Guitar Cleaning Tips

It is very important to take good care of your guitar and keeping your guitar clean for the looks and the sound of it. You can get your (acoustic, classic or electric) guitar into professional condition yourself with the following methods.

You will only need a cotton polishing cloth (the same you use to clean your car). You might als need a screwdriven (in case you have an electric guitar) and optional things you could use are polish and oil-cutting solvent.

First of all, it is important to test the strings on your guitar (because it is vital to maintain good tone and pitch).
Buy new strings when needed and replace them with a speed winder. Speed wind the strings until they are loose enough to pull off the guitar one by one. Unwind them from the neck in order to remove them. Do NOT cut the strings, for there may occur problems, like: Because it is a sudden tension-release, it could cause the bridge-tension to recoil and bounce out of place, when you have extremely taught strings, they can fly all over the place (including your eyes)& when you can damage the wood or leave permanent marks while trying to get the cutters around the string.

In case you have an electric guitar, you should examine the pickups.
If they look rusty, unscrew the faceplate (make sure the wiring inside the guitar is not disturbed). Clean the rust using any common rust dissolving agent and after that you can put the pickups back in place and polish them.

Check the fretboard very well because the oil and sweat from your hands dull the sound and sullies the wood after playing your guitar for weeks. Take a look at the nut as well. Take out the string and lubricate the groove with a professional solution (or soap). After drying it, replace the string (this will keep it in tune).
Cleaning the fretboard with a damp cloth works great on all types of finishes. You can also use a gentle oil-cutting solvent if there is a lot of grease on the body.

The body of your guitar should be cleaned as well, because (over time) oil and grease from your hands will build up there. You may also use polish (make sure it is recommended for guitars) on shiny, clear finishes. Do NOT use polish on a satin finish (not shiny). Use a damp cloth to wipe off the bridge after polishing your guitar. You can use a small toothbrush in order to remove embedded dirt if it needs more than a perfunctory cleaning.

Vienna Geerlings is a Guitar fanatic.
For more great information on guitar cleaning, visit:
http://www.LearnHow2PlayGuitar.info

Guitar Tip: the best way to learn guitar

Different ways to learn guitar for different people

Many people go to a concert and watch fabulous guitar players mesmerize the audience by strumming their guitar-strings to make great music, which flows effortlessly from the guitar.
These people want to imitate their favorite rockstars and are looking for the best way to learn this. A lot of different methods are available for this and it is not easy to decide which method is the best. Actually, the more methods there are, the more (different) opinions you will get and that makes the choice even more difficult. Probably there are different methods that can be described as the best way, but this depends on the person who wants to learn how to play guitar.

There are people who asume that employing a teacher (usually an expert on the guitar) is the best way. This should be a very experienced and patient person who should know all the required techniques and should also know the best methods to learn guitar so he/she can provide the best instructions. If this teacher has sucesfully teached other people to master the guitar before, this would be a great way of knowing that this teacher is a good one indeed.
Make sure your teacher can provide lessons at appropriate times for your schedule.

Many people believe that the best method is learning by themselves without a teacher and practise. They learn the guitar-basics from instruction(videos) from the internet or from books and this usually saves a lot of money compared to a teacher. The basic techniques can be learned from the videos or books, and they can practice these techniques to perfect their skills learned from these tools.

The best way to learn guitar differs for each person. There are people who will only learn with instructions from a teacher on a regular basis. For other people this (for any reason) may not be the best way to learn guitar. As a guitarplayer I would say that that practice makes perfect and most experts agree on this. You can learn from a teacher, books, video's or internet but practice is the best way to learn guitar.


Vienna Geerlings is a Guitar fanatic.
For more great information on guitar playing, visit:
http://www.LearnHow2PlayGuitar.info