How to Buy a Guitar for Christmas – Top 10 Parents Guide to Holiday Guitar Purchases
As the holiday season quickly approaches, there are lots of parents out there looking to buy a guitar this Christmas or Hanukkah season.
This article is intended for the first time buyers who don’t play guitar and need a place to start with what they should get.
In our combined 50 years of working with musicians and being musicians, we’ve had an opportunity to come across a lot of guitars! Here is some advice:
1) One of the most important things to remember is that your child should enjoy playing the instrument. That said, get them the kind of guitar they WANT – either electric or an acoustic. Many people start learning on an acoustic (we did) but I’ve found that if it doesn’t sound like the song they are trying to learn, it can become frustrating QUICK and the child will ultimately give up on the instrument.
2) For an electric guitar, get a guitar that has at least one humbucking pickup. A humbucker pickup is one with two coils (vs a single coil). A humbucker makes the guitar much less noisy. It also gives it a more full sound.
3) Use a TUNER! I prefer a chromatic tuner because it allows you to tune to any note. It takes a LONG TIME to learn to tune by ear, so give your kids a break and buy them a tuner. My father was a guitar player for over 50 years – HE could tune a guitar by ear…
4) A decent pair of headphones, which leads to #5, but headphones are a must. This way your child can practice and not drive everybody nuts in the house! A word of caution: make sure they don’t CRANK UP THE VOLUME. Excessive loud noise WILL cause hearing loss (my ears ring because of all the loud noise over the years).
5) Get a decent little practice amp that at minimum has reverb. Also, make sure it has a headphone jack! Optionally, but a really nice to have, if they have an RCA jack (so you can plug in an iPod or CD player) so your child can play along with the song, you should get that as well.
6) Encourage the use of a metronome. So many people can’t keep time, and that’s because they never learned HOW to keep time. Do your budding musician a favor and get them a metronome.
7) Go to your local music shop and sign up for some lessons. Start with the minimum to get the ball rolling, but it’s important so that the child doesn’t get frustrated trying to teach themselves the instrument.
Watch out for Guitar Packages… They may seem like the silver bullet, but sometimes they skimp on parts of the package. Try pricing out the pieces, you’ll find you probably can get a better amp or better guitar for the money.
9) Buy a hard shell case or at minimum a gig bag. A guitar stand is also a must. I can’t tell you how many broken necks I’ve seen over the years because a musician rested the neck on the amp then proceeded to step on the guitar!
10) Buy and read lots of books, subscribe to Guitar player magazine – the more you read, the more you learn, the more you know!
That’s a quick 10, but there are easily lots more I could add.
Here’s my biggest piece of advice: you don’t have to buy a NEW instrument! A used guitar is just as nice as a new one and will save you a lot of money. If you look at some of the guitars we’ve had on our website, they are 99% used and some are ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL! I wouldn’t pass them over for a new guitar ever – and they would have saved (in some cases) hundreds over the exact same guitar new.
Also, you can’t find some guitars anymore… So keep that in mind – new doesn’t always = better, just more money!
Since we don’t have any used pieces at the moment, I’ve put together some nice packages for you to look at:
That’s all for now… as you can see, for about $320 you can get a nice setup! Keep an eye out here for other tips and deals as the holiday season approaches!
:(
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Watch out for Guitar Packages… They may seem like the silver bullet, but sometimes they skimp on parts of the package. Try pricing out the pieces, you’ll find you probably can get a better amp or better guitar for the money.
Epiphone DR-90 Acoustic Player Pack Natural Chrome Hardware
Epiphone Les Paul Special II Electric Guitar Heritage Cherry Sunburst $169.99
Crate FlexWave Series FW15 15W 1×8 Guitar Combo Amp Standard $79.99
Audio Technica 15′ Instrument Cable $19.99
On-Stage Stands A-Frame Guitar Stand $19.94
Musicians Gear Chromatic Keychain Tuner $9.99
Musicians Gear Electric Guitar Gig Bag Standard $14.99
Ernie Ball 2225 Nickel Extra Slinky Electric Guitar Strings Standard $4.19/ea.