The Pinky

Hi and welcome, I am a recent returnee to playing the guitar so the only advice I can offer you is the advice that a friend of mine (who plays semi-pro) gave me. Have fun and enjoy!

Hopefully I have got this in the right forum, wasn't sure where this fitted. Please can I have the benefit of your experience and expertise with regards to strings? You may have seen from my posts that I picked the guitar up again about 6 months ago and one of my purchases was a Epiphone Gibson Studio, which I absolutely love, I just wish I could play better (must practice more!). This guitar is fitted with what I would term as light strings, so much so that sometimes I inadvertently bend the strings when forming chords, these strings are great for bending for solos etc, and as I get more proficient I am less inclined to inadvertently bend the strings. So I have no idea what strings are fitted and can only assume that they are of a lighter gauge but where on the scale I don't really know due to my relative inexperience. I am looking to buy a set kf spares to replace the current strings when they wear or break. My conundrum is what strings should I go for and what gauge? Being on the lighter side the strings are comfortable to play and presumably if I go for heavier strings then they will become a little heavier to play and will be more difficult to bend, either intentionally or not. Any thoughts, tips or advice is welcome. Thanks in advance. Alan

The quick answer is yes I am happy and have become even happier as my skills have developed. I guess in retrospect I should have asked more how would a more expensive guitar reflect in feel and my playing. I was lucky enough to come across a rather nice Epiphone Les Paul Studio electric guitar for what I have been advised is a reasonable price, there is not a mark on it. The same guitar tech that checked the acoustic changed the pick up switch for me and he is suitably impressed with my purchase. And bonus a work colleague gave me this little amp.

I think I've only turned up to 2 or 3 to quickly try it, I certainly won't need to turn it up to 11, although my son might! I am thinking perhaps getting some headphones as well so as not to annoy Mrs "The Pinky" too much.

Well my dilemma has been resolved! I went into the office today and when I spoke about my purchase a colleague said he had an amp that he no longer uses and I could have it - no charge! All I had to do was give it a dust and buy a lead. What a result! In the interest of not commuting the same sin as I did in my other post here is a picture, apologies for the mess but the tonics are for gin. Double celebration today, me with a new amp and my beautiful wife's retirement. All I need to do is learn to play the guitar properly now!

Please accept my sincere and humble apologies! To make up for my schoolboy error, please accept 2 for the price of 1, the Epiphone and the Hohner acoustic I bought back in February. Now I am shopping for an amp, as per my post elsewhere on the forum.

Just a quick update, a visit to the gp has established its a tendon problem in my elbow, which hopefully is subsiding a little with some pain relief and anti inflammatory. Wrt posture I have Zoom meeting next week with a guitar tutor, so if there are any issues there hopefully he can point them out. Thanks and I will update in due course.

Thanks for the advice, I bit the bullet and bought it. I am very happy with it and the seller, he was extremely helpful.

Well following on from my thread elswhere on the forum, asking for opinions on the Epiphone Gibson Les Paul, I bought said guitar and and very happy with it. The seller was a little on the bohemian side shall we say, however he was extremely helpful and informative and the guitar I only two years old is near mint. He told me about how he had set it up what he'd done and said to give him a shout if i needed any help with it. I am very happy with my purchase. As a result I am now looking for an amp for home use, I am thinking 10 to 20 Watts, anything less would be a bit lack lustre and anything more too much for home use. I want a half decent sound and am not worried about massive distortion or effects at this stage, can anybody make any recommendations based on my thoughts and the guitar of choice? There appear to be an abundance of second hand amps on Fleabay and Market Place, but I guess that may be from a lot of people who decided against playing the guitar or who have moved on to more substantial amplification. I am familiar with the names of Peavey, Marshall and Orange, however there appear to be a plethora of manufacturers out there and I am sure they are of varying qualities. My son has suggested Boss Katana? I have also seen names like QTX and Kustom Dart. I assume I also need to consider the quality of leads? Any help would be extremely welcome please, and although I don't want to spend too much cash I obviously want reasonable sound quality and not to waste my money. Thanks in advance.

Looking at buying a second hand Epiphone as per the subject title, it appears to be owned by somebody who plays a bit and talks about how he has had it set up. It appears to be in good condition, does the £100 asking price sound about right? Thanks for any help.

Thank you guys for your thoughts, I was wondering whether I was barking up the wrong tree which is why I thought I'd ask. I certainly wouldn't necessarily expect a solution here or a diagnosis, but of course your feedback has given me some food for thought and something to check further just in case. I am of course looking at other possible causes, and one thing this won't do is pit me off playing. I will check further and feedback at some point.

I have been playing for about 3 or 4 months and a few weeks back I noticed a slight pain in my left elbow every so often, not so much when I am playing but at other times. I have no bruising and don't recall knocking my arm, and it just occurred to me that the only thing I have been doing recently is picking up the guitar. It is certainly not significant or constant pain. I am generally left handed but play right handed (and that is comfortable), I tend to sit in a high dining chair to play but have started to stand more as I tend to hold the guitar more vertical rather than with the top leaning in to my chest a little. Could my playing be the cause of the elbow discomfort or should I look elsewhere in my lifestyle?

@randythoadesthanks for the tips, practice is definitely the key, unfortunately not had too much this past 10 days or so for various reasons such as work. The other thing I remember is that i will have good days and bad days, sometimes it just clicks and other times it doesn't. I think the best piece of advice I have been given is just to enjoy playing, that is what I plan to do and that is what I am doing. I accept the limitations of both my abilities and the time I have available. You are absolutely correct about us all being on different levels, I must admit I had a great feeling when round a friends one evening. He bought an electric guitar that sits in the corner of his front room and never gets played, I said that I tinkered a little and he asked me to tune it up for him which I duly did. I then played a few blues rifs and some general doodling about at which point the others in the room didn't realise I was such an "accomplished player", I quickly put the guitar down and picked up the pint glass before they started asking for requests! I think his guitar has just sat in the corner gathering dust ever since.

Welcome, I like the list of gigs,on your website, looks like you tour most of the world without having to move too far from your room!

Or more to the point making progress that I am very happy with! As explained elsewhere I have recently picked the guitar up after far too many years away from the fret board, so I consider myself a beginner. It has taken a couple of months but this weekend has seen the latest moment of joy when I can see I have made steps forward. I have gone through the pain with the fingers (and still am) as well as all the other joys of developing stunning techniques and rhythm etc, but I feel this weekend it has all come together somewhat and I actually played through a whole series of chord progressions without watching my left hand, and it sounded okay - not too many buzzes or Duff notes! There are two things in particular I can largely attribute this to firstly daily practice of at least 10 minutes each day and guidance from @JLGTuition, I have no links with @JLGTuition, I am purely a very satisfied member of his Facebook group. That aside the feeling of achievement and progress that i have made is extremely satisfying, I will never be a world class player and am purely playing for my own pleasure, but to play the guitar is a great thing to be able to do IMO even to my limited abilities.

Hi Rabb, I am relatively new to the forum and a returnee to playing guitar so consider myself a newbie again. I am going through the chats on the forum and came across yours and wondered how you are getting on? I am slowly getting my fingers into shape again, how are your fingers doing?

So picking the guitar up again has broadened my horizons music wise. I pop into charity shops every so often and pick up guitar tab books, usually for about 50p or so, there may only be a couple of songs in each book for the time being but my logic is 50p for a couple of songs is pretty good. However there is a bonus in that when looking for easy chord progressions ( I am learning again after an extended absence from playing the guitar), I come across the occasional gem. The latest one is Fishermans Blues by the Waterboys, I remember the whole of the moon by The Waterboys but other than that they passed me by. Picking up the guitar has led me to a great song (both to listen and to learn to play) and a band that i need to listen to. Thank goodness for on line streaming!

I am fascinated by alternative tuning, I don't know any and have never tuned to anything other than standard tuning, however I remember years ago Michael Chapman released an album about playing guitar the easy way. This comprised of alternative tunings to play selected songs - it never seemed easy to me. This week I learnt that apparently Otis Redding couldn't play guitar but had a guitar tuned so that he could play chords simply by "barre" a finger across all the strings and simply moving up and down the frets. I'd never heard of this before and I wondered how the guitar is tuned to achieve this. I realise it is a very limited way to play.

Thanks for the responses so far, all very useful stuff. I realise that they were probably very open questions and there are probably numerous answers and opinions, however it is all good stuff to build some knowledge on and to confirm some of my initial thoughts. The world has obviously moved since I last played with any regularity. At present I am happy with what I have and at least know I am not a millions miles from where I should be and that at present any shortcomings are in my skills as a player and not my guitar. I don't know where this journey with playing guitar is going to take me yet but I am enjoying the ride. Thanks for your support guys, I am sure I will have loads more questions and I look forward to hearing and learning from others opinions, expertise and experience.

Hi everbody, I am relatively new to the forum and a returnee to guitar playing after an embarrassing number or years away. I was never going to set the world ablaze, and nor will I in the future, with my playing as my guitar is for my personal pleasure. I picked up a Hohner acoustic a couple of months ago for a reasonable price (£40) from a guitar enthusiast (I walked away from what I thought a lot of rubbish) so I figured it was somewhere reasonable to start, and this appears to have been confirmed when a local guitar tech saw it when I purchased a set of strings from him. My fingers and brain are starting to get "match fit" and I am making some reasonable sounds. So here comes the million dollar open question(s)! What would be the next reasonable step for my next acoustic if I decided to upgrade? I am happy with where I am at present but as my playing hopefully improves could I and how would an upgrade be reflected in my playing? Secondly the thought of an electric is sometimes appealing although not a priority, however if I was to go for an electric where should I start? Being as I have been away from playing guitar for such an extended time I considered myself to be a beginner and have the knowledge of a novice, I appreciate that the Gibsons and Fenders are probably the pinnacle of guitars and not really for me (at this stage! ). I get the impression like most things that you get what you pay for and that maybe some "more budget" equipment should be avoided. The world seems awash with second hand guitars which is probably a good way to go if I know what to look for and what to pay, so what can I consider as a reasonably manufactured guitar, are there any manufacturers to be avoided? Is it possible to purchase a reasonable second hand guitar, that is playable and could be for a period of time for less than £100? Where should I set my budget? A lot of questions I guess but that is what happens when you let somebody like me with limited knowledge into a room of learned ladies and gentlemen I'm afraid! Thanks for reading and thanks in advance for any guidance and thoughts. Alan

New to the forum and flicking through a few days and found this topic and thought I would chip my tuppence worth in for what it's worth. I appreciate it is very subjective there are so many and it changes with my mood and whatever I'm listening too so firstly mentioned in despatches has got to be Jeff Beck, Jill Jackson and George Benson. However the three I always come back to are: Frank Zappa - so underrated it's unbelievable, even if you don't like his music give it a listen just for his playing. Paul Kossoff - just a sublime guitar player IMO. Finally John Martyn what he did with a guitar was absolutely amazing, especially when he taped the pick up on his acoustic and used and ecoplex(?) In the 70s.

Hi everybody, Thanks for letting me join. I have just returned to picking up the guitar at the ripe oldahe of 60 after a lengthy absence. I used to play years ago at school and we had a heavy gigging schedule in bedrooms and garages, neither I or we as a band were that good to be honest. I picked up my son's guitar and dabbled with it for a few months a few years ago but didn't continue, however I have recently bought my own acoustic and consider myself very much a beginner again. My fingers hurt a bit, my coordination is off and I am struggling to get a decent sound at times, but I reckon a bit of patience and a few months should see me become more accomplished. I only plan to play for my own pleasure. Looking forward making progress and to chatting on here of course. Thanks Alan