Finger placement on the strings

Learning guitar is trickier than I imagined but I'm excited regardless. I can tell I'm having a small issue with putting enough pressure on the strings and not accidentally hitting the adjacent string. But, what I'm asking is confirmation on what I guess I already suspect. My fingernails. I need to trim them way down. I'm not able to get that finger tips straight down on the strings as I'm supposed to.

My other small issue is plucking with a pick. Its going to take lots of practice to get the right pressure. At first, I'm doing ok. Jingle Bells is coming out clearly. Then, it sounds like I'm stomping on those bells! Quite annoying. But, I am VERY happy with this instructional site. I appreciate the video instructions being up close. I, also, borrowed books with instructional pictures of the chords and notes to go between the video and book images.

My goals are realistic. I already know that within a year that I'll be just "ok" at playing acoustic guitar. And after a 2nd year, I'm shooting for "Really OK!" :) After that, I'm hoping to give George Strait a run for his money!

Hi Holly,

It's great that you have realistic goals for yourself, this takes away much frustration and allows you to learn more efficiently.

It does take a little to time get the picking pressure right. Usually, the brain is deciding to either focus on the left hand or the right hand and the other hand gets ignored. But this will all come together with practice.

You definitely have to sacrifice nail length to make it work, at least in the fingering hand. It sounds like you're focusing on all the right things.

Great to have you here, let us know if you have any more questions we can help you with?

best,