Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Getting Your Money's Worth From Lessons

Are your lessons worth the money?

With all of the materials out there, is it worth paying for guitar lessons? I'd argue that the answer is yes for several reasons, even though it sounds self serving. The biggest reason is that you have someone to ask questions of, give you honest feedback and keep you on the correct path. As more and more information becomes available, and this isn't limited to music lessons, people become confused about what's important, where they should focus, and how much time they should spend on learning the concepts they've discovered. A beginning guitar student needs to forget about how overwhelming everything seems to be and to concentrate on one area at a time.

Getting your money's worth.

Your guitar teacher needs to know what you like, how you feel about your progress, and how you practice. These are some of the things you need to be clear about to get the most for your money. I've had students work on songs for weeks and then finally tell me they don't like that song. There are many others that will teach the same concepts, but I can't give you a different song unless I know you're unhappy.  Most beginning guitar students don't see much progress, so if you're in doubt about how you're doing, have your teacher give you an honest evaluation. Guitar is very slow going at first and it can be discouraging to say the least. If you're unhappy with your where you are, talk over ways to improve how you practice. Too many guitar students aren't really practicing, but they're just playing songs over and over. You need to have a specific goal for that practice session. Whether it's learning a new song, smoothing out trouble spots or improving the whole song, focus on what needs the most improvement.

No comments: