Benefits of Playing Guitar
Whether your New Year's Resolution to learn to play guitar is starting to weaken, or you're looking ahead to the longer days of spring and summer, and wondering whether to fit guitar lessons into those lighter evenings, you're not alone.
Guitar lessons should be a fun activity and a way to fill some of your spare time - they shouldn't feel like a chore - but sometimes we all need reminding of the benefits of playing guitar, and why for so many people, learning guitar is a joy all year round.
Here are six of the best benefits of learning guitar, including some you might not have already thought of. So if your strings haven't been strummed in a week or two, here are some reasons to pick up your guitar today, even if only for a few minutes!
Fun Hobby
For many people the biggest benefit of playing guitar is as a way to relieve stress. Concentrating on playing a musical instrument can be a great distraction from anything that might be worrying you in your day-to-day life.
Even if you're not a worrier, playing guitar can be a fun activity and might feel like a rewarding way to spend some spare time. In the end, it's a skill you can also demonstrate to friends and family, or even turn into a career if you get good enough to join a professional band or orchestra.
It's important to remember that playing guitar should be fun. To progress well, you should practise three hours a week, but it's up to you whether that's half an hour a day, or an hour every other day, or even just a few minutes here and there - do what feels rewarding to you.
Social Activity
There are social benefits of learning guitar, too. Bryan offers professional guitar lessons in Leeds city centre, so you're in the perfect place to socialise before or after your lesson. Or you can learn guitar online via webcam, so your guitar lessons leave you with plenty of time for other social activities if you're not near Leeds city centre.
As your skills develop, you can look to join or form your own band, or start attending open mic nights and jam sessions where you'll meet like-minded local musicians who can share tips on how to learn guitar to an even higher standard.
Learning a musical instrument is an organic process as your brain learns the muscle memory and the fluency to play guitar without consciously focusing on the technical process. Making new friends and socialising with more people is an organic process too, as you find the people who brighten your world - so the pair go perfectly hand-in-hand.
Skill
You might find playing a musical instrument alone to be relaxing, or enjoy the social opportunities of playing as part of a band - but does playing guitar make you smarter? Learning a new skill at any age can help to invigorate the brain, but learning a musical instrument can have some surprising implications for other parts of your mental processing.
In 2021, the teaching journal Cogent Education published a study by researchers from Spain and Austria, who tested whether a higher level of musical aptitude is associated with better fluency when reading silently in a foreign language.
The researchers found that musical aptitude - and in particular, being taught music - is linked with higher scores across a range of other mental abilities: "The non-musically trained students were less fluent while reading silently in Spanish, exhibited lower scores in musical aptitude, working memory and IQ, and knew a smaller number of foreign languages."
Can guitar make you smarter? It's difficult to say anything about cause and effect, but this and other research seems to suggest that people who learn a musical instrument generally are more intelligent, have better memory, and may also find it easier to learn a foreign language.
Read more about learning guitar by yourself vs. having a private tutor.
Expression
Making music is an excellent way to release some emotion and to express yourself, and guitar - especially electric guitar - is an instrument that makes this very easy to do. As you learn electric guitar to a high standard, you can start to alter the sound of the instrument with effects pedals, and explore more of its capabilities that traditional acoustic guitar don't have to offer.
The range of expression you can achieve with an electric guitar is incredible. But even with an acoustic guitar, the way you play the instrument and the tunes you improvise can be an excellent outlet for any emotions you've been bottling up, and after a jam session or a guitar lesson with Bryan, it's likely you'll find yourself feeling much happier in general.
Confidence
It's not egotistical to say that being good at anything just feels nice. Learning a musical instrument, a foreign language, or an artform like painting, all helps you to feel more capable and well-rounded, and is something you can bring out to impress other people too.
If you ever struggle with self-confidence or self-esteem, this could be the biggest benefit of playing guitar for you. Confidence grows as you see your own guitar playing ability improve - and getting through the first few weeks until you can see positive progress is a great achievement.
The positives of performing don't stop when you leave your lessons though. When you're ready, you can perform publicly, first to friends and family and then to strangers, and you might surprise yourself with how confident you feel when you do.
Learning
Finally, one of the big benefits to learning guitar is the feeling of self-discipline that comes with learning a new skill, whether you're starting from scratch or already have some musical ability to bring over from elsewhere in your life.
It takes continued effort to learn guitar to a high standard: Bryan's approach is methodical, organised and follows a clear step-by-step path, with students asked to put in about three hours a week of practice time to help remember new skills and reinforce the muscle memory.
With a clear feeling of reward every time you master a difficult skill or play a new song with no mistakes, this can help you to appreciate your own ability to learn - and could have knock-on effects to help you learn other skills in completely different areas of your life.
Conclusion
Overall, the benefits of learning and playing guitar are many and varied, and reach far beyond the practice room or stage. If learning guitar was your New Year's Resolution, don't give up now! And if you're thinking of learning guitar this summer, now's the time to start.
Either way, Bryan is here to help, with a systematic and methodical approach to help you learn guitar in Leeds city centre (or via webcam, if that's more convenient). Get in touch today and let's get you started on your musical journey!
Bryan’s Personal Experience of Learning Guitar
I, like many others including the ones reading this blog post, started to learn guitar because of the influential musical artists we heard on CD or radio, sometimes seeing them play live on TV or a recorded concert on DVD. After the initial curiosity stage, learning can feel like a chore and progress may seem slow. However, I found the above factors true in helping me develop musically and shape who I am today, both in music but also outside of music.
The biggest benefit that I experienced would be the work ethic. Learning and playing the guitar taught me that you reap the rewards depending on how much effort you put into practice. In addition to that, having teachers guiding me through with the correct methods ensured that I was always on track to making good progress. It very soon became clear that there are no shortcuts to success, and that in order to get what you want out of music and beyond, you always have to pay the price.
Learning guitar in my teenage years really helped me develop the social skills as I played in bands and joined combo classes. Playing in an ensemble requires working in a group with other people, so learning how to develop the necessary negotiation and communication skills can have long lasting effects on these so-called soft skills.
But most importantly I think it comes down to the fun aspect of being able to express yourself musically and gain the confidence to tackle demanding challenges. I totally agree with legendary virtuoso Steve Vai’s point of view which is that when something becomes fun it doesn’t really count as work anymore. There is so much joy in playing the guitar that instead of dreading the next practice session, we should all be grateful for the opportunity and look forward to it!
Read more blogs about guitars, music, and learning.
