I grow weary of playing air guitar, and want to make the leap into learning real guitar. I play piano (well, not in a while, but I used to be pretty good) so I have a good basis of knowledge of music in general (reading music, chord structures, and whatnot). I started playing last week using my roommate's accoustic guitar and a book of guitar chord charts, but it's slow going, and I am wondering if this is really the best way to learn.

So the question is: What is the best way to learn? Should I:

Continue to just play on my own, learning chords and trying to play songs that I like?

Take guitar lessons? If so, what is the best way to go about finding a teacher?

I have some friends in bands -- I could maybe hire one of them to teach me, since they're always low on money and it would be nice to support them, but if they have never taught before, do you think it would be a bad idea?

Thanks guys. I look forward to bringing the

i don't respond well to teachers, i'm more of a hunt and peck kind of guy but it took me way too long to get good.

Pretty much all three of those methods have worked for different folks. Teachers will keep you from forming bad habits, but then... it's not quite as rigorous as piano playing, unless you're into classical guitar.

Get your friends a sixpack and pick their brains for an hour or two. Then, do what I did: put on a great album with easy chords in headphones, and bang away on an acoustic, so that you can hear it (but barely). Very rewarding.

If you already have a knowledge of basic theory, keep learning those chords and make yourself be able to play them all over the neck. A lot of early players drop out because it hurts or they can't get the barre chords or whatever. A teacher will keep beating you over the head until you get the chords down.

And like the Cap'n says, find a album you love and learn to play along with it.

And write your own songs using the chords you know.

1. Go with a friend who plays and shop for an instrument that is in your budget, sounds good, and is physically easy to play.

2. Make picking up your guitar a reward. Like you get to play guitar only after you get x, y, and z done (like a chore you don't like, dishes or whatever). Seriously, this is important.

3. Reward yourself at least once a day for like 10 minutes. Or multiple times, whatever.

4. Just like piano, or typing, or learning to tie your shoelaces, learning an instrument involves building muscular memory which takes time and repetition, so practice one or two small things SLOWLY and STEADILY. Then to get it out of your head and into your hands, watch t.v. and switch between say a couple chords back and forth without stopping. By the time you get to the next commercial break, you'll be able to do it, and you can move onto the next two chords. Works for scales, fingerpicking, anything you want to do. Within a month or two your hands will have the facility to do more than you thought possible in that time.

But get yourself an instrument, the commitment financially is a good motivator at the beginnning, plus you'll sound better sooner if it isn't hard to play and has good tone.

Hope this helps.

This goes without saying.

Thanks for all the great advice guys. This is very helpful, and is getting me really excited to learn! I will continue on my own, following your suggestions, and will occasionally pick my friends' brains.

Don't think of it as practice, think of it as play. It's a subtle point to have to make with yourself, but it makes a big difference.

I was making a joke about jerking off.

it depends upon how serious you want to be with this, If you just want to learn to play for fun then I would get one of your friends to show you a few easy songs and chords and go from there. If you want to do more with the instruments you can get a lot of books that will show you the basics and then progress to harder ones and so on. Also just practice as much as you can. Also it helps to just mess around on the instrument some times and just try to see what sounds good, Also you can play while watching tv which for some reason is when I usually come up with my best stuff

What I did was took four or five lessons, then just learned on my own.

Granted, I am hardly a stellar guitar player... but I can strum some tunes.

If only I got solid advice like this when awhile back I wanted suggestions on bettering my piano skills. All those comments are solid. I want to slide the piano aside for a bit and try my hand at the guitar since most music I first fell in love with was guitar based.