I began playing guitar in December of 2019, and I found it to be a very fun thing to do. I have 2 guitars now, one electric (Yamaha ERG121) and one acoustic (Yamaha F310), and an effects pedal for the electric one. If you have no idea on what an effects pedal is, I will explain it later in this post.

When I began playing it, I had a lot of trouble remembering riffs, tuning the guitar, and doing all of those other things, but over time it became much easier and easier to do. I remember struggling to learn the main riff of Smoke On The Water, mainly because I kept hitting the wrong notes.

Let's talk about the differences between the electric and acoustic guitars. The electric guitar requires an amplifier, otherwise the sound of the strings will be very quiet. Electric guitars are generally slimmer and smaller than acoustic ones, but they are heavier due to all of the machinery inside of them. Acoustic guitars are lighter due to their hollow bodies, but they are also bigger.

Electric guitars have a wide variety of effects, but acoustic guitars have a unique sound, not to mention that you can just carry them everywhere as they are lighter and do not require to be connected to amplifiers. About the effects: there are some amplifiers and even guitars that have built-in effects, but generally, you will end up using pedals. Those pedals have a wide variety of effects, such as distortion, delay, tremolo and much, much more. I have a distortion pedal, specifically the Boss Turbo Distortion DS-2.

I learned literally everything through the Internet, mainly YouTube videos, sometimes articles if I was too lazy to watch a video. YouTube is a very helpful platform for when you want to learn to do something (screw your ads, Guitar Tricks). Even if you cannot find a proper video, it's pretty much guaranteed that you will be able to find information on whatever you are trying to find. I don't see any reason why you won't be able to learn things using YouTube.

I mainly learn to play by learning songs. If I see some specific technique that's used in the song, I will try to learn it.

Okay, now about the pains of playing guitar. Literal pains. Fretting strings is pretty painful after some time, but your fingers get used to it as you play more and more. It's more painful on acoustic guitar, due to the heavier gauge strings. Basically, if you feel dull pain, it's normal. If you feel sharp pain, stop immediately. It's unhealthy to play past that point.

Although playing an instrument is not a thing that everyone will enjoy, I think that you should try it out. A hobby is always helpful (unless it's harmful), as it gives you a thing to do, and is generally healthy for you.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.