Optimum Guitar
My mission is to give you the tools to make your dreams come true. I teach a classical guitar technique but you won’t be limited to play only classical guitar.
After completing the three first courses, you can choose to continue developing your classical guitar playing and broaden your classical repertoire. You can also use your skills to play chords, with strumming or fingerstyle technique, to accompany yourself or others. You can add intros to songs and improvise solos and accompany yourself while doing it.
I have composed the majority of the course material myself, but my dream is not that you keep playing my music. My dream is that you follow the dream, and never loose the spark, that once got you started with guitar.
At Optimum Guitar you learn guitar by following a series of pre recorded lessons. The lessons are grouped into courses with 10 lessons in each course. I use a method where you start by playing with your thumb in the right hand. In the first course you use your thumb to play simple melodies on the bass strings and your right hand fingers only to strum chords.
In classical guitar technique it’s important with fingers that move independently from the arm and hand. When you start playing guitar with the thumb you establish a good right hand technique with indipendent fingers.
With this method you also learn guitar as you learn the alphabet, the first notes you play are A, B and c. In course two you start playing melodies also with your fingers. In the third course you start playing with your thumb and your fingers combined, then we can start talking about a proper classical guitar technique. In course three you will also learn essential techniques as arpeggios, scales and different strumming patterns.
If you are a beginner and have never touched a guitar this is the guitar school for you. It starts from the zero and the progress is slow to make you feel confident in your way forward. If you already are a failrly experienced player but feel that you want to improve your technique this is also the place for you.
You still start with course number one, give it a few weeks even if it feels easy, in course three you will notice how things come together.
Children's course
To do the first course the student needs to be able to press the strings in the frets on the fingerboard with the left hand. Children who can hold the guitar and reach around it but still can't press the strings can start with the Children's course as a preparation for the the first course. There the child learns by playing the bass notes on open strings to some common children's songs. The songs are in Swedish but the child can play along without knowing any Swedish or having heard the songs before. The child then learns the first strings and notes on the guitar and to play rythmically along with the music. They also learn how to play with the thumb, a skill they will need in the first course once they start with that.
Course 1
Playing rest strokes with the thumb on the three bass strings.
Learning the names of the notes on the bass strings. Playing sharp notes.
Simple melodies on the bass strings.
Some basic chords.
Strumming technique.
Some famous riffs and intros from popular music played on the bass strings.
Learning to read scores with note names, ”the alphabet of music”.
Course 2
Learning the notes of the three treble strings.
Simple melodies played with the fingers on the right hand on the treble strings.
Plying with both free stroke and rest stroke.
A few more chords.
Some famous riffs and intros from popular music played on the treble strings.
Course 3
Playing with the right hand thumb and the fingers combined; classical guitar technique.
More advanced guitar pieces.
Barre chords.
Scales.
Learning to read scores with musical notes.
Samuel Edvardsson plays Caboclinho by Dilermando Reis
Optimum Guitar School Online doesn’t offer any quick fix, it offers a path for you to follow to learn guitar from zero. My aim is that you should feel safe on your path to learning guitar. The courses deliberately have a slow progression and each new step is based on something you already learned before. In order to present a material in the right pace and with the ideal progression I have composed the exercises myself.