The Right Approach To Worship Guitar: A Beginner's Guide
Worship has always gone hand in hand with music. Since the beginning of time, beats and rhythmic chants were used as a form of prayer. Samuel spoke of David dancing in the presence of the Lord. In the chapter of Exodus, Miriam played her tambourine and danced to celebrate the freedom of the Israelites as the Egyptians that pursued them drowned.
As Christianity spread and was adopted by different communities all over the world, so did its music and its methods. Hymns were made, and Christians the world over evolved their choirs from singing Gregorian to Gospel. Contemporary worship music took on the popular tunes of pop and rock. Starting from the Jesus Movement of the late Sixties, spiritual revival also influenced the music scene. Rock and roll, which suffered the stigma in some Christian communities of spreading a bad influence and rebellion, was made the tune of praise.
The guitar is an ideal instrument for worship - easy to learn, with its simple sound resonating sincerity. It is an instrument based more on chords than notes, similar to the voices of a choir with lifted voices. This instrument is suited for travel, and can be easily brought out of its case, all set and ready to go, wherever worship takes place.
Now, worship guitar lessons in some ways are conducted like any other guitar lessons for any other kind of music: you have to learn how to move your fingers into chords and notes. Because worship music tend to have a lot of chords and chord patterns, learning chords is a great way to start on playing Christian songs.
The beginning stage of your worship guitar lessons worship guitar lessons will also give you basic skills like reading chord notation, guitar tuning, and dexterity drills for strumming and chord switching. Eventually, you'll move on to more advanced topics like chord substitution, sliding notes, plucking, and reading tabs - a form of notation that lets you know where to place your fingers for more complicated pieces. If you keep at it, eventually you'll find that you've built up an impressive repertoire of worship songs, and can experience the unique joy of praying by making music.
Of course, there may be stumbling blocks along the way of your worship guitar lessons. Learning to play the guitar, or any instrument, for that matter, requires you to persevere with lots and lots of practice. But as long as you genuinely enjoy what you do, the process of learning isn't so much of a chore. Playing Christian music on a guitar is a great way to express your faith, and in many ways is one of the deepest, most meaningful prayer experiences you'll ever have.
Christian music and worship songs have always been a means for the faithful to express their love for God. Taking Christian guitar lessons can help you to do this. By learning basic skills like Christian guitar chords and chord patterns, and moving on to more difficult techniques like plucking and substitution chords, you can find that your faith can likewise deepen into something more meaningful, and personal.
Published July 24th, 2009
Filed in Education
