Are guitar lessons worth it?

If you’ve ever wanted to learn guitar, you’ve probably weighed out the pluses and minuses of taking guitar lessons. 

Guitar lessons will ensure that you’re learning the correct technique (as well as the right terminology) as opposed to just learning by ear. However, finding an in-person instructor, keeping to a set schedule of lessons, and commuting to and from the lessons can be an imposition to some learners – especially those with a busy schedule. 

Many famous guitar players learned to play in slightly unorthodox ways and some stuck to a more traditional method. 

Here’s how some of the biggest guitarists around learned to play: 

 

John Mayer 

John Mayer’s father rented a guitar for him to play when he turned 13, and a Stevie Ray Vaughan cassette tape gifted to him by a neighbor helped Mayer develop his affection for the blues.

Mayer took guitar lessons from a guitar shop owner in his Bridgeport, Connecticut hometown. His preoccupation with the instrument concerned his parents so much that they took him to see a psychiatrist, who assured them he was fine. 


Slash

Slash – aka Saul Hudson – originally started playing bass. He switched to guitar after hearing music teacher Robert Wolin play “Brown Sugar” by the Rolling Stones. He started taking classes with Wolin, playing a one-stringed flamenco guitar gifted to him by his grandmother. Hudson was a champion BMX biker, but started devoting up to 12 hours a day to playing the guitar.



Jimi Hendrix

As an elementary schooler, young Hendrix took to carrying a broom with him to pretend it was a guitar. Hendrix first got his hands on a string instrument while helping his dad with a side job. The client allowed Jimi to keep an old, one-stringed ukulele that was among the items being removed from her home – and he taught himself by ear to play Elvis Presley songs. He bought his first guitar for $5 (about $51 in 2022) and played for hours every day. He listened to artists like Muddy Waters, B.B. King, and Robert Johnson for inspiration.



Kurt Cobain

Nirvana’s guitarist and frontman developed a love of music at an early age. He reportedly started singing at two years old, and started playing the piano at age four, composing his first song – about a trip to a park. For his 14th birthday in 1981, Cobain’s uncle let him choose his gift – a bike or a used guitar. Cobain picked the guitar. He learned to play some songs by Led Zeppelin and Queen before starting to write his own songs. He played guitar left-handed, despite being forced to write right-handed. 



Eric Clapton

The “Cream” guitarist got his first guitar for his 13th birthday, but it was so difficult to play that he lost interest until two years later. Blues music was Clapton’s biggest inspiration – he practiced learning the chords by playing along to blues records. By age 16, he was getting noticed for his skills and began busking around London.

 

However, if you want fast, real results, guitar lessons can get you there faster. Fret Zealot’s ecosystem of guitar lessons allows users to learn guitar how they want – when they have time, wherever they are. Rather than having to travel to a guitar teacher, Fret Zealot users can access lessons from world-class instructors from their phones. 

There are lots of courses for complete beginners, which will teach you the basics like notes, chords, strumming, and finger positions, and from there, you can learn what interests you – whether it’s delving into simple song lessons or working on more advanced techniques like pentatonic scales or riffs. 

Plus, the Fret Zealot app contains every note, scale, and chord – so you’ll never have to resort to books or diagrams. 

According to TakeLessons.com, the average cost of in-person guitar lessons in the U.S. is $30 to $60 an hour. With Fret Zealot, you’ll save money on the cost of guitar lessons, plus gas or transportation and any books an in-person tutor may require. The biggest saving is time – you can simply take out your phone anytime, and get to learning. 

 

Songs you can play with just four chords

There are a lot of songs you can play with just three chords – here are songs you can play with only four!

 

You Shook Me All Night Long – AC/DC 

Chords used: G, C, D, G/B. 

Angus Young uses power chords to play the rhythm part of this song. If you need help figuring out power chords, check out this course!

 

Brown Eyed Girl – Van Morrison 

Chords used: C, D, G, Em. 

 

Four chords and a little fingerpicking are all you need to master this classic.


Creep – Radiohead

Chords used: G, B, C, Cm

 

If you have trouble with the Cm barre chord, check out this easy barre chord course! 


Smells Like Teen Spirit – Nirvana

Chords used:  F, Bb, Ab, and C#

Kurt Cobain used a lot of power chords and barre chords in his playing style. Learn more about his unique style with this course.


With or Without You – U2

Chords used: G, D, Em, C 

 

Learn this U2 favorite with easy “cowboy” open chords! 

 

Photograph – Ed Sheeran 

Chords used:  D, Bm, A, and G

 

This lesson includes a play-along video so you can make sure you have the rhythm right. 

 

Tennessee Whiskey – Chris Stapleton 

Chords used: A, E, Bm, D. 

 

Another song that sounds great with “cowboy” chords. 

 

Wagon Wheel – Darius Rucker 

Chords used: G, D, Em, and C 

 

This popular song is perfect for beginners. 

 

Folsom Prison Blues – Johnny Cash 

Chords used: E, E7, A, and B7

 

This simple chord progression gets bluesy with the addition of 7th chords. 

 

Five great country songs to learn on guitar

There’s something about country music that’s perfect for a six-string. Here are five great country songs you can learn on guitar – and the step-by-step lessons to learn them. 

 

Tennessee Whiskey – Chris Stapleton 

Chris Stapleton’s cover of “Tennessee Whiskey” is a huge crossover hit – it made it to number 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 after its release in 2015. The original version was recorded by David Allen Coe in 1981.



Wagon Wheel – Darius Rucker/Old Crow Medicine Show

This song, popularized by Darius Rucker, is made up of a simple four-chord progression. The chorus and melody were written by Bob Dylan in the 1970s, and Ketch Secor of Old Crow Medicine Show wrote the verses 25 years later. 


Somethin’ Bad – Carrie Underwood and Miranda Lambert

Country stars Carrie Underwood and Miranda Lambert teamed up for this 2014 hit – an all-woman take on the “bro country” genre that was rising in popularity at the time. The song was originally written as a male/female duet, but the lyrics were tweaked for the Underwood/Lambert pairing. 



Man! I Feel Like a Woman! – Shania Twain

Country superstar Shania Twain wrote this track for her third studio album with longtime collaborator and then-husband Robert John “Mutt” Lange. Twain said the title of the song was inspired by drag queens who worked at the same Canadian resort she worked at while providing for her brothers and sisters after their parents’ death. The video is a gender-swapped homage to Robert Palmer’s videos which featured glassy-eyed models as backup dancers. 


Friends in Low Places – Garth Brooks

Songwriters Earl Bud Lee and Dewayne Blackwell penned this jukebox classic in 1989. According to Lee, he was at lunch in Nashville with a group of fellow songwriters when he realized he forgot his wallet, but said “Don’t worry, I have friends in low places, I know the cook”. Lee and Blackwell gave the song to Garth Brooks – who they had met when he was a salesman at a Nashville shoe store – and it was the last demo session Brooks ever did as a singer. Brooks’ version was the lead single on his second studio album. 

 

Check out these lessons for other great country songs on Fret Zealot!

The top 5 Fret Zealot courses of 2023

Fret Zealot has guitar courses for all skill levels, genres, and techniques. These are the five top courses for 2023. 

 

30 Day Beginner Challenge 

One month is all it takes to learn the basics of guitar with this course. 

 

The Total Beginner’s Guitar Course (Level 1)

This is a great course for complete novices at guitar. It breaks down guitar anatomy, how to tune, finger exercises, as well as first chords and strumming.


Electric Guitar Beginners – Level 1

This beginner’s course will teach you chords, how to read chord charts, and how to strum in time. 


Acoustic Beginners – Level 1

This course, which covers chords, strumming, and good practice habits, is all about setting the foundations of your guitar education journey. 

 

Acoustic Guitar Lessons For Beginners

This step-by-step program takes the guesswork out of what and how to practice. It breaks down music theory into easy-to-understand sections.



Read more:

Review: Pentatonic Protocols guitar course by Robbie Calvo

How to choose between over a hundred courses available on Fret Zealot

These are the top five guitars in the Fret Zealot store in 2023

These are the five most popular guitars from the Fret Zealot store in 2023! 



Epiphone Slash Pack

Designed by Slash himself, the AFD Les Paul Special-II has more appointments than most electric guitars. Topped with AAA flame maple, this guitar also features a dark cherry mahogany body and neck, ivory binding, and a silk print of Slash’s Snakepit logo on the headstock. The first time you plug into a high-gain amp, the AFD Les Paul Special-II’s Ceramic Plus Zebra-coil humbuckers will treat you to the thick, overdriven, screaming metallic tone that Slash made famous. Complete with a premium gig bag and signature guitar picks the Epiphone Slash AFD Les Paul Special-II Outfit is a great bundle for beginners or anybody who is searching for a quality, affordable electric guitar.

Check out this review! 


Epiphone PR-4E

The Epiphone PR-4E Pack gives you a great-sounding acoustic-electric guitar and much more! You get a quality Epiphone PR-4E acoustic-electric guitar that sounds amazing unplugged or amplified, with a comfortable neck for easy fretting. You also get an acoustic guitar amp, a gig bag, electronic tuner, strap, and picks. When you learn to play on a quality acoustic-electric instrument that sounds good and feels right, you’ll be inspired to keep playing.  That’s what the affordable Epiphone PR-4E Pack gives you.


Yamaha FG800

 

Review: 

Try this guitar’s acoustic/electric counterpart, the FGX800C. 


Epiphone Player Pack

The Epiphone Les Paul Player Pack gives you a great guitar, combo amplifier, and everything else you need to get started playing electric guitar! You get a quality Epiphone Les Paul electric solidbody guitar with two humbucking pickups and a fast neck for easy fretting, a 10-watt amplifier with a clean/crunch switch, a gig bag, a clip-on tuner, a strap, and picks. When you learn to play on a quality instrument that sounds good, you’ll be inspired to keep playing. Quality, great sound, and affordability are what the Epiphone Les Paul Player Pack gives you.

Check out this review. 


Epiphone DR-100

The DR-100 has the look, sound, and build quality that first time players and professionals expect to find when they pick up an Epiphone. The dreadnought is considered the classic go-to shape for bluegrass, folk, rock, country, and everything in-between. The dreadnought sound is commanding when required, but its balanced sound means that at any volume, you can be heard and hear yourself well, too.

Click here for the review.

These are Fret Zealot’s top five new lessons of 2023!

We unveiled lots of brand new song lessons this year – from AC/DC to ZZ Top. Here are the five most popular song lessons we released in 2023. 



Purple Rain – Prince

“Purple Rain” is the title track for Prince’s 1984 album and film of the same name – but it was originally intended to be a collaboration with former Fleetwood Mac frontwoman Stevie Nicks. Nicks said Prince sent her a ten-minute instrumental version of the song and requested that she write the lyrics. Nicks declined, saying it was too much for her. Prince brought the song to his band instead, and by the next day, had “Purple Rain” as we know it arranged. 

 

Creep – Radiohead 

Radiohead’s debut single “Creep” – and one of their most successful songs – wasn’t supposed to be released at all. The band recorded the song at the request of their producers and released it as a single in 1992. It didn’t become a hit until it was re-released in 1993. 

 

Take Me Home, Country Roads – John Denver 

Songwriting team Taffy Nivert and Bill Danoff were driving through Maryland when the inspiration for “Country Roads, Take Me Home” struck. They were originally going to sell the song to Johnny Cash, but John Denver “flipped” when he heard that news, and had to have the song for himself. The song is one of West Virginia’s four official state anthems. It was selected to go in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress in 2023.


Hells Bells – AC/DC

The creepy bell featured at the start of this 1980 track is an actual 2,000 lbs. bronze bell. It was recorded using a mobile studio inside of the bell’s foundry in England.


Come As You Are – Nirvana

Read more:

Want to learn to play guitar like John Mayer?

Getting the band back together! Five bands that reunited after breaking up

Want to learn to play guitar like John Mayer?

Check out this John Mayer Player Study course, and you’ll be slinging guitar like the “Gravity” songwriter in no time! 

Background 

Mayer was born in Connecticut in 1977 to a high school principal father and an English teacher mother. Young John Mayer became infatuated with the guitar after watching Marty McFly’s performance in Back to The Future. Mayer’s father rented a guitar for him to play when he turned 13, and a Stevie Ray Vaughan cassette tape gifted to him by a neighbor helped Mayer develop his affection for the blues.

 Mayer took guitar lessons from a guitar shop owner in his Bridgeport, Connecticut hometown. His preoccupation with the instrument concerned his parents so much that they took him to see a psychiatrist, who assured them he was fine. 

Mayer briefly attended the Berklee College of Music before dropping out after two semesters and moving to Atlanta with a college friend to form the duo LoFi Masters. They played in clubs and coffee houses in Atlanta, parting ways as Mayer wanted to pursue pop music. Mayer recorded an independent EP, Inside Wants Out, in 1999. 

Mayer’s fledgling career benefited from the growing online music market at the time – he was able to benefit from an online following. A lawyer acquaintance sent Aware Records Mayer’s EP, and the label later released his internet-only album, No Room For Squares. Columbia Records later remixed and re-released the album, which spawned radio hits like “Your Body is a Wonderland”, “No Such Thing”, and “Why, Georgia”. 

Style

“Crossroads Festival 2010 – John Mayer” by aaronHwarren is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0.

 

 

 

 

Mayer’s blues influence is evident in his guitar playing, which features a distinctive sound. He utilizes a mix of fingerpicking and flatpicking to incorporate percussive elements. Mayer is a guitar collector and has over 200 guitars

 

 

 

 

 

Dead and Company 

Mayer has been touring with Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart since 2015 as Dead & Company. He developed a strong interest in The Grateful Dead’s music in 2011 after hearing their song “Althea” on Pandora. He played the song with Weir on the Late Late Show, impressing Weir enough to bring him on. 

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Getting the band back together! Five bands that reunited after breaking up

Unfortunately, band breakups happen – and they can get ugly, especially when money and fame are involved! Here are some bands that thrilled fans by getting back together after their breakups. 

 

Guns ‘N Roses 

Hard rock band Guns ‘N Roses saw meteoric success in the late 1980s and early 1990s with songs like “Welcome to the Jungle”, “Sweet Child O’ Mine”, and “Paradise City”.  The band went through several lineup changes, including founding drummer Steven Adler leaving in 1990 and founding guitarist Izzy Stradlin leaving in 1991. Tensions rose while trying to create a new original album after the 1994 covers album “The Spaghetti Incident”. Guitarist Slash left in 1996, followed by bassist Duff McKagan in 1997. Lead singer Axl Rose was the only remaining member when the act resurfaced in 2001. However, in 2016, Slash and McKagan came back in 2016 for a hugely popular (and ongoing) reunion tour. 

 

The Police 

British New Wave band The Police were at the top of their careers with songs like “Message in a Bottle”, “Roxanne”, and “Every Breath You Take” when they disbanded in 1984. Creative differences – and age differences – contributed to strife within the band, and all three members embarked on solo careers following the breakup. In 2007, the band reunited for a 30th anniversary tour (briefly). When the tour ended in 2008, The Police once again disbanded – as the world’s highest-paid musicians of that year. 

 

The Eagles 

The Eagles had a huge hit with their 1976 album Hotel California, but tensions were high as they recorded their followup, In the Long Run. That tension between guitarist/vocalist Glenn Frey and guitarist Don Felder bubbled over during a 1980 fundraiser concert for a U.S. Senator. Frey felt that Felder had insulted the senator under his breath, and confronted him about it – and that he felt the par would get into a physical altercation following the show. The group separated after that night. The band had a reunion in 1994 for their Hell Freezes Over tour. 

 

Blink-182 

Possibly the biggest pop-punk bands of all time, Blink-182 has had a few lineup changes but is best known for being a trio: drummer Travis Barker, bassist/vocalist Mark Hoppus and vocalist/guitarist Tom DeLonge. The group had era-defining hits in the late 1990s/early 2000s, including “All the Small Things” and “What’s My Age Again”. However, they broke up in 2005 following arguments about recording and the direction of the band. In 2008, Barker survived a plane crash that killed four people, leading to the trio reuniting and starting the conversation about getting back together. The band reunited in 2009 and toured until 2014, when DeLonge quit. He was replaced by Alkaline Trio’s Matt Skiba for several tours and albums, including 2016’s California. Hoppus announced in 2021 that he was diagnosed with cancer, and the band announced DeLonge’s return in 2022. 

 

Led Zeppelin 

“Jimmy Page with Robert Plant 2 – Led Zeppelin – 1977” by Jim Summaria, http://www.jimsummariaphoto.com/ is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

After drummer John Bonham’s tragic 1980 death at age 32, Led Zeppelin disbanded, and lead singer Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, and bassist John Paul Jones went their separate ways. In 2007, the group reunited for one night only – with Bonham’s son Jason on drums. The group played the O2 Arena in London. Although the show generated plenty of buzz about a new tour or record, it never happened. 

 

Review: Pentatonic Protocols guitar course by Robbie Calvo

We reviewed Robbie Calvo’s “Pentatonic Protocols 1” guitar course.

A professional guitarist and musician for over a decade,  Calvo teaches you his unique soloing strategies through this course. These intentional, defined approaches can be applied to all five Pentatonic scale shapes – no matter what genre you’re playing.

Read more about Calvo here.

Check out the review here:

 

More songs you can play with only three chords

Even with a basic grasp of guitar chords, you have a lot of songs at your fingertips. Here are some songs that only need three chords to play. 

 

What’s Up – 4 Non Blondes

Chords used: G, Am, C

This ‘90s anthem is a great song to break out at parties, and with a simple strumming pattern, it’s easy to play.


Evil Ways – Santana

Chords used: C, Gm, D

While playing Carlos Santana’s lead part on this 1970 hit might take some practice, the riff is made up of just three chords.


Englishman in New York – Sting

Chords used: Em, A, Bm

 

Born This Way – Lady Gaga

Chords used: E, D, A. 

You’ll need a capo on Fret 2 to play this pop song in the key of the recording. 


Blowin’ in the Wind – Bob Dylan 


Chords used: C, F, G.

One of the best-known folk songs of all time, “Blowin’ in the Wind” can be played with only three chords. You can also play this song with a capo on the 7th fret and G, C, D.