7 Reasons Why You Quit Playing Slide Guitar

by John Tuggle on August 25, 2010

With the rise in popularity of Slide Guitar, partially due to Derek Trucks, many people are now wanting to play the most expressive way of playing the guitar.  Playing slide guitar is as close to the human voice as you can get.  If you want to play a soulful melodic sound, then there’s no better way to do it than with a slide.  If you go to a blues jam and play slide, you will definitely be a standout.  There’s just not a lot of people who are playing it compared to standard blues guitar. Slide Guitar and Amp

So how do you get started?  Well, many people who start out with high hopes of learning Duane Allman and Derek Trucks style slide, never realize their potential and often give up.  I’ve talked to many people whot said, “It’s just too hard!”

I’ve put together this list of 7 reasons people quit playing slide guitar.  If you don’t do each one of these things, then I can pretty much guarantee that you will not stick with it, and you’ll  become just another statistic on the slide guitar hit list.

Here are the 7 reasons

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Eric Clapton has always been one of my favorite guitarists. His laid back, melodic, and easy to listen to style has been something I’ve tried to achieve with my guitar playing. He always seems to hit the perfect note!

If you didn’t know, Eric is releasing a new album in September entitled, Clapton. The new album features guest contributions from Steve Winwood, Wynton Marsalis, Sheryl Crow, Allen Toussaint, Derek Trucks and others. It is co-produced by the guitar legend’s long-standing collaborator Doyle Bramhall II. He is also releasing the Crossroads 2010 DVD in November.

You can win both of these by leaving a comment below. The CD will be shipped approximately on September 28th and the Crossroads DVD approximately on November 9th.

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Mastering BB King’s Vibrato

by John Tuggle on August 12, 2010

BB KingIf you have listened to BB King and tried to reproduce his playing, then you already know that his vibrato is one of the most difficult things to reproduce.

Simply put, if you can’t vibrato like BB, then your licks won’t have the same punch. Yes they may still sound good, but without a strong vibrato, they won’t capture the listener’s attention the same way.

BB actually developed his vibrato by trying to emulate the sound of the bottleneck. In the interview below you can listen to him explain why he did this.

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How to Emulate Pedal Steel with Slide Guitar in Open E Tuning

July 20, 2010

If you want to expand the sounds you can get on slide guitar in open e tuning, then check out this tutorial on emulating pedal steel. Pedal Steel is a really cool instrument and can be extremely difficult to learn, carry around, and they are quite expensive. So what if you want to get that type [...]

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2 Hot Blues Riffs to Spice Up Your Playing

July 14, 2010

In this guitar lesson, I’m going to show you 2 blues riffs you can use to create a cool blues guitar rhythm groove. These type of riffs are used by SRV, Clapton, and Derek Trucks as well as countless other blues guitar giants. You can use these riffs to create a monstrous sounding rhythm groove. [...]

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Warren Haynes Lead Guitar Lesson: 1 1/2 Step Bending

July 12, 2010

In today’s lead guitar lesson, I want to show you a cool way to add some flavor to your blues guitar playing in the style of Warren Haynes. He didn’t invent this style, but he sure is good at making it sound incredible. I think he got this concept from listening to such blues greats [...]

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Slide Guitar Lesson 3 Month Video Challenge.

June 24, 2010

I keep saying over and over again about the importance of recording yourself to find out what you need to practice to get better. Well now I’m going to give you a real life example of this in action. A customer of Learning Guitar Now has agreed to record himself playing slide guitar, observe where [...]

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How to Record Your Guitar Playing Over a Backing Track.

June 16, 2010

From the very beginning, I have always recorded myself playing guitar to see exactly what I sounded like, and to see if I had made any progress. This is one of the best ways to become a better guitar player. If you don’t know what you’re doing wrong, how are you going to fix it? [...]

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Blues Guitar Lesson: How to Play Blues Guitar Like Eric Clapton.

June 11, 2010

Does playing the guitar like Slowhand himself sound appealing to you?  Or maybe you’ve been trying to recreate those Cream-era Clapton solos and just can’t seem to pull them off. Well In today’s blues guitar lesson,  I’m going to show you how to play blues guitar like Eric Clapton by utilizing the minor pentatonic scale. [...]

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This is Why I Think Derek Trucks is So Great.

May 27, 2010

I’m sure everyone has heard of Derek Trucks by now. If you haven’t, you need to. He is becoming one of the greatest guitar players of all time. He has already accomplished amazing things such as, joining Eric Clapton on tour and playing Duane Allman’s guitar parts, playing in the Allman Brothers Band, and a [...]

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