This is from our Woodshed Newsletter. A twice-monthly email for people interested in playing guitar or getting started on the instrument. Each edition has links from the best beginner guitar lessons we can find from around the web to help you learn guitar, grow as a player, and create your own music.

You may have noticed that this is a topic that we keep coming back to in the newsletters but it's a topic that I 've been really focused on in my own playing recently. It's also essential for new players to not try to learn so much at once that they forget what they have worked on in previous weeks.

So what does it mean to expand and solidify? For me it's taking a concept you're already familiar with and either applying a new approach or new technique to it. The links below are a good example of this. Taking the open string picking hand exercises you use to get comfortable picking and applying some rhythmic concepts to it, or taking the chords you're already familiar with and playing something other than the root note on the bottom to open up new tonal possibilities.

By doing things in this way you're expanding your knowledge while also reinforcing what you've already learned. It's a great way to feel good about your playing while you're doing the hard work of learning something new.

Try it out and let us know how it works for you, or if you have a different approach!

Keep going and we'll see you after the Thanksgiving holiday, which of course we hope is a happy affair and full of fantastic food! If not you can always use practicing as an excuse to get away!

-Dave

From Beginning Guitar Online

Below are a couple of links from content that has been recently launched on our YouTube channel as well as the full lessons with transcriptions and notated examples on the Beginning Guitar Online website.

On the other side of the first link, Chris walks you through the one-octave scale patterns that can be found in the first position. The first position means the frets near the headstock. These come in handy for rhythm players looking to add some melody around the chords they strum as well as country flat pickers looking to keep up with the fiddle players!

The second link is to our latest YouTube video.

Expanding Your Possibilities with Slash Chords

Take the chords you already know a bit farther with slash chords! It's easy to get started with them and you may already be using them. Slash chords are where you play something other than the root note in the bottom of the chord.

Picking Hand Accuracy

Work on your picking hand accuracy with these four highly effective warm-ups. Using only open strings and some basic rhythms, this lesson is great to focus on both your ability to play in time as well as getting more comfortable with your picking hand across the strings.