Guitar lesson #1

Have you always wanted to play guitar, but never got around to actually getting started? Here is reason to begin... a free online guitar lesson, which is essentially the same lesson I teach all new students. You'll learn how to hold a guitar and pick, the names of parts of the guitar, a scale, a few chords, and a couple of songs..
You will need:
A guitar with six strings. Any type of guitar will work fine.
A guitar pick. Medium gauged picks are recommended to start with, but any will work okay in a pinch.
A chair without arms.
A reasonable amount of patience.

Lets begin:

PARTS OF A GUITAR

Although there are many different types of guitars (acoustic, electric, classical, electric-acoustic, etc.), they all have many things in common

At the top of the guitar is the "headstock", a general term which describes the part of the guitar attached to the slimmer neck of the instrument. On the headstock are "tuners", which you will use to adjust the pitch of each of the of the strings on the guitar.

At the point in which the headstock meets the neck of the guitar, you'll find the "nut". A nut is simply a small piece of material (plastic, bone, etc.), in which small grooves are carved out to guide the strings up to the tuners.
The neck of the guitar is the area of the instrument you'll concentrate a great deal on: you'll put your fingers on various places on the neck, in order to create different notes.
The neck of the guitar adjoins the "body" of the instrument. The body of the guitar will vary greatly from guitar to guitar. Most acoustic and classical guitars have a hollowed out body, and a "sound hole", designed to project the sound of the guitar. Most electric guitars have a solid body, and thus will not have a sound hole. Electric guitars will instead have "pick-ups" where the soundhole is located. These "pick-ups" are essentially small microphones, which allow the capture the sound of the ringing strings, allowing them to be amplified.
The strings of the guitar run from the tuning pegs, over the nut, down the neck, over the body, over the sound hole (or pick-ups), and are anchored at a piece of hardware attached to the body of the guitar, called a "bridge".

Now, that we know about the basic parts of a guitar, it's time to get our hands dirty, and start learning to play it. Get yourself an armless chair, and take a seat. You should be sitting comfortably, with your back against the back of the chair. Slouching significantly is a no-no; you'll not only end up with a sore back, you'll develop bad habits on the guitar.

When playing the guitar sitting down, the body of the guitar will rest on one of your legs. In most styles of guitar playing, the guitar will rest on the leg farthest away from the headstock. This means, a person playing the guitar in a right-handed fashion will typically rest the guitar on his/her right leg, while someone playing the guitar in a lefty manner will rest it on their left leg.

Each string is classified by frets.. Each fret produces a different sound.. Each string its classified as follows from bottom to top...

6. ----------------------------E
5. ----------------------------B
4. ----------------------------G
3. ----------------------------D
2. ----------------------------A
1. ----------------------------E