Learning to play guitar

[JTalley]

I've been taking a guitar class for a while now, and I just now learned how to play tabs.

Of course, as soon as I could, I Googled the tabs for Dueling Banjos. Fun song to play, but my fingers are killing me.
Anybody else play?

[ihatemybike]

Learn to play the theme to Firefly, or better yet Mal's Song.

[loopie]

Just started too but haven't been spending the time on it that I should yet either...

I'm starting with "Metal Method" ...very good finger exercises

[Herbie]

Been playing on and off for about 20 years now... jeez, I'm old now. Started off doing rhythm guitar to back myself as a singer, eventually branched to lead guitar, a few bands, etc.

In the near term, yes, your fingers will hurt. The line "played it till his fingers bled" from "Summer of '69" isn't hyperbole or metaphor, if you're playing hard every day, you will bleed some and develop callouses fast. Some of this is semi-permanent, even after a long break from playing, my fingertips on left hand have probably 50% the sensitivity of the right hand. Main thing early on is to learn to play songs you like. It will keep you motivated to learn new stuff and practice practice practice.

These days I'm going back to my "roots", playing acoustic guitar to back myself singing. I don't play much lead, no time to keep my chops up. Of course nowadays I'm mostly singing the classics like "Wheels on the Bus" and "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star"... yes having a baby changes a few things! ;)