed at that same level for the past 53 years!!

[Bucksstudent]

1. I started wanting to play electric, got saddled with an acoustic.

2. I wanted an electric Rickenbacker. My first guitar was a Romanian Amada.

3. I never joined a niche acoustic forum.

4. I learned a lot of what I know about guitars from reading claims on forums, and researching them for myself.

5. It sounds like you're talking about Ultimate Guitar.

7. I have never turned to a forum for "help" with my tone.

11. I knew that to begin with.

12. Actually I got my main acoustic through wanting a specific wood, and then having to settle for a mahogany Tacoma.

16. Kinda. I traded a Korean PRS and Eastwood Saturn 63, and had to pay several hundred dollars.

21. I started studying acoustic technique on electric.

24. The grail... You work with what you have.

26. I've never been in a GC.

28. That and a pair of Polyweb Elixers.

30. I do. It's a Fender Classical. It still have the original strings from four years ago.

[recordingtrack1]

 

Originally Posted by Pitar

Modify this development summary to suit your experiences/sensibilities:

1. Want to play acoustic guitar.

2. Buy a particular brand of guitar. We don't need to know which one and why. But, assume loyalty has been established due to money spent on it.

3. Join an acoustic guitar forum. Hell, join'm all, I don't care.

4. Read crap reviews of your chosen brand/model. Get defensive. Keep in mind you still don't know crap about playing at this juncture.

5. Become a figurative member of said brand fan club and brainwash yourself to it's defense come hell, high water and/or poor forum speak against it.

6. You're a serious noob and skills are beginning to develop, including hand and ear, and suddenly you begin string experimenting. Why only just now?

7. There seems to be a change in the tone of your guitar (evidence in 6, above). Inexplicable to you, you turn to the forums for help.

8. You learn about RH, set-ups, bone vs poly-razz-ma-tazz, strings, holding your mouth wrong, the whole suite.

9. Your sensibilities have now been tampered with and you wonder if changes in (8) are fixes. You don't want to throw money around needlessly.

10. You decide to go to the GC (type) store and do a little tone-work. You come away enlightened and feeling your leather has just been tested.

11. You know the answer lies in the guitar itself. You can feel it, hear it and most importantly, generally sense it. Now, what to do?

12. Back to the same store for a contrasting A/B of different brands/models. You can do this now. You've gained the requisite skill set.

13. You decide on a brand/model that piques your interest and, damn, can it nicely represent your skills or what? It costs a lot. Now what?

14. Back to the forums for more advice. Now when you read you can cut through the BS in the responses and filter out the good stuff. It all sounded spot on before didn't it?

15. You learn of other brands/models similar to your grail in (13) and check them out. Yep, sure enough you're happy at a fraction of the grail's price.

16. You take a beating on your trade and get that new guitar.

17. Be really happy. I mean r-e-a-l-l-y happy, until you gain additional hand and ear skills.

18. Repeat steps 7 through 17, inclusive, until you become a (19).

19. Reach the pinnacle of frustration after trying all factory produced guitars that do not satisfy that damnable nuanced ear you've developed.

20. Begin a sampling of private luthier-built guitars and realize that's where your grail has been all along. Kick self for wasting thousands of dollars on junk.

21. You have been learning for quite some time, have quite the skill set and have acquired a decent financial posture. You reward yourself with a particular luthier-built, so-called boutique guitar.

22. Apply (17) here. It's been a long time coming and you have reached Maslow's Self Actualization. But, what about the other side of the comma in (17)?

23. You are now totally and admittedly confused. You now have the skill set capable of a sonic equivalent of picking pepper out of fly {censored} and failed the grail.

24. You realize that there isn't such a thing as a grail. Your mind and community are laughing at you now. What to do...

25. Skills. You begin to wonder if....nah......well maybe.....

26. You go back to GC and pick up a cheapo lammy and go for it. Okay, it sounds pretty good. You work your skill set over and into it. Pretty damned good!

27. You find a $xxx.xx Pac Rim guitar that gives you everything you can get from that boutique build and there you are feeling like an unwrapped sucker.

28. You aren't a stupid person and finally realize it's skills that make the guitar sing and nothing else really matters.

29. You buy the guitar in (27) and keep your boutique build.

30. You don't own a beater guitar.

 

This is good, P

Just one comment though........Decaffeinated maybe?

[Pitar]

 

Originally Posted by recordingtrack1

This is good, P

Just one comment though........Decaffeinated maybe?

 

Good suggestion. I've been wired since Monday when I told my main source of income to go pound sand. Been up to my eyeballs in financials and other related boring crap hedging (literally) between going self-employed again or hiring on somewhere. I make it sound academic but we all know in this economy it's a crap shoot either way. I knocked out the 30 points in this thread starter in like 5 minutes so, yea, I need a depressant and a hammock about now. Meeting all next week with business owners looking to retire, too. Ima wreck.

[EdBega]

The more I learn the more I realize how little I know.

Disclaimer: Yamaha is the best bang guitar for the money ...

[OldTwelver]

I feel like I've been cheated out of the experience Pitar outlined.

I had good mentors, players in the family and close friends, who steered me well at an early age.

Every guitar I've purchased over the years lived up to my expectations, although I set the bar rather low for those I took to Southeast Asia. 115F and 90% salt air humidity is not a nice place for cherished instruments. So, the good one's stayed at home.

The only 'dud' I've owned was given to me as a Christmas gift by a well meaning ex, and it took a little time to arrange a fatal accident for it (it was from the dark side anyway) !!

Like I said .... really no regrets, except for letting a couple slip through my hands that I really really really needed.

Yep, well and thoroughly cheated, I am .....

Paul