Guitar Picking Quotes & Sayings

In the last couple of years I've been picking up my guitar again. — Peabo Bryson

I honestly believe that you have to be able to play the guitar hard if you want to be able to get the whole spectrum of tones out of it. Since I normally play so hard, when I start picking a bit softer my tone changes completely, and that's really useful sometimes for creating a more laid-back feel. — Angus Young

I saw the Village as a place you could escape to, to express yourself. When I first went there, I wrote and performed poetry. Then I drew portraits for a couple of years. It took a while before I thought about picking up a guitar. — Richie Havens

The one thing I do have is good ears. I don't mean perfect pitch, but ears for picking things up. I developed my ear through piano theory, but I never had a guitar lesson in my life, except from Eric Clapton off of records. — Eddie Van Halen

It's just a favorite language to me, that country finger-picking guitar style. — Kenny Loggins

If you don't know the blues ... there's no point in picking up the guitar and playing rock and roll or any other form of popular music. — Keith Richards

After Sleater-Kinney broke up in 2006 I had very little desire to play music. It took well over three years before picking up a guitar meant anything to me other than an exercise. — Carrie Brownstein

I am definitely still the same kid that I was picking up the guitar at 15. But, I have definitely learned to be more flexible and roll with the punches. It's such an unpredictable business to be in and it's insane how things change so last minute. — Kate Voegele

It turns out kids today still learn that four-chord progression when they're just picking up the guitar. — John Scofield

I do the protest stuff. I do country and western. I play both acoustic and electric guitar in a lot of different styles, from loud, psychedelic stuff to quiet finger-picking. — Eugene Chadbourne

Every one of the songs was based around picking an acoustic guitar. That was part of the concept from the beginning, that the tempos were going to go from slow to almost mid-tempo. — Jules Shear

Music is a spiritual expression of what's in your heart. Music as a way of getting rich is a pretty new thing, and I often wonder if the mega-bucks glitzy atmosphere is making the quality of music suffer. You have to work really hard to get around that and remember why you're in it in the first place: because you have to be. It's like an addiction. You can't go a day without picking up your guitar. To me, the only commercial goals that are really valid are, 'Boy, I wish I didn't have to go to work. I wish I could do this all the time.' — Trey Anastasio

After months of playing air guitar to 'Free Bird', what really got me into guitar was watching a documentary about Jimi Hendrix and picking up the Woodstock soundtrack. Listening to his version of 'Star Spangled Banner' and 'Purple Haze.' My brother played acoustic guitar and, idolising him, I thought, 'I'm going to get a guitar.' — Kirk Hammett

Lying on her side, the warm fire at her feet, Helen's laughter died away as Lucas suddenly went from tuning to playing.
It was like an orchestra in an instrument.
He played with both hands-not one hand picking and the other holding down strings-but with both hands so that it sounded like more than one guitar was playing. Sometimes he hit the strings to make them hum like a harp, and sometimes he hit the body of the guitar like a drum to add bass and keep time. It was the most fascinating thing Helen had ever watched, like Lucas had a dozen voices in his head, all singing the same song, and he'd figured a way to make them come out of ten fingers.
Helen looked at his face and could tell why he loved it. It was like thinking for him, only this was a puzzle that he could share with her as he solved it.
He'd walked into her head when he'd come to her world. And she'd walked into his when she finally heard him play.
It was heaven. — Josephine Angelini

Of course, it is very important to be sober when you take an exam. Many worthwhile careers in the street-cleansing, fruit-picking and subway-guitar-playing industries have been founded on a lack of understanding of this simple fact. — Terry Pratchett

Example 1c is the pattern I often play as my first warm when picking up my guitar. It — Simon Pratt