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What Kind of Guitar Should I Start On?
| Written by Paul Race for Creek Don't Rise™ and School Of The Rock™ |
Buying your first guitar is like choosing a college major while you're still a sophomore in high school - it's very posible that your interests will change. If you stick with the guitar and really learn it, you may decide later that you need a totally different instrument than the one you started with. The good news is that you can learn on ANY guitar that is at least nominally playable and holds some kind of tune. But if you want to give yourself the "best shot" at achieving your present goals (at least), you'll probably want to know enough about guitars to make an educated first choice. What kind of music do you want to play? I'll be honest, I prefer a steel-stringed flat-top acoustic for a lot of different kinds of music, and especially for leading groups or playing "out" in noisy places. But some guitars are just plain better for certain kinds of music than others. Let's take a look at the benefits of various kinds of guitar. (I'll have some summary information toward the end of this article, so if something in the middle doesn't make sense, don't lose heart - I like almost all kinds of guitars, so I've put in more detail than you really need.) Two centuries ago, most guitars were designed around the "classical" model (sometimes called "Spanish" because of its purported origin). This included a small- to medium-sized body, "waistline" indentations that were fairly deep, cedar top, strings that were made with "catgut" (really processed sheep intestine), and a relatively wide fingerboard. Today most classical guitars use nylon for the high strings and fine wire around some core for the low strings. Pros: Cons: Our sister site Riverboat Music has a buyer's guide for Classical guitars. It explains the features and options you should consider when deciding between Classical models.
To learn more about the features and options you can choose on Classical guitars, click the little banner to the right.
The good thing about a guitar was that you could take it anywhere, and it cost a lot less than a piano. So it's no surprise that the classical model that came from Spain was eventually adapted to suit the "popular" music of North America, whether it was written down or not. Cedar faces were replaced with stronger woods, gut strings were (often) replaced with wire, the "waist" became a little less pronounced, and the area surrounding the bridge became larger to provide a bigger sound. Because top bracing took a while to adjust to steel strings, many guitars of the late 1800s and early 1900s added a separate "tailpiece" that you attached the strings to. The strings would cross the bridge like a violin's strings, but they were no longer attached to it. This adjustment kept the tension of metal strings from ripping the bridge off the face of the guitar. Later "flattop" guitars would incorporate better bracing. By 1960 flattop guitars with tailpieces were becoming rare, except among specialty guitars or very cheap lines. Today you still may see desirable collector's guitars with tailpieces, but most current parlor guitars have followed the lead of the dreadnoughts and gone back to bridge-mounted strings. Like a classical, you can get very nice parlor guitars today, or very cheap ones. If you come across a better quality parlor for a reasonable price, don't turn your nose up at it. Today, with better amplification, some artists prefer parlor guitars for their relatively focused tone. It is possible to put nylon strings on a parlor guitar when you're starting out, if you want. Either way, if the student is big enough to hold a parlor guitar, it's almost always a better choice than a 3/4-sized instrument. Pros: Cons: Something to think about
The more I look at the options available, the more I think that parlor guitars are the best "starter guitars" for students old enough to physically handle them. They can grow with the guitar without technically outgrowing it. And guitars that are meant to be "parlor guitars" and not just "starter guitars" are more likely to be built for the long haul.
To learn more about the features and options you can choose on parlor guitars, click the little banner to the right.
As guitar continued to become more important to American homes and popular music, demand for louder guitars led to continued experimentation. Two of the "bigger is better" approaches caught on: Pros: Cons: Here's an irony: when I was starting out on guitar back in the early 1960s, most guitar players I emulated or knew were playing what we would now call parlor or jumbo guitars. The first time I saw a dreadnought guitar, it looked peculiar to me. Dreadnoughts were early hits among Country and Western pickers, though, and for several years, catalogues advertised them as "Western-style" guitars. Due to its playability and big, but bright sound Our sister site, Riverboat Music, has a buyer's guide for these. It explains the features and options you should look for as well as things that won't, frankly, make that much difference to you.
To learn more about the features and options you can choose on dreadnought guitars, click the little banner to the immediate right.
To learn more about "super jumbo" guitars, click the little banner to the far right right.
A century ago, itty bitty guitars were made small for convenience, not for price - they were purchased by people who traveled a lot or had limited space, but they were often just as well made as the bigger instruments. But as the guitar became more and more popular, especially in the mid-20th century, kids started getting lessons earlier, and manufacturers started marketing "1/2-sized" and "3/4-sized" "starter guitars to their parents. Never mind that they had necks like baseball bats, tone like a brick, and action like a cheeze slicer. The common reasoning among parents was, "He's always starting things and not following through. Let's get him a cheapo guitar, and if he doesn't stick with it, we're not out very much money." So the kid gets a "guitar" that looks cheap, is barely playable by any standard, and can't possibly produce a decent sound; and the kids gives it up after six weeks. "See," says the parent, "I knew he wouldn't stick with it. Good thing we didn't put any more money into the thing." Manufacturers have fed this industry of "throwaway" guitars for over sixty years. In fact my first guitar was one - a 3/4-sized Kay that my cousin got with Green Stamp books that she gave me in frustration. And no surprise - the action really was like a cheese slicer. I couldn't afford a real guitar, so I took off the nut and bridge and filed them down to get the strings into the same time zone as the frets. I also sanded and stained the face and back. (The guitar came spray-painted black with a fake pick guard painted on). After I painstakingly hand-painted a fake "binding" on the face, it was "de-uglified" to the point that I wasn't embarrassed to take it out in public - after all it wasn't that much smaller than the parlor guitars that most folks had in the early-to-mid sixties. I owned it for about six years, until my sister gave me a Mexican-built 12-string, and I traded the Kay away for a Harmony bass that was even uglier (I know that's hard to believe.) And the funny thing is, the Kay really did sound better by the time I passed it on. Even cheapo guitars can age, although they seldom age as well as expensive guitars. This brings me to a second point about "starter guitars." I'm a sucker for anything that could be made playable. When I was in college, I "set up" and rebuilt any number of guitars for friends that had got stuck with some cheapie and couldn't afford to replace it. Gone are the days when I have time to put twenty hours into salvaging a $50 guitar. But the point is, many $50 guitars CAN be made playable if you have a relation who will take it on as a labor of love. Many can't, so let Uncle Felix or whoever take a look at it before you take the plunge. Take a look at our article on evaluating used guitars for more information.
About "3/4" Nomenclature - During my research, I discovered that a lot of folks who grew up with dreadnoughts imagine that a "3/4" guitar should be 3/4 the size of a dreadnought. So they order a "3/4" guitar for their eleven-year old and the kid freaks because he feels like it's a "baby guitar." (By the way, I like "baby guitars" if they play in tune.) Though there really is no standard for what constitutes a "3/4" or "1/2" guitar, you should know that those categories were invented when what we now call "parlor guitars" were the norm, and most parlor guitars still had short (12-fret) necks by dreadnought standards. So, a so-called "3/4" guitar will automatically have a shorter neck (and "scale length") than the average classical or traditional parlor guitar, and a noticeably smaller body. This makes the whole thing much smaller than a dreadnought. No, it's not false advertising. Plus kids really are growing up faster and getting bigger. When I was eleven, my sister's full-sized archtop was quite a handful, but many kids today are approaching their full height by that age. The old rule of automatically ordering a "3/4" guitar for any kid under 12 no longer applies. And frankly, by the time most kids are ready to start guitar, they've already outgrown the so-called 1/2-size guitars. (The vast majority of those are unplayable toys, anyway.)
Pros: Cons: Something to think about
The more I look at the options available, the more I think that parlor guitars are the best "starter guitars" for students old enough to physically handle them. They can grow with the guitar without technically outgrowing it. And guitars that are meant to be "parlor guitars" and not just "starter guitars" are more likely to be built for the long haul.
That said, if your student is small, or you want a guitar you can easily travel with, a "3/4" may be your best choice. Or if your finances are "challenging," you may want to investigate the "starter guitar" universe for cost reasons alone.
To learn more about the features and options you can choose on starter guitars, click the little banner to the right.
As jazz developed in the early 20th century, many jazz bands had guitars. The problem was that the old traditional flattops (what we call "parlor guitars" today) had too much sustain. The percussive "chunk" of the strum was good. But if the player left an open string ring for very long, it muddied the sound. Somehow someone figured out that archtop guitars (with f-holes like a violin) had a loud-enough "chunk," but relatively little sustain. So archtops became the standard for jazz bands, and stayed strong through WWII. They also achieved notoriety during the Depression as "Mountain Music" guitars, courtesy of the Carter family.
Later on, as these became electrified, the manufacturers took shortcuts that made them less useful as acoustic-only instruments. So when the Folk Revival happened, archtops took a "back seat" to Parlor and Dreadnought guitars. That said the good ones still have a great low and mid range, which makes them a nice complement to treble-rich instruments like dulcimer, banjo, and mandolin.
Pros: Cons:
You may still fine a nice used one in a pawn shop or Craig's List ad. I actually started out on an archtop - an SS Stewart that my big sister bought at a pawn shop. Like most archtops of its era, the SS Stewart lacked an adjustment screw in the neck, so once the neck started to bow, she put nylon strings on it and never looked back. To learn more about shopping for and selecting archtop guitars, click the little banner to the right.
As guitars entered the electronic age, it's no surprising that many of the earliest "electric guitars" were converted archtops or based on arch-top designs. Theoretically, the coiled magnetic pickups would allow jazz players to compete in volume with the rest of the band. In practice, though, an archtop with a pickup was really a whole "nudder" instrument. Because you don't need to hit the strings on an electric very hard, you can use relatively light strings, and the strings can be closer to the neck without "fret buzzing" than the strings on an acoustic. Also, because electrics are designed for lead, it's more critical to have an accurate, playable fretboard all the way from the nut to the fourteenth fret (and beyond, on a cutaway). This combination of factors makes most electrics easier to fret and to play barre chords on than most acoustics. And this in turn has led to an "urban rumor" that it's easier to learn guitar if you start on an electric. But an electric guitar is a different instrument, and in my experience, most kids who start on electric never really make the transition to acoustic. For one thing, most acoustic guitar players use the ringing sound of open strings as much as possible (only deadening them when they change chords), but most electric guitar parts avoid open strings - because on an electric, they muddy the sound. In other words, an electric guitar play can pick up an acoustic guitar with decent action and get notes out of it, but he will never learn to get the most out of the an acoustic unless he approaches it as an entirely different instrument. Going the other way, I've known lots of acoustic players who made the adjustment to electric guitar smoothly - once they realized that barre chords sound better on the electric. Another "urban legend" is that an f-hole electric (sometimes called a "hollow-body" or "semi-hollow-body" electric provides a sound that is "halfway between" an electric and and acoustic. So some players who find it inconvenient to drag two guitars around settle on an ES-335 or some such. Such guitars are capable of putting out great sounds. In fact, there was a time when Gretch f-hole electrics almost defined Country and Western music. But the electronic output of f-hole electrics is limited by the magnetic coiled pickups, which filter out the high overtones that characterize acoustic guitar sounds. The pickups also overemphasize the sustain of open strings, which WILL affect how you play the instrument. If you like the sound of an f-hole electric, go for it. Just don't fall for the trap of thinking that it's some sort of compromize between an electric and an acoustic. Pros: Cons: Very few people start out on 12-stringed guitars, but I'll put in a note about them in case you come across one you really like. Most acoustic 12-stringed guitars you'll see are flattops, usually dreadnoughts with some parlors. Strings are tuned in pairs. The highest four strings are actually two identical E strings and two identical B strings. Strings from G to low E are tuned in octaves. On American 12-strings your pick hits the highest note of each pair before it hits the lower note. Each pair is close together so your left hand frets each pair as if it was one string (except you may need a bit more pressure). The extra high notes give a well-made twelve-string a bright, full sound. Acoustic ensembles with two guitar players may have one six-string and one 12-string to give more variety to their sound. You can hear the power of a strummed American-style acoustic 12-string on the Moody Blues' "Question of Balance." That said, to start on a 12-string, it must have supurb action, or you must have fanatic dedication. Most electric 12-strings are f-hole guitars. American electric 12-strings have the same tuning as acoustics. But the neck is narrower, and it's harder for some people to play certain chords near the nut. Rickenbacker 12-strings have an added difference: the lower four pairs of notes are strung "backwards," that is, your pick hits the low note first, then the octave. The difference in sound isn't mind-blowing, but it's there. You can hear Rick 12-strings picked and strummed on the Byrds' "Turn, Turn, Turn" and similar songs. If you have a 12 string you want to start on, you might try putting just six strings on it for a while, then putting 12 back on after you've played a year or so. This isn't a perfect solution, since the neck will be "extra-wide" and the tuning pegs might rattle without tension on them. But it's a way of starting out on a 12 if that's your only choice. The following note assumes you're leaving twelve strings on your guitar. Pros: Cons: Now that I've told you what I perceive to be the pluses and minuses of starting out on each of the major guitar types, you're probably still wondering what I recommend. Every student has different goals, tastes, maturity levels, budget, and size. But here are some general guidelines that I hope will help. If this rules out a dreadnought, consider a parlor guitar. If it also rules out a parlor guitar, you will be stuck with a 3/4-sized or smaller guitar. The only caveat is that the vast majority of 1/2-sized or 3/4-sized guitars made since 1950 sound like bricks and play like cheese slicers, so don't let the kid bring home the first guitar he or she picks up. For more details on buying a used guitar, please see our article on Evaluating Used Guitars. Also, don't assume that you have to buy the guitar at the music store to get lessons there. Most guitar teachers have a few open slots most of the time, and some of them don't mind teaching out of their house if "studio space" at the music store is expensive. Classical Guitar
These strings give a rich, mellow, and not very loud sound, unless you have a very expensive guitar. The strings are designed to be fingerpicked or strummed with the back of the nails, Flamenco-style. If you pick them with a flatpick, the guitar will sound like the background track to a spaghetti western. If you strum them with a pick, you'll wear the strings out very soon. And if you have bad strumming technique, your flatpick could carve a hole through the relatively soft face of the guitar in about twenty minutes.
That "face" (on better-made classical guitars) is usually cedar, a wood that is too soft to be used on a steel-stringed guitar, but which amplifies the sound of nylon strings better than most other woods. Cheaper classicals often use plywood tops with a cedar veneer so that they look authentic. Some still have a decent sound, but really bottom-line classicals often have the resonance of, say, a brick.
Classical Guitar as a Starter Guitar
A final note about learning with nylon strings: Instead of shopping for an actual classical guitar, you could start out with a "parlor guitar" strung with nylon strings, then put steel strings on it when you're ready for a louder, more contemporary sound. Or get a used 3/4 size cheapy and string it with nylon strings to learn on, so you're only out $50 or so when you start. Then when you get a bigger guitar, you can put steel strings on the little one, too, and leave it in the back seat to take to the beach. The main disadvantage of this approach (other than losing the "cool factor") is that your guitar will not be very loud, so you won't have the instant gratification of filling the room (even your bedroom) with sound. On the other hand, you can practice in the "wee hours" without disturbing anyone. Parlor Guitar
There were many experiments, of course. Longer bodies, shallower bodies, deeper bodies, more strings, drone strings, and so on. But by 1900, if you went to the store looking for a "guitar," chances are you'd come back with something like what we call a "parlor guitar" today. The name "parlor" actually emerged after bigger types were invented, because it's loud enough for the living room, but generally not loud enough (unamplified) for larger concert venues.
Parlor Guitar as a Starter Guitar
appeal as a dreadnought, so if peer pressure is an issue. (On the other hand, hipsters don't have as much problem with unusual guitars as some other subcultures.)Dreadnought and Jumbo Guitars
Jumbo guitars, favored by Gibson, kept the same basic shape as what we now call parlor guitars, but they made the body wider and longer. The resulting sound was louder, but also a little deeper. For folks who want a big sound, they are still a popular alternative to the more popular dreadnought body style. However very few "student model" jumbos have been made in the last fifty years, so you're not as likely to start on a jumbo as you are on a classical, parlor, or dreadnought.
Note: Gibson also introduced a line of "super jumbo" guitars which we don't recommend for beginners unless they have very long arms. However, we do have a link to a "super jumbo" guitar buyers' guide below in case you are interested in learning more about them.
Dreadnought guitars, essentially pioneered by Martin, made the "waist" less prominent and lengthened the part of the body where the bridge attaches. Dreadnoughts are easier for some people to handle than jumbos, and - to some ears, at least - have a more balanced sound. Even Gibson eventually adopted the dreadnought shape for lines like the J45 and J50. Dreadnought Guitar as a Starter Guitar
the dreadnought is the most popular "fullsized" guitar shape today. To kids starting out today, I imagine that parlor and jumbo guitars look peculiar.
3/4 or "Starter Guitars"
3/4 or "Starter" Guitar as a Starter Guitar
Name-brand starter guitars can usually be made playable, and sometimes are playable out of the box.
"Starter-level" Name Brand Guitars: Brands like Alvarez and Yamaha don't have a sub-brand to stick on their starter guitars. And they don't want their entry-level guitars to give their good guitars a bad name. So these tend to have better quality out of the box than off-brand or sub-brand guitars. They are even sometimes playable out of the box. If you buy one from a music store, it may already be "set up" to play.
Or if you have a friend or family member who can restring it and adjust the neck, you may be be fine.
Archtop Guitars
Archtop Guitars as Starter Guitars
Our sister site Riverboat Music has a buyer's guide for these. It goes into more detail than this section, although the work involved in making a true solid-top archtop guitar is so extensive that most of the instruments you can find new for under $2000 are made in China, with all the accompanying quality control problems.
Electric Guitars
For one thing, the pickup restored the sustain that old-timey jazz players had considered a problem. By the 1950s, though, jazz guitar styles had evolved to the point where "open strings" were almost never heard, much less sustained. With a tube amp, jazz players could get the "chunk" of the strummed chord and turn the amp up for nice sustained leads. Blues players like B.B. King especially liked the capabilities of the new instruments.
Eventually, manufacturers like Gibson realized that an electrified archtop didn't need to be so deep, and began making shallower versions like the famous ES-335. These had very similar tone, were easier to handle, and were less prone to feedback.
But the guitar was not done evolving. Electric guitar pioneer Les Paul proved that you could get a good, even sound out of a solid piece of wood. Paul was mostly a lead player, so he didn't need the "chunk" sound of strummed archtops. Instead he focused on finding woods and construction techniques that would maximize the potential of emerging electronics technologies. Gibson's "Les Paul" guitars maximized sustain with a glued-on neck that picked up the vibrations from the guitar's body.
Fender's Stratocaster added body extensions ("horns") that would serve a similar purpose. By now the electric guitar had come into its own.
Electric Guitars as Starter Guitars
Easy to fret, so uncommitted students don't wimp out as fast. Maximum "cool" factor for kids sensitive to peer pressure.
Probably first choice for someone whose only goal is learning barre-chord-centric music such as jazz or heavy metal.
12-String Guitars
Twelve-Strings as Starter Guitars
Summary
Whatever else you get out of our pages, I hope you enjoy your music and figure out how to make enjoyable music for those around you as well.
And please stay in touch!
- Paul Race
All material, illustrations, and content of this web site is copyrighted © 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006,
2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 by Paul D. Race. All rights reserved.
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