Perhaps you are at this moment looking for a guitar teacher for yourself or a loved one. I am based in the beautiful town of Croxley Green, Hertfordshire but I do teach students from all over the place, including online. Guitar lessons are a great idea for a whole host of reasons, many of which you will doubtless already be aware of. However let me list just a few: inspiration, accountability, motivation, knowledge, experience, specific instruction tailored to you, someone who can spot mistakes that you might not and so on. The internet is a wealth of knowledge which is both a blessing and a curse. It can be overwhelming. Just trying to find where to start can be enough to stop you in your tracks. So much of teaching the guitar is intuitively responding to a student, in the moment, based on many factors: how engaged is the student with the material? How challenging is the piece? Is the piece appropriate for their level of ability (regardless of whether they really, really want to play it)? An astute teacher has an eye on not just the short term but also the long term motivation of the student. Watching a video on YouTube doesn’t provide feedback, as useful as it may be. Ultimately, the human connection is what drives people forward. Progress happens most rapidly when students both like their teacher, feels that their teacher likes them and feels that the teacher really cares about their improvement.
The graded syllabus is more often than not a good idea for younger students because it serves as a structured and tapered developmental path. At the same time, grades are not for everyone. Indeed, some students rebel against discipline and the more the teacher tries to get them to work on the things they need to work on in order to improve the more it pushes them away. Others use their guitar skill as a means of feeling good about themselves at an otherwise challenging time in their lives, the unfortunate byproduct of this being that they are unwilling to engage in any learning activity that might involve risk to this good feeling. These kind of quirks of personality in turn can result in a conflict of interest – the teacher’s well intentioned desire for the student to improve and the student’s reticence or just outright refusal to engage in disciplined learning. The balance can be extremely delicate. Too little push from the teacher and no progress is made. Too much and the student seeks out a new teacher, one who won’t hold them accountable or encourage them to confront their musical shortcomings. In the hands of an inexperienced teacher it is even possible that they may stop learning altogether. The goal of the experienced, sensitive teacher is to walk the narrow path, avoiding the precipice on either side!
Of course, not everyone has guitar lessons with progress in mind. Some students simply enjoy having time with an experienced player and wish they had more time to practice but it simply isn’t possible. Learning the guitar is a journey with different beginnings and endings for everyone. Those who do want to see rapid progress may be interested to know that I register all of my students as users of this site. Once that is done they are able to log in and view their individual practice schedules (most often updated by me on a weekly basis) and I can also share content with all or some of my students. This way everyone gets to benefit from the library of music and guitar related material I have built up over the years – and am constantly adding to. It also helps with accountability because students always know what they’re supposed to be doing and for how long. Students also can’t say they lost their practice diary (assuming they had one in the first place)!
If you would like to make an enquiry concerning guitar lessons, please don’t hesitate to get in touch using the form below. I have students as far as Gerrard’s Cross and Beaconsfield but primarily serve the areas of Croxley Green, Sarratt, Chandlers Cross, Loudwater, Rickmansworth, Chorleywood, Moor Park, Northwood and Pinner and I have taught guitar students from Bushey and Watford for those who don’t mind a short drive. I’m also regularly teaching guitar in schools such as Croxley Danes, Pinner High School and at the performing arts specialist college, Tring Park. As I mentioned earlier I can and regularly do teach online. Online lessons can work well if the student is keen – Zoom have introduced special features for musicians which lower the latency of the connection. So it’s worth a try even if you are not local!