About the Site

totalguitarist.com provides guitar lessons on a wide range of topics. All lessons are provided free of charge. The site is more about becoming a well-rounded musician rather than just another guitar player. For this reason, topics such as music theory, reading, and rhythm are covered in far more depth than usual.

The goal of the site is to create a comprehensive resource for learning guitar. As a teacher and player, I have been disappointed with most instructional materials out there. Many books and videos are inaccurate or dumb down the material. For this reason, this site will be most useful for players who want to go beyond just playing guitar and gain a true understanding of the inner-workings of music. That said, anyone regardless of style, background, or ability should find lessons that are beneficial to their goals and interests.

About the Lessons

The lessons on this site are conceived in a highly structured way. Many lessons have other lessons as prerequisites. This is to allow you to learn gradually and have material at your disposal to help you prepare for any given lesson on the site.

Modular Lessons

All lessons are constructed in a modular way. This means that concepts like reading, technique, and music theory are covered separately. This is done in such a way that you can work on a technique lesson without having to understand the theory behind the concept. An example of this is the lessons on chords found in various sections of the site including technique and theory. You can learn about the music theory behind chords in the theory section and various techniques for playing chords in the technique section. Some of these sections reference each other, but most lessons are conceived in such a way that they can be learned without having to refer to other lessons.

Structuring the lessons this way does several things:

• 1. It allows people who already have knowledge in a certain area to learn more efficiently. If you want to learn a technique, but already know the music theory behind the concepts in the lesson, you will learn faster without the extraneous information.
• 2. Separates each concept into bite-sized chunks, which can make it easier for a beginner to grasp the concepts.
• 3. It becomes easier to come up with a structured course of study that suits your own interests and goals.

Prerequisites

Many lessons have a list of prerequisites for that lesson. This is under the heading "What You Should Know." These are other lessons that you should have gone through before working on the current lesson. Following this study plan will produce the most benefits. Some prerequisites are only recommendations, but you will get the most out of each lesson if you go through all of the prerequisites first. Note that a prerequisite doesn't mean that it is impossible for you to go through the lesson if you haven't worked through the prequisite first. It just means that the lesson will be more difficult to understand.

Information Boxes

Most lessons contain informational boxes that are set off from the main content. These boxes contain notes, tips and review of previous lessons. In most cases, these boxes aren't an essential part of the lesson and can be ignored. However, you will learn more about each concept by reading them.

Notes

Review

Tips

A Work In Progress

This site will be continually updated. Lessons should be added at least once or twice per week, and in many cases, more frequently than that. None of the lessons currently on the site should be considered complete. These lessons will be updated based on visitor feedback and questions to constantly improve them.

Downloads

Many lessons include downloads of additional materials, such as worksheets, exercises, and more. It is recommended that you use these materials to gain a full understanding of the concepts in the lesson. All worksheets have corresponding answer sheets, so you can easily check your work on music theory exercises.