“Only they who believeth in their guitar quest shall be granted passage”

Category: news

feels right to play left, do you?

for years I’ve been playing guitar right-handed. the fact is I’m lefty. when i took a moment to think, actually it wasn’t easy and i had difficult times in learning right-handed guitar playing (and I’m still learning guitar now). some people might think why i should bother to learn right-handed guitar playing instead of playing it lefty. Here the best reason of all time, “Because at first i didn’t even have a guitar!”… i borrowed my friend’s guitar, which is of course it’s a right-handed guitar,and start learning to play it. Everyday i came to his house and we learned it together.

i love this sentence, “we learned it to-get-her”. 😀 hahaha, everyone has own reason in playing guitar and mine was to get some cute girls’ attention. what a great reason to start guitar playing.

anyway, 😀 years gone by and i found myself right-handed when it comes to guitar playing. while until now, I’m still curious about playing guitar lefty. so today i decide to learn the lefty way. i have a Yamaha CX-40 nylon strings guitar and i changed the strings order. this post is a kind of legal agreement for myself to play left guitar. i made promise to myself that i will perform my left guitar playing in front of people on stage a year for now. actually i can’t raise the bar for more. it is a longer-term deadline compared with when i learn the right-guitar playing. no girls get involved in this agreement :D.

changing the strings order to learn playing left guitar

so here i show you my Yamaha CX 40 nylon strings guitar which i change its strings order. if you start learning guitar today just like me, then that’s great!! we can share all things about guitar, remember I’m a beginner here so go easy on me guys, see ya next post…
March 15, 2014
things made you fall in love with guitar

there are moments when you look at your guitar(s) and think “why am i so addicted to this instrument?”. well, i have my own moments and i feel great about them. here few things those made me fall in love with guitar.

Songs.

everyone has their favorite songs. you love the lyrics, you like how the vocalist sung the notes, you are thrilled by the music composition and especially in this case, sometimes you just love how the guitar sounds in the song. the way it starts the intro, or how the lead guitar screams at interlude, even you maybe just love the way your head moving because the guitar funky rhythm along the song. the next day, you’ll find yourself at music store and choosing your very first guitar.

movies.

everybody loves movies and there are movies with guitar in it. Crossroads (1986 film) is one of recommended movies that will made you. or you can watch It Might Get Loud (2008). that movies is inspiring, both in guitar playing and music knowledge. even you will love August Rush (2007). these kind of movies will move your legs to local guitar shops and you’ll find yourself overjoyed with guitars.

video clips.

this will be the other thing. through video clips you’ll see how the musicians performing their songs. at some clips you watch them playing with the coolest style along the music play, then suddenly you want that so bad. you want to be a guitarist with with the coolest style you just saw. you might get attracted visually at first, but it might be a significant start for your life as guitar player.

people’s playing.

this one is interesting. you have your favorite song and it is played by piano, suddenly one day you find an URL to video covering your favorite song with guitar and you think it is great cover and it is refreshing. i bet the next moment you will start covering all your favorite songs with guitar and upload them on YouTube.

the guitar models.

it is simply a love at the first sight. is it possible to guitar? yes. there are gorgeous guitar models and you just want it badly. the quilted maple decals, inlay designs, shiny bridge and knobs, or even unique headstocks will encourage you to have that guitar. you will reach it and the next thing happened is, you asked the music shop keeper to give it a try on amps then boom! the guitar is yours and you want to show it to everyone.

maybe I’m just overreacting about this, but you know, my guitar addiction has brought me to here in this site and I’m sure it will continue to other great things. how about you guys? girls? 🙂
March 13, 2014
my blog milestone

well, i think i will redirect my blog theguitarlearner.blogspot.com here but, on second thought, i need to plan it well. so, I’ll see you around soon.

March 11, 2014
Direct Input for (much!) better Output

Have you ever consider using DI box for your live performances, or your recordings? what is EXACTLY a DI Box anyway? does it really a tool for better sound output? all these questions are being asked around here and there, but actually, for me, i can’t hear the differences,at least, not with passive DI box. okay, so what’s the point in this post anyway?well, i tried to read and summarized all sources i can get which brought me to some conclusions. yes… (one of stupid things I’ve done is writing something i don’t actually know, but here it is)DI box is important it regains the lost signal of your guitar sound. it converts high-impedance, line level, unbalanced output guitar signal to a low-impedance microphone level balanced input to mixers. the low impedance allows the signal to be sent over long cable runs with significantly less signal loss.

…. the lower impedance (around 600 ohms is normal) allows an insignificant load to the input of a mixing console or preamp which is also designed to accept input from low impedance microphones. – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DI_unit

something you might find on stages is, you don’t hear the honest sound from the stage output. it is different from your sound set while you want the output is exactly the same as you hear on stages. A direct input box will help you to get that. by lowering the risk of lost signal, you will get your sound much better.

which one do i choose? passive or active DI box? that’s a good question. well, honestly, what i’ve done to get the answer is by searching on the internet and find stuff with “built especially for guitar: label.. hahaha, and i got a DI Box, not too cheap, The ULTRA-G GI100 active DI box made by Behringer.

Behringer ULTRA-G GI100 active DI box

things i got from using this active DI box are great. the cabinet simulator button helps me so much in getting the warm tone at the output sound from the mixer. it’s really helpful for you who uses analog effects with hi gain distortion and overdrive. sometimes our analog effects are just too harsh for the PA speakers, the cabinet simulation button will handle that problem. you can see on the next picture here, the ‘virtual 4×12″ cab’ button, yes, that button helps me in any stage conditions.

Behringer ULTRA-G GI100 active DI box

this DI Box has a dB cut feature. it cuts -20 dB plus more -20 dB , so you don’t have to worry about damaging your Head-cabinet Amp. you can see the connection examples provided by Behringer in PDF file. the pad button will cut your frequency as you can see on the next picture here:

Behringer ULTRA-G GI100 active DI box

well, this DI box isn’t like the class A DI box, and i haven’t try other DI Box. if you need suggestion, of course i will say that i wanna have a Radial JDV™ Active Super Direct Box on my setup, hahaha.. see you next post.

Radial JDV™ Active Super Direct Box
January 30, 2014