New Guitar Club

[JackG]

I'm not sure if this is the right folder, but here goes .....

This past Saturday the Summer Guitar Club I am leading met again. This was our second meeting. We had four new members ... which was very exciting. We basically followed the same pattern as the first week.

— Introductions, ice breakers and tuning
— Played songs from the songbook which includes the primary songs used in our contemporary worship services at our church.
— Used a Paul Baloche teaching DVD for Open the Eyes of My Heart.
— Open play … anything they would like to play. The first request was 2112 Overture by Rush.
I think everyone had a good time and will be back again.

QUESTION: While I’ve tried to make it clear the Guitar Club is not lessons, but about playing music together most of the participants are pretty young and inexperienced. Any suggestions on some basic things I could be teaching? Should I print out some basic scales and run through those each meeting? Work on chord variations? I’m sure there are other options as well. Your thoughts would be most appreciated.

Does anyone else lead a Guitar Club in their church??

Jack
Who’s feeling a little in over his head right now!

[jazzrat]

Jack, Great idea and welcome!
I have a dream myself of doing something similar.
How about a 'Lick of the Week' Someone brings in a classic or new rock lick and everyone learns it.
I also thought about asking the congregation for guitar donations so folks could, A. Have a club guitar to use if they did not own one, or B. learn to work on or set up guitars. Everybody has an old guitar in the closet.

Scales may or may not be the thing to teach a mixed group.
I help a couple younger players around church. What seems to help them is to break down a P & W chart into it's simlest form so they can play something no matter their skill level. For instance if they can't play a F barre chord have them play a Dm7 on the top three strings.
Keep us updated.

[stephen]

Alright Jack! You made it! Glad to see ya here bro!

[seagullplayer]

I don't really have alot of advise. We started a very small guitar club in the Teen group. The kids where just not very mature. It was all riffs and "crazy train" and that kind of thing. Just could not keep them focused. I'm really interested in how you progress. The kids showed real talent, most of them will be much better than I ever will be. I just need a better way to keep their attention and interest peaked.
May God Bless your ministry with these young musicians.

[Tim Kelly]

To Jack G,

I am interested in learning how you obtained a copy of the instructional DVD on "open the eyes of my heart"?

Tim

[JackG]

Tim...

The book used is The Paul Baloche Songbook. The link is below ...
http://shop3.gospelcom.net/epages/baloche.storefront/42c43dbe064fd267271d45579e7b06c3/Product/View/1055

On his webstie you can view an instructional clip on "God of Wonders." I enjoyed it. That link is below ...
http://www.leadworship.com/resources/songbook.html

Hope these help!

Jack

[OlsonAcoustic]

While I’ve tried to make it clear the Guitar Club is not lessons, but about playing music together most of the participants are pretty young and inexperienced. Any suggestions on some basic things I could be teaching? Should I print out some basic scales and run through those each meeting? Work on chord variations? I’m sure there are other options as well. Your thoughts would be most appreciated.

Does anyone else lead a Guitar Club in their church??

Jack
Who’s feeling a little in over his head right now!

I don’t have one at my church, I just teach one on one, but I know a friend that does. He started classes with Mel Bay's Chord Book Encyclopedia. He also uses an electronic metronome which tends to help the rhythmically challenged. He also went through the effort of programming drum, bass and piano tracks for common worship songs into his Korg Triton so that the class could practice with a band like scenario. This actually works really well because you can speed up or slow down the song to help with riff generation for advanced players or chord changes and progressions for beginners.

He is also the paid full time worship pastor, so he has a little more time to do these things than most folks do. Wish I had that kind of time. :dunno :cry:

[Larry Wallwart]

I'm not sure if this is the right folder, but here goes .....

This past Saturday the Summer Guitar Club I am leading met again. This was our second meeting. We had four new members ... which was very exciting. We basically followed the same pattern as the first week.

— Introductions, ice breakers and tuning
— Played songs from the songbook which includes the primary songs used in our contemporary worship services at our church.
— Used a Paul Baloche teaching DVD for Open the Eyes of My Heart.
— Open play … anything they would like to play. The first request was 2112 Overture by Rush.
I think everyone had a good time and will be back again.

QUESTION: While I’ve tried to make it clear the Guitar Club is not lessons, but about playing music together most of the participants are pretty young and inexperienced. Any suggestions on some basic things I could be teaching? Should I print out some basic scales and run through those each meeting? Work on chord variations? I’m sure there are other options as well. Your thoughts would be most appreciated.

Does anyone else lead a Guitar Club in their church??

Jack
Who’s feeling a little in over his head right now!

I was thinking about starting a guitar interest group at our church. If I could work out the location and time I'd do it.