Hi Fender Lounge peeps, Hi I'm Rik,

I bought my first fender strat the other day by mistake

I was honestly just going in for a look at £200 - £300 stuff but ended up getting the black basic strat for £400-ish - and I love it.

But now I'm looking for playing tips. I've been playing since 13, I'm now 30-something and haven't really played much over the last 10 years. So, if anyone can point me to a tutorial or two, would be great.

Few things I'm interested in...

1. Expanding my fret board knowledge. I'm cool with my blues scale but always seem to use the same frets and positions - I need to move up and down the fretboard more.

2. A new scale or two - maybe something jazzy or classical. I use the pentatonic too much, if that's possible.

3. I used to use slightly larger Eric Ball gauge 10 (rather than 9 which has come with the guitar) on my previous guitar, still getting the feel of it but would I have to tweak the neck if I was to change?

Anyway, loving the machine, even though neighbours may not.

Rik

Hi Rik and welcome.

Check out an artist/author called David Mead. He has a book called Rhythm and one called chords and scales.....or scales and chords, I forget which.

He uses a method of just applying formulas and shapes and counting to the fret board........I know that is what guitar playing is but he explains it simply and makes you think about what you are doing. The books are just full of diagrams of alt voicings of chords and scales as well as linking up the scales through all their positions.

I know that there are loads of books of this ilk on the market, but as a teacher I have to say that his books are a wee cut above. They are pricier than others, they tend to go from about £10 to £25 but worth the investment.

Have fun mate and enjoy your new toy!

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speak slowly I'm a drummer too!!

And I proudly lack a stick or a kazoo up my arse...........

Cheers mate, I'll take a butchers,

Welcome to the forum Ric. Try Mike Dodge's Penatonic Lessons. He'll open up their use up and down the board. Some great stuff there. http://lessons.mikedodge.com/lessons/Ad ... entTOC.htm

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The blues ain't nothin but a good man feelin bad.

Magic - this is going to take me a while to get my head around but it'll be worth it!

Also, realising I need to speed up my fingers somehow but I'm sure that will come back.

Thanks,

Rik

Hi Rik, welcome to the forum.
A good way of getting to know your fretboard is to play the same note on each string. For instance play the C note on the 6th string and then the 5th and so on and do that with every note. Not forgetting the flats or sharps whatever you want to call them.
It's useful for when you come to soloing, knowing where the notes are.
Whatever you do......have fun, see you around.

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Thanks mate, I'll give it shot.

Looks like I might have to go back and do some work with all this. (I've never had a proper guitar lesson so think I need to step back to a bit of the basic theory).

You Tube is your freind. Theres alot to learn on there.

Ok Rik, this is one of the most useful lessons I've seen, it will get you moving up that neck.
Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_qw03-3gFg

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Hi Rik, I'll take a stab at your #3 for you:

Changing up to a string set starting with a high E string of .10 has pretty much zero chance of requiring any truss rod adjustment when we are talking about Fender Stratocasters. Fender rock maple necks are just not that sensitive to a small change.

I went from:

9 11 16 26 36 46
to
10 13 17 30 44 52

...on two strats with no need for neck adjustments.

Cheers all, got a lot to learn it seems.

Ha - a Londoner? If so, greetings from south of the river. And welcome to the Forum.

Time to break out of that pentatonic box for sure. What music are you into that has some other notes in it? For instance, many moons ago I started out on Dire Straits, The Who and The Allman Brothers. Plenty of extra notes to be found amongst those - and many other people's playing too.

Start by listening; that's my ha'peth worth.

Good luck - C

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WHen a guitarist stops telling themself that it's time to quit mate!

_________________
speak slowly I'm a drummer too!!

And I proudly lack a stick or a kazoo up my arse...........

Actually a Brummie, just like the phrase

Hmmm, maybe a bit of Dire Straits - *tab search begins* - ta, Ceri

Don't worry - currently "winning" - just found and resurrected my proco rat pedal. Shame the crappy plastic Ibanez wah-wah hasn't lasted the course.