Hi, I’m Dean and I live about an hour north of Salt Lake City, Utah. I have been wanting to learn how to play guitar for many many years, just never actually got around to giving it a go until now. My main hobby is woodturning, but that’s just not horrible feasible when my shop is averaging about 25 degrees in the winter because it’s not heated lol. So now is the time to begin the guitar journey. My first guitar should be arriving tomorrow and I couldn’t be more excited.
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Welcome Dean, I’m so glad you’re here, you’ve got some wonderful learning ahead of you. What sort of guitar have you ordered?
I ordered the Ibanez aw54Lopn. I was looking for the best “budget” guitar i could find that actually came left handed. I went with that one because A) it was one of only 2 in my budget that had the solid top (being mahogany helped as well, being a woodworker i love mahogony) and B) the only other one in my budget that comes left handed is a fender that has really bad reviews.
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Welcome to the Community, Dean. The guitar looks fabulous. Wish you well as you embark on this adventure.
Welcome Dean and happy NGD (New Guitar Day). Good luck with your learning journey and plenty of people here to ask advice of…no question too silly to ask.
Hello Dean and welcome to the community. 
Yes, that does sound a little cool. Please don’t forget to post a picture of your new guitar and now it is tomorrow so happy NGD. Enjoy.
Hi Dean and welcome
You should get some good tones from that Ibanez, it looks good in the ads I’ve just checked. I have dark mahogany Washburn HB32 which has a richer fuller tone to its sibling sunburst maple HB30.
Happy NGD in advance. Take your time with the course and make it enjoyable. Plenty of folk here to help if you get stuck.
Cheers
Toby
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Here it is since it was requested. But quick question. I’m doing grade 1 module one trying the OMC from D to A and back. How the heck do you keep my fat sausage of a ring finger form muting the first string???
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Beautiful guitar, happy NGD!
The trick with the finger is angle of attack on the fretboard. You want that finger to be as close to perpendicular as possible so that you are playing with the tips of the fingers. The mental image I try to keep in my head is the shape of my hand as if I am grasping a billiards ball. It’s the difference between holding a billiards ball with fingers curved as compared to grasping a thick paperback book, where your fingers are relatively flat. The other thing is that as your fingers build calluses on the tips, they will not sink into the string as much.
Ok that helps….now what is the trick for spreading the ring finger away from the middle finger? I have some strangely shaped fingers from having several of them broken, so my ring finger and pinkie on That hand actually curve toward the first 2.
Lovely looking guitar, Dean.
Your fingers will become more flexible and able to stretch over time. Justin covers that in this lesson which maybe you’ve not yet reached.
But everybody’s anatomy is different and then there is things like historical breaks. For that there is no other way than to experiment and observe to discover ways to play that work for you.
Thank you for all the help. I really appreciate it. And thanks on the guitar comment! And no i haven’t gotten to the finger stretching lesson. I may have to skip up to that one. I’m still in grade 1 module 1 lol
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