Beginner Guitar System Review

Railroad Media has teamed up with Nate Savage, a veteran guitarist with 17+ years of experience to create a brand-new DVD guitar curriculum called the Beginner Guitar System.

The course is moderately-paced, and spends a good chunk of time teaching the essentials all guitarists need to know like common chords, bar and power chords, rhythm, and theory. While the course is obviously for guitar novices, students will get to tackle material that even some intermediate guitarists may not be at all familiar with.

In my opinion, guitarists that are just starting out shouldn't waste money on private instruction to learn the absolute basics when there are great beginner courses out there like the Beginner Guitar System, that can do a better job for less money (I will concede that private lessons may make more sense when moving into more advanced techniques and theory).

Screenshots

Screenshots of Nat Savage’s Beginner Guitar System.

Features

Below I’ll mention what's included with the Beginner Guitar System and then briefly expound on each part of the course.

A thick, coil-bound 177-page workbook - This amply-illustrated manual is meant to be used alongside the video lessons. It’s full of chord charts, sheet music, and supplemental lesson material that rounds out the video content. At first, I thought the textual lessons were simply a transcript of the video lessons, but they are in fact, separate, supplemental lessons. The only thing we would have liked to have seen added to the manual would be hand diagrams. You'll know to reference the workbook when the page number of the workbook is displayed on screen.

A large, 34”x22”chord chart poster - Hanging this large poster in your room is terrific way to quickly memorize many of the most common chords and makes a superb learning aid. So far we’ve not seen another physical guitar course include this in their course.

4 Lesson DVDs – The heart of the Beginner Guitar System is the video lessons. Between the 4 discs, you can break up the video into about 25-30 different lessons.

The course gets you started on the right foot by informing you of everything you need to get the most out of your guitar. It explains everything from how to hold your guitar, to how to use common guitar accessories such pedals and amplifiers, to the different ways of tuning your instrument. Unlike other courses, Nate uses several different guitars when explaining how they work and how to replace strings on them. By the end of the first DVD, you’ll already have begun playing a couple chords and a song or two. Moving on you’ll learn how to read sheet music,chord diagrams and correct picking techniques. You’ll learn a variety of guitar licks, bar chords, cross-picking, and then move on to the essential scales all guitarists need to know, lead techniques like bending and legato, and musical theory.

Due to the great camerawork, you’ll have no problems figuring out what your right and left hands should be doing at any given time. You’ll also be able to get the exact fingering on those tricky chords with the help of close-up shots. Both standard musical notation and guitar tablature is shown on screen with an indicator showing where you are in the music. From a usability standpoint, this might be the best DVD guitar course out there.

2 Play-Along DVDs – These extra 2 DVDs contain 10 songs you’ll be able to learn as you near the end of the course. Like the other video lessons, they are very well-produced. Almost every song represents a different genre of music, including country, pop, blues, rock, punk, metal, reggae, and gospel.  Each song first gets played in performance view where you get to see all the band members playing their instruments, a rhythm view, and an instructional view where Nate breaks each part down and explains everything he’s doing step-by-step.

3 Play Along CDs - The play along CDs contain all the songs taught and performed in the play along DVDs. There is a version with the full band minus the guitar, another without the guitar but with a metronome added, and lastly, another with the full band and the guitar. When I used iTunes to open the CDs, I discovered that they didn’t embed the track names into the CD, so I had to reference the track listing at the end of the workbook.

1 Metronome CD – This works as a temporary metronome, until you find a real metronome to accompany you with your playing (and you should use one). The CD includes 31 tracks at varying tempos but unfortunately, like the play along CDs, the tracks are unnamed, so you won’t know at what speed the metronome track is playing at, without referencing the back of the workbook.

Support

Though we didn't see it advertised on the product website, there is a support forum designed specifically for customers of the Beginner Guitar System course. It is a private forum though, so to gain access, you have to send Nate an email.

Other questions you may have can be resolved using Railroad Media’s phone or email support options listed on their site.

Ordering Information

The Beginner Guitar System is currently only available from their website, BeginnerGuitarSystem.com. It’s also very affordable at the price of $97. If money is tight however, you may want to take a look at their 5-month payment plan.

Payment methods include all major credit cards as well as popular payment option, PayPal. Beginner Guitar System’s website also advertises a 90-day no-strings-attached guarantee where you can return the course within 90 days if you don’t think it was worth your investment.

Conclusion

With all the overpriced, incomplete and poor quality guitar courses available on the internet, the Beginner Guitar System is a breath of fresh air. Nate Savage does a great job covering all the fundamentals a new guitarist should learn while keeping things interesting. The work Railroad Media put into the details of the course add a lot to the lessons. A case in point would be the play along DVDs and CDs that allow you to put your new skills to the test in a fun and rewarding way.

When you think of the cost of hiring a guitar teacher to learn all the material contained in the Beginner Guitar System, this might be the best $97 you’ve ever spent.

When comparing the Beginner Guitar System to our #1 pick Learn and Master Guitar, it has a few things going for it, including a cheaper price tag and better quality video. L&MG though, can take you further on your guitar journey which gives it slightly better value. However, if you are planning on eventually taking private guitar lessons once you master the basics, Beginner Guitar System is your best bet!