- Most guitarists favor the use of a flat pick. Some prefer to use their fingers, letting the nails grow on their right hand to assist with that. Other guitarists use finger picks, or a combination of a thumb pick and fingernails to get different tones. Start with a flat pick. A note is formed by pressing the finger of the left hand down inside a fret. Begin by playing the strings without fretting them. The notes will be, from low to high, E, A, D, G, B and E. Practice picking each string. Playing them this way is called open position.
- The left hand should finger each string in the middle of the space between frets to get the best tone. Start by placing the first finger of the left hand in the first fret of the low E string. This note will now be an F. Place the middle finger in the second fret to play an F#, the ring finger in the third fret to play a G, and the pinky in the fourth fret to play a G#. You'll notice that playing a note in the fifth fret will be the same note as the open string above it, except when playing the G string.
- Slides, hammer ons and pull offs is are great ways to play faster and get different tones. They are also effective ways to move to a different position on the guitar. For instance, if you play the F note on the E string and then slide your finger up the neck to the fourth fret, then use the other fingers to play the notes above just like you would with the middle, ring and pinky fingers at the bottom of the guitar, you are playing in fourth position. This will let you start to see scale patterns on the guitar to construct solos.
