Exploring Different Guitar Styles and Genres
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Introduction
The Diversity of Guitar Styles and Genres
The guitar is one of the most versatile instruments. There are so many different electric guitars and acoustic guitars to choose from. They come in just about any shape or size to suit your needs. There are also many different styles and genres to choose from. Guitar styles or guitar genres have distinct techniques and sounds. They can develop versatility and creativity in your guitar playing. Exploring different guitar styles or guitar genres is a wonderful way to learn the guitar. You will never get bored exploring because there is always something new to discover when learning guitar. Some guitar genres or guitar styles are more challenging than others so make sure you choose a style that is appropriate for your level of playing. Rock guitar or Blues guitar are often appropriate for beginners while Jazz guitar and Country guitar tend to be more suited to more experienced guitarists. Genres such as Rock guitar and Blues guitar have more beginner oriented guitar techniques, harmonies, and scales such as open and movable power chords and pentatonic scales. Jazz guitar has more complicated harmonies and modes. Playing Jazz guitar chords requires a great deal of hand strength. Country guitar can have fast picking techniques that are quite challenging. For these reasons make sure you choose a guitar style or guitar genre that is appropriate for your interests and goals.
Finger Style Guitar
Mastering the Art of Finger Style Guitar
Finger Style guitar is a diverse guitar genre or guitar style. The guitar techniques involved in finger style guitar include picking or plucking the guitar strings directly with the fingertips, fingernails, or guitar picks attached to the fingers. Playing with the finger tips, nails, or guitar finger picks all create a different tone. The finger tips will produce a softer tone than the nails, while guitar finger picks will create a much louder tone. Finger style guitar has a unique sound and is extremely versatile. It can sound quite intricate when the fingers are in motion. The different layers created by finger style guitar playing can create a unique, versatile musical texture. Finger style guitar is capable of playing melody, bass lines and middle voice notes all at the same time in conjunction with one another creating quite a full sound. This guitar style or guitar genre is often used in folk, classical, and acoustic guitar styles or guitar genres.
Blues Guitar
The Soulful Sounds of Blues Guitar
Guitar styles or guitar genres such as blues guitar are a great starting point when first learning the guitar. The expressive techniques such as string-bending, sliding, vibrato, and the use of pentatonic scales make learning the guitar fun. There are many helpful guitar playing tips when it comes to blues guitar. Learning how to hold a pick and the correct hand position of the fret-board hand is a must for any beginner. Also, pentatonic scales are a great starting point since guitar students only have to deal with five different notes in the scale. Mastering blues guitar can enhance a guitarist's emotional expression and improvisational skills. Blues guitar has a great deal of improvisation, making it quite an expressive genre. Bending strings or sliding at just the right time or spinning a note with vibrato can lead to some excellent musical phrases and this can heighten the enjoyment of playing the guitar. The origins of blues guitar can be traced all the way back to African-American roots of the early 20th century when African slaves were brought to America and forced into hard physical labour. These slaves would often sing their traditional songs when working. The songs they sung usually had a call and response where someone would sing and then they would be answered by another singer or singers. This call and response form worked well with instruments like the guitar with it's portability and soulful sounds.
Rock Guitar
Rock Guitar: Power Chords, Riffs and Licks
Power chords, iconic riffs and licks, distorted amplifiers and electric guitars are the foundation of rock guitar. This guitar style or guitar genre is a blast to learn when learning guitar. Like the blues, rock guitar is also an excellent starting point for your guitar journey. In terms of guitar techniques, or characteristic sounds, power chords are easy to play in relation to other chords making them great for beginner guitarists. Pentatonic scales are also easy to learn since there are only five different notes in the scale. Pentatonic-based riffs and licks are abundant in rock music. Sunshine of Your Love by Cream, I Love Rock n Roll by Joan Jett and the Black Hearts, and Sweet Home Alabama by Lynyrd Skynyrd are just a few of the great songs that contain iconic riffs and licks in rock music. Guitarists like Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page have helped shape the rock music genre with their use of distortion, feedback, and guitar effect pedals. Both Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page were masters of their craft with their stellar guitar techniques and impressive stage presence. Learning rock guitar can improve technical prowess and stage presence. Technique is at the heart of any guitar genre or guitar style. Diligent practice of guitar technique is required in order to play certain rock songs or rock guitar solos and this ultimately leads to improved technical prowess on the guitar. There is also a great deal of showmanship involved when learning rock guitar. Many rock guitar masters run, slide, and even jump around when performing on stage. This often adds to the enjoyment of listening to a rock concert or performance adding a visual element to the show. Practising your favourite rock guitarist's stage moves is one way to ensure you put on a great show.
Jazz Guitar
The Complexity of Jazz Guitar
Delve into the sophisticated world of jazz guitar, where improvisation and complex chord progressions are key. Improvisation is a huge part of learning jazz guitar. Rhythm comping complex chord progressions and improvising melodies play a huge part in learning guitar, especially jazz guitar. Here, you can expand your harmonic knowledge by learning complex four note chords and secondary chords and improve your improvisational skills on the guitar by learning to play modal melodies and intricate passages. Guitarists like Wes Montgomery and Joe Pass have influenced guitar genres and guitar styles such as jazz guitar. Wes Montgomery is considered by many to be the most influential jazz guitarist of all time by revolutionizing the guitar genre or guitar style with his distinctive thumb-picking technique. Joe Pass was also quite influential. His virtuosity on the guitar was astounding. Joe Pass perfected the melodic chord-style of guitar playing where melody notes are added to mainly barre chords creating a very characteristic tone mainly found in guitar styles or guitar genres like jazz guitar.
Acoustic Guitar Styles
Exploring Acoustic Guitar Styles from Folk to Flamenco
Acoustic guitar styles or guitar genres requires a deep understanding of rhythm and dynamics. Playing rhythm guitar is a huge part of this guitar style. The acoustic guitar is a wonderful accompanying instrument. Here, learning strumming techniques is a must. Each rhythm has a distinct sound and feel and each rhythm is associated with a specific strum pattern or picking pattern. Learning how to count rhythm is also essential. If you can say it you can play it! Ultimately, when learning guitar you want to associate picking and strumming patterns with distinct rhythms and then learn to master how to count those rhythms. Acoustic guitar styles or guitar genres are highly versatile especially in folk, flamenco, and classical guitar music. Folk guitar music can be played with a guitar pick or with the fingers while flamenco guitar and classical guitar are played mainly with the fingers when picking or plucking the strings. Often, when finger picking folk guitar music the strings are picked with the finger tips and not the fingernails. In flamenco and classical guitar the strings are picked or plucked with the fingernails. All three of these guitar styles or guitar genres can have thick textures with intricate picking and plucking. This type of guitar playing is extremely versatile since you can play melody with bass lines and middle voice notes all simultaneously. Playing these guitar styles or guitar genres requires a deep understanding of rhythm and dynamics. Flamenco music for instance, is a type of Spanish dance music so learning the rhythms to some of the dances can be quite helpful. After all, rhythm is an integral part of music. Dynamics give music life and can make things more dramatic and suspenseful by playing loudly or quietly at just the right time. Exploring these acoustic guitar styles or genres can enhance a guitarist's musical sensitivity and dexterity. Classical, flamenco, and folk guitar all require quite a bit of dexterity in the finger picking hand and fingers in order to play intricate passages and interesting textures. Learning how to shape phrases according to the style of music you are playing will help you become more sensitive to the music.
Fusion and Modern Genres
Blending Genres: The Evolution of Guitar Styles
Blending guitar styles or guitar genres is a great way to experiment and create new sounds. The fusion of different guitar styles can lead to innovation and expression in guitar playing. Modern guitarists such as Carlos Santana, Joe Satriani, Jeff Beck, and Frank Zappa are just a small list of many guitar players who blended genres to create new sounds. Carlos Santana blended jazz elements with Latin rhythms and rock elements in his music while Frank Zappa was more of an avant-garde guitarist who blended jazz, rock, be-bop, and tango musical styles using influences of 20th century composers such as Stravinsky and Varese. The fusion of guitar styles or guitar genres has created many new genres of music such as jazz-rock or progressive metal. Guitar fusion can be defined as the blending of two or more genres or styles of music. Jazz-rock uses complex harmonies and modal melodies with pentatonic scales and power chords. Progressive metal tends to have longer songs called epics, with odd time signatures and superior vocals. Each fusion guitar style or guitar genre has it's own unique characteristics so there is just about any sound to suite any guitarist's wants and needs. Have fun exploring the wonderful world of fusion guitar.
Conclusion
Finding Your Unique Guitar Style
There are so many unique guitar styles or guitar genres to choose from. Each has their own distinct sound and guitar techniques. Exploring different genres or styles can develop versatility and creativity in your guitar playing so make sure to try different genres or styles. Choose the guitar styles or guitar genres that appeal most to you. This will motivate your guitar practice. Also, experimenting with different styles will make you a well-rounded player and keep you interested since there is so much variety. Some guitar genres or guitar styles are more challenging than others so make sure you choose a style that is appropriate for your level of playing. When learning guitar make sure you choose a guitar style or guitar genre that is appropriate for your interests and goals. Doing so should ensure that you will never get bored exploring because there is always something new to discover when learning guitar.