Guitar Lesson: Use Bluegrass Flatpicking to Add Excitement to Your Accompaniments
In this guitar lesson, learn how to use bluegrass flatpicking to add riffs and fills on top of your playing to create the exciting sound of multiple instruments.
Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers
Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers, founding editor of Acoustic Guitar, is a grand prize winner of the John Lennon Songwriting Contest and author of The Complete Singer-Songwriter, Beyond Strumming, and other books and videos for musicians.
Announcing the Winners of Will Ackerman’s Tuning Challenge
Will Ackerman’s solo guitar piece “I Had to Go There” is in a rare tuning: F C Eb Ab C Eb. The guitarist invites you to give song’s tuning a try and share what you discover.
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How to Play Neil Young’s Luminous Love Song “Harvest Moon“
With its graceful melody and romantic glow, the song is an acoustic repertoire staple—sung at countless weddings and song circles.
Letters from Pete: How Pete Seeger mentored and inspired generations of musicians
Tony Trischka grew up with Pete Seeger’s banjo ringing in his house, by way of his parents’ records of the Weavers, the Almanac Singers, and Seeger’s folk songs for children. In 1962, at age 13, Trischka started getting serious about…
A Visit To the Studio of Guitarist, Producer, and Windham Hill Founder Will Ackerman
It’s hard to picture a more idyllic environment for making music than guitarist Will Ackerman’s Imaginary Road Studios in Windham County, Vermont.
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Am I Too Old to Learn Guitar?
If we, at whatever age, are truly determined to make music come out of those six strings, we will.
My First Guitar | The Acoustic Guitar Podcast
Listen to the first-ever episode of The Acoustic Guitar Podcast, a new monthly show from your friends at Acoustic Guitar magazine.
Indie Folk Songwriter Joan Shelley Heads Home with ‘The Spur’
The Spur is a batch of songs that reflect on putting down roots, coming out of what Joan Shelley calls a “period of opposite extremes—of creative hyper-connection and physical isolation."
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How to Play James Taylor’s Timeless Cowboy Lullaby “Sweet Baby James”
Here are some tips on how to play "Sweet Baby James,” the 1970 title track of James Taylor’s second album. Taylor himself has called it his best song.
Watch Joan Armatrading Play Her Classic Ballad “Love and Affection”
Watch Joan Armatrading play "Love and Affection" on her Ovation 12-string guitar, and learn some tips for playing the song with her rich chord voicings.
Explore Joan Armatrading’s Unorthodox Acoustic Guitar Style
Joan Armatrading has followed her own path for 50 years to become one of the most revered songwriters of her generation. Here's an in-depth look at her guitar playing.
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Remembering Guitar Innovator Rick Turner (1943–2022)
Remembering guitarist, luthier, electronics designer, and Acoustic Guitar contributor Rick Turner, who passed away April 17, 2022 at age 78.
Crosspicking 101: A Private Bluegrass Lesson with Molly Tuttle
Crosspicking is an essential technique in the bluegrass guitar toolkit. Here's a bluegrass guitar crosspicking lesson from Molly Tuttle.
How to Craft Dynamic Song Arrangements on Acoustic Guitar
Even if you’re accompanying a song with one guitar, you can create the same kind of journey on your instrument that a full band arrangement would.
Roots Guitarist and Educator Happy Traum Teaches a Few Songs from His Storied Career
At 83, the guitarist Happy Traum is remarkably youthful—still playing concerts & teaching. Here is a retrospective of his life in music as captured by 6 songs.
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12 Tips for Learning Songs from Recordings
Learning to play your favorites tunes accurately and thoroughly requires digging deeper than visiting online tab libraries. Here are tips to help with the process.
Remembering David Surette, Humble Master of Folk Guitar and Mandolin
David Surette was renowned for his superb solo fingerstyle guitar arrangements of Celtic tunes, as well as the Grateful Dead guitar/mandolin duo Steve and Dave Play Dead.
Learn to Play Larkin Poe’s “She’s a Self Made Man” on Guitar
The title track of Larkin Poe’s 2020 album Self Made Man is a blues rock banger, with crunchy electric guitar by Rebecca Lovell & scorching slide by Megan Lovell.
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Inside the Songwriting and Guitar Style of Lucinda Williams
Explore the music of Lucinda Williams by way of some of her best-known songs, with tab examples demonstrating her rhythm playing.
Three More Christmas Carols for Solo Acoustic Guitar
Check out Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers' fingerstyle guitar arrangements of 3 Christmas classics: “The First Noel,” “Joy to the World,” and “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.”
Video Lesson: Inside the Soulful Acoustic Guitar Style of Bill Withers
An immersion in Bill Withers’ music brings powerful lessons for any guitar-playing songwriter, especially about the value of directness. This lesson goes inside some of Withers’ best songs—especially from his first few albums, when his own guitar was most prominent—to reveal the understated accompaniment style that carries them.
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Watch Lucinda Williams’ Classic Performance of “Passionate Kisses”
To play the acoustic guitar rhythm part of Lucinda Williams' "Passionate Kisses", capo at the fourth fret and use C shapes, which sound in the key of E major.
Sunny War and Her Guild Dreadnought Shine on the Evocative ‘Simple Syrup’
After listening to Sunny War's Simple Syrup, you won’t be able to get the melodies of this one-of-a-kind songwriter/guitarist out of your head.
Video Lesson: Exploring Dropped-D Fingerpicking
Fingerpicking and dropped-D tuning fit together like hand and glove. For evidence, just consider the long list of fingerpicking classics played in dropped D, which includes Jorma Kaukonen’s “Embryonic Journey,” Pete Seeger’s “Living in the Country,” the Beatles’ “Dear Prudence,”…
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Video Lesson: Exploring Joan Baez’s Elegant Guitar Style
A skilled and precise fingerstyle player, Joan Baez modeled an approach to accompaniment that was not flashy, but effective, elegant, and complete-sounding with no other instruments.