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JamPlay vs Justin Guitar: Who’s Offers Better Lessons?

JamPlay and Justin Guitar are no doubt two of the best online guitar lesson sites available to both beginners and experienced players.

Both sites offer a wide range of lessons for both beginners and experienced players alike. While JamPlay has a wide range of instructors, some famous and some not, Justin Guitar is the work of just guitar player and teacher Justin Sandercoe of YouTube fame.

Even though both sites are great options for online guitar lessons, we here at Guitar Niche pit Justin Guitar vs JamPlay to find out which is truly the best option for you.

JamPlay vs Justin Guitar Quick Comparison:

JamPlay and Justin Guitar In Detail: Breaking Them Down

Before we get started, let’s go over how we’re going to compare and judge the two sites against each other. We’ll be comparing both the features and appearance of the websites as how we imagine a beginner and an experienced player will view them.

For example, an experienced guitar player is more likely to be impressed by number of songs or technical lessons available while a beginner will be looking for an easy to follow set of introductory steps or lessons.

The major criteria, as with all good online guitar lessons, will be how easy it is to navigate each page, how many features and lessons are available, and how easy each video is to follow.

Guitar Teachers and Basic Lesson Plans

No matter how easy the user interface is, the site will ultimately only be as good as the teachers who are teaching the lessons.

The teacher’s ability to communicate the importance of each technique or lesson and how it pertains to the overall lesson plan is vital.

Without being able to see progress on the instrument and through each site’s student path, beginners are likely to get frustrated, or lose interest.

JAMPLAY

Our first impression of the site for this JamPlay review section was that the instructor list features a lot of big-name guitar players who teach either techniques or their own songs.

While it can be really inspiring and motivational to players to learn from their heroes, we feel this feature has more marketing value than teaching value.

The basic lesson play is split into 4 phases:

1. Beginner
2. Genres & Skills
3. Songs, and
4. Songwriting

We really like the flow of this order and think it makes it easy for the student to accumulate skills while constantly using them.

You’re earning them in a new context such as “here is a country riff, now let’s play it in a popular country song, finally, let’s write a song featuring this riff”.

Furthermore, the instructors in the beginner series videos we watched spoke slowly and clearly, demonstrating years of experience teaching the guitar.

However, there are multiple options and pathways for each phase and level which can be confusing or redundant.

For more info their site, check out our complete JamPlay Review >>

JUSTIN GUITAR

To kick off our Justin Guitar review, let’s take a look at the lessons and learning structure. All Justin Guitar lessons are taught by the main man himself, Justin Sandercoe.

While some people may be discouraged by the lack of famous, guitar hero instructors, the familiarity and consistency of having the same instructor can be very comforting to new players.

The lesson plans are well laid out with a nice, descriptive “welcome” page explaining a little bit about the site and module structure.

With labeled beginner and topic options, we found it easy to navigate but somewhat “busy” with the number of options.

The color-coded difficulties are also helpful as it works to break up the wide number of options into smaller, more manageable sub-categories.

The lessons are also further split up under the labels of “beginner”, “intermediate”, “advanced”, and “spectrum”.

For more info on this service, check out our comprehensive Justin Guitar Review >>

Winner: JUSTIN GUITAR

User Interface

When learning guitar, there are enough small things to frustrate and discourage you enough to quite altogether. One thing that can easily make it worse on a student is a hard to navigate website or lesson plan.

Even for experienced players, you don’t want to have to spend too much time trying to figure out to how to find your way around the song lesson pages or figuring out how to slow down the video or where the tabs load from.

JAMPLAY

Overall, the user interface is not difficult to navigate whatsoever, but we wish there was more of an emphasis on getting started with lessons.

Once you scroll down a little bit, the viewer is bombarded with course options that don’t seem to tie in together at all based on genre, style, or difficulty.

Once you get to the lessons tab on top of the site, the four phases are easily laid out and you are directed to the homepage for each phase.

However, as we mentioned before, it can be a little bit overwhelming to a new student as there are about two dozen options, split between acoustic and electric guitar.

This site puts the onus on the student to find out which path is best suited for them and the page layout further emphasizes that.

JUSTIN GUITAR

The home page on Justin Guitar is set up with a much more user-friendly appearance in our opinion with the first thing you see being a 1-minute introduction video and a “beginner’s start here” page with links.

As you scroll down, a screen pops up with interesting stats and numbers representing the site such as the number of songs and lessons available as well as users, subscribers, and facebook likes.

From a strictly aesthetic perspective, the Justin Guitar site is much more modern, interactive, and appealing than the JamPlay web page.

If you can’t find what you’re looking for on the front page, there are helpful drop-down menus along the top page to help guide you towards tools, lessons, and more.

Winner: JUSTIN GUITAR

Lessons Toolbox

Along with all the videos and great teachers that makes these sites great, the real value lies within the tools they offer via the website.

Things like tabs that pop up next to the video, the ability to slow down/speed up the pace, built in tuners, or chord finders are all invaluable to students.

JAMPLAY

JamPlay has a very easy to use toolbox that is located right below the video screen of each lesson. It’s simple to find and shouldn’t be too confusing for students as it has helpful labels and links to multiple features.

Students can hit the clearly labeled “Ask A Teacher” button for additional help, take their own notes in “notes”, and control playback speed with an adjustable clicker among many others.

While we have not been thrilled with their home screen and lesson selection user interface, this is clearly a top-notch video lesson webpage.

JUSTIN GUITAR

For those of you familiar with YouTube video formatting, you may enjoy the Justin Guitar video lessons and toolbox, or lack of a toolbox.

Basically, his site is just YouTube videos with a few additional comments and tabs you can access under the video.

While the video content is no doubt fantastic, many helpful tools like video speed control, note taking, or separate published tabs are not available on the same screen as with JamPlay or Guitar Tricks.

For some, they may appreciate this streamlined platform and with no subscription cost, you are certainly not getting ripped off or losing value. But if cost is not problem, it may be best to opt for a more complete learning package.

Winner: JAMPLAY

Available Song Lessons

Last but not least, if you’re going to be shelling out your hard-earned money to learn your favorite songs, you expect at least some of those songs to be available on the platform.

JAMPLAY

While licensing and tablature rights can get legally tricky, JamPlay still appears to have a questionably low number of songs available for its students to learn; somewhere in the range of 200-300 by our hand count.

Hard rock and heavy metal are well represented, as are The Beatles but overall the selection is lot on many classic and modern rock hits such as guitar lesson staples “Wonderwall” or “Good Riddance”.

Blues and Country are similarly understaffed as a dozen or more of the instructor’s original pieces take up valuable space.

JUSTIN GUITAR

Justin Guitar’s free online guitar tutorials lists over 550 song lessons available, while JamPlay doesn’t list a number, our hand count suggested they had only 300 or so. In addition to having more than JamPlay,

it also has a more diverse selection of genres such as alternative, funk, and reggae.

The same color coding from the general step by step guitar lessons is used here to help users filter songs based on difficulty.

What’s more impressive is how many of these lessons are available with only one instructor, while sites like JamPlay have dozens of teachers and less lessons.

Winner: JUSTIN GUITAR

Final Recount:

(3 / 4)

JUSTINGUITAR WINS 3 OUT OF 4 CATEGORIES

PROS

• • • Free
    • More available song and genre lessons
    • One teacher simplifies things
    • Easy to navigate
    • Live Lessons

CONS

• • • No famous instructors
    • Few in-lesson tools available

(1 / 4)

JAMPLAY WINS 1 OUT OF 4 CATEGORIES

PROS

• • • Familiar, famous instructors
    • Awesome in-lesson tools
    • Live Lessons

CONS

• • • Little diversification in song/genre lessons
    • Lack of streamlined lesson plans
    • $19.99/month
    • No clear “beginners start here” button

In Summary, Which Is The Best Online Guitar Lessons Service For You Personally – JamPlay or Justin Guitar?

Justin Guitar won three out of the four categories, making it incredibly impressive considering it costs $0 per month compared to the $19.95 per month that a JamPlay membership costs – though they do offer a free access trial.

While you can’t go wrong with either, Justin Guitar definitely offers more value and is less risky considering it is free and accessible to all.

While JamPlay packs in more features and instructors, Justin Guitar is a step above in usability and quality.

The post JamPlay vs Justin Guitar [Who’s Better?] first appeared on GuitarNiche.

JamPlay Key Features:

We certainly hope you benefit from the information we provide in this article! Just so you know, we may receive compensation if you use the links on this page. If you do, thank you so much!

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JamPlay Guitar Lessons Review: Do They Really Deliver Great Value?

JamPlay is home to one of the largest lists of guitar instructors on the web, including popular performing and studio musicians.

For a full understanding of some of the highest rated providers available to you, check out our complete guide to online guitar lessons.

JamPlay Overview

In addition to the impressive teaching array, JamPlay offers great features like live lessons, chat forums, and a wide variety of technique lessons as well.

A JamPlay membership will set you back about $19.99 per month, but with the huge selection of lessons, it should be easy of guitarists at any level to extract value from their membership.

Let’s take a more detailed look at the song options, lesson plans, and instructors you’re paying for with an extensive JamPlay review.

Who Is JamPlay For?

If you’re asking what is JamPlay?, or is JamPlay worth it?, the answer comes down to your familiarity with the guitar. With an incredibly extensive selection of lessons, JamPlay is a great way to continue your guitar education but has some flaws that make it not necessarily the best option for beginners.

As we’ll discuss in later sections, a limited song selection and busy lesson plan makes it more optimal for student guitarists who have already advanced passed the beginner stages.

Despite some of these shortcomings, the video lesson quality is still top notch, and if you can find the lessons you need, you’ll learn from some the best instructors online.

What’s Included?

For the JamPlay membership cost of $19.99/month, you are certainly getting a lot of value when you consider all that’s included.

Quality concerns aside, there are four phases of learning that includes beginner lessons, skill lessons, song demos, and songwriting help.

While each phase has a somewhat overwhelming number of paths to follow, some students may be grateful for all the options. The song selections are also limited in both number and genres when considering JamPlay vs Fender Play or other competitors.

Specifically, the hard rock and metal categories feature heavily with some lessons being instructed by the musicians and songwriters who made the songs famous.

Furthermore, there is a huge variety of instructors in playing style, musical genre, and instruments (acoustic, electric, bass lessons all included).

If that’s not enough there are free live lessons available with your subscription and an IOS app available so you can take your lessons with you, however the app doesn’t have great JamPlay user ratings on the app store.

Jamplay Features

One of the best features on the JamPlay website is the video lesson portals. With the biggest toolbox of all lesson sites featuring tabs, supplemental notes about the lessons, speed controls, and “ask a teacher” help functions, you can truly find everything you need once you start each video.

Lessons like “classical guitar for the modern guitarist” and “modern grooves and retro rhythms” show off the strength of the site, diverse and educational options spanning multiple styles, but only somewhat covers up for the more lacking features.

As stated before, I hand counted somewhere between 300 and 400 song options, much less than some competitors which can influence song-hungry students when picking to subscribe to JamPlay or Guitartricks.

While modern rock and metal are certainly popular, many of today’s guitarists and music fans play and listen to a wide variety of genres and styles, many of which aren’t featured in JamPlay’s song selections.

Online Tutorials & How To Access

JamPlay is easily accessible via their website, www.jamplay.com, or by searching for JamPlay in your web browser. As stated before, there is also an IOS app which is great for guitarists who want to practice at work, school, or while travelling away from their computer.

All the videos I watched and followed along with, also featured great introductory or beginner sections that introduced the instructor, lesson material, and tools featured along with the video.

JamPlay Lessons Review – Key Points

Alternative Lessons Programs

As you’ll find in our other reviews of GuitarTricks, TrueFire, and ArtistWorks, there are many different options out there for guitar students looking to learn online.

JamPlay is one of many great choices with its diverse lesson options, quality instructors and great lesson toolbox to help you get the most out of each video.

JamPlay has drawn raves reviews for the number of famous musicians who have recorded lessons on how to play their own songs or techniques, something other sites have begun to compete with.

Furthermore, JamPlay has the history and student testimonials to go against any of those sites. Ultimately, the choice will come down to what instructors or lesson plans you are looking for and how easily you feel you can navigate the website.

Conclusion: Is JamPlay the Right Guitar Lessons Program for You?

As we researched this JamPlay lessons review, there’s a lot to like about the service, but in comparison to some of its competitors, it just doesn’t stack up.

One of the most engaging features of these sites is their song lessons and tabs, which can engage even more experienced players.

This helps keep subscribers after they have learned the instrument, or attracting players who aren’t strictly beginners or amateurs.

Compared to other services like TrueFire, the low quantity and limited genre options really hold JamPlay back, as does the difficult to navigate beginner lesson plan.

Personally, we just don’t think it is smart to let the beginner students choose for themselves which path to follow out of a handful of similarly labeled options.

The more traditional, linear options on other sites may be more limited in variability but help give students a quick and easy intro before allowing them to branch out.

You certainly can’t go wrong with JamPlay and its high quality video lessons, but be sure to make sure it is the one for you by taking advantage of a free trial when possible.

Check Out JamPlay Here >>

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Key features at a glance:

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ArtistWorks Guitar Lessons in Review: Is The Service Worth It?

Get ArtistWorks Here! >>

ArtistWorks Overview

Boasting lessons for over 15 different instruments besides the electric and acoustic guitar, ArtistWorks has thousands of published video lessons.

Featuring famous musicians who teach each genre or style of guitar playing that made them famous, ArtistWorks also has one of the most interactive student bodies of any online music lesson site.

Started in 2008 after the founder couldn’t find any suitable Jazz guitar teachers in their area, ArtistWorks does have one of the longer histories of successful online guitar lessons. Let’s take a look at all the site has to offer in this GuitarNiche ArtistWorks review.

Who Is ArtistWorks For?

If you’re looking for the best guitar course, ArtistWorks is certainly worth considering. ArtistWorks is best suited for beginner students who are looking to learn specific genres or styles from the basics to advanced levels.

Guitar fans may rejoice when they see that each step by step set of lessons is taught by a genre specific professional musician.

Rock guitar is taught by Paul Gilbert, country by Guthrie Trapp, and Keith Wyatt handles blues guitar.

However, with no designated metal or hard rock teachers, players hoping to learn jazz, rock, blues, or acoustic should make up the primary student group here.

Additionally, each genre-based course selection features the lesson’s page, a Video Exchange Learning® platform, study materials, and links to forums where you can discuss music topics with other students.

Paul Gilbert ArtistWorks Review

If you’re a serious fan of electric guitar. particularly from the 80′ and 90’s, you’ll have heard of Paul Gilbert.

Paul Gilbert is simply a monster rock guitarist world-renowned for his intense shredding ability and musicality.

Not only is he rated by Guitar World as one of 50 fastest guitarists of all time. He’s also an accomplished and very experienced guitar teacher.

Early on in his career Paul graduated from the Guitar Institute of Technology, which is enough to give any guitar player serious credibility.

Throughout his career, both in collective efforts and as a solo artist, Paul has been known as a player that can shred guitar like no one else.

His incredible skill combined with a very personable presence and guitar teaching ability made him a natural fit for ArtistWorks.

From ArtistWorks:

He’s known for his enthusiastic and approachable guitar lessons, which are founded on decades of experience.

Gilbert has been the guitar teacher of an impressive list of players including Buckethead, Joey Tafolla, “Satchel” from Steel Panther (Russ Parrish) and Nicole Couch of Phantom Blue among many others.

Other notable accomplishments include writing articles for the prestigious Premier Guitar magazine.

In May, 2012 he launched the Online Rock Guitar School with Paul Gilbert as a part ArtistWorks’ offerings and has since been sharing his extraordinary talents under the category of “Rock Lessons with Paul Gilbert“.

Paul Gilbert Jamming with Online Students

In terms of what ArtistWorks has to offer for edgier guitar lessons, Paul Gilbert is a pleasant surprise. Whether you’re a beginner, intermediate or highly advanced guitar player, he has something to bring to the table.

Paul Gilbert’s video lesson lengths run from roughly five minutes to a half hour with the built-in option to play them at slower speeds or in a loop.

As mentioned, the Video Exchange feature allows students to submit their own videos of themselves rocking out, or just asking Paul a question.

Consequently, Paul goes through each student’s video and in exchange, as the name implies, records a video offering support and answers in response to the questions.

Although this could seem intimidating for some, students in Paul’s community are nothing short of supportive and respective. The channel is held accountable as a judgment-free zone and in turn, is friendly, collaborative and highly interactive.

Alternatively, if you want to observe more than interact, you can still draw inspiration from the hundreds of archived exchange videos. You’ll find tons of useful hints you can interpret and then apply to improve your own technique.

ArtistWorks Rock Guitar Lessons with Paul Gilbert: Highlights

• Students get a music theory workshop from an A-List pro
• Access the Video Exchange Library at any time
• Subscribed students get up to 5 submissions
• Affordable guitar lessons from a world recognized personality
• Communication through a mini chatroom.
• Community spirit fostered by the video exchange platform
• Easy navigation

Check out Paul Gilbert’s Rock Guitar Course here >>

For those who prefer a less intense style of playing, Paul Gilbert may be a bit much. And for you we have other choices mentioned in this article.

But if you gravitate to online lessons with Paul Gilbert, your guitar abilities are sure to improve. With regular practice and instruction, your guitar technique, repertoire, and confidence will all reach new levels.

As mentioned, the real value here is in the the video exchanges. This is what sets Paul Gilbert’s ArtistWorks lessons apart from all the others. If you take advantage of it, you’ll realize the true value of the service and can’t go wrong.

ArtistWorks Adult Beginner Acoustic Guitar Lessons

In answering the call for more diversity, and the demand for those who are looking for a creative pastime during a pandemic, ArtistWorks has added a full Beginner Acoustic Guitar Lessons course to their platform.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the course is its instructor: David Butler who is the Chairman and Cofounder of ArtistWorks.

As a lifelong acoustic guitarist and one of the original engineers at AOL, he developing an industry-unique approach to online music instruction only available at ArtistWorks. Moreover, he has been awarded three US patents in the process.

Geared more towards adult beginners, the course features familiar songs and focuses on developing core skills.

With a focus on comprehensive, step by step instruction, the online guitar course is designed to help first time players avoid getting frustrated.

Access the ArtistWorks Beginner Guitar Lessons Course Here >>

ArtistWorks Beginner Acoustic Guitar Lessons Highlights:

• introductory monthly price of $35 (discounts available)
• Beginner Guitar Chords
• Guitar Tab
• Basic Music Concepts
• 100s of guitar lessons at your own pace
• Specifically geared to adult beginners
• Easy Guitar Lessons & Tunes

What’s Included with the Service?

When figuring out if ArtistWorks lessons are the best option for you, it ‘s important to consider all that’s included in your subscription.

It seems, at the moment at least, there are no ArtistWorks free trial options, making some people hesitant to purchase a subscription without a test run.

Still, there is quite a bit included in your subscription fee, which can be anywhere from $23 a month for 12 months or $35 a month for 3 months.

Most notably, the huge diversity in lessons is a huge plus, you can learn multiple guitar styles, both electric and acoustic, as well as multiple electric bass styles.

If your musical thirst still isn’t quenched, you can peruse the piano, mandolin, voice, or woodwind instrument options.

That’s a lot of musical opportunities laid out in front of you if you so choose. If diversity is of value to you, ArtistWorks may be the best guitar course for you.

While the lessons are engaging and feature quality content, one of the most endearing inclusions has to be Video Exchange which allows students to upload videos of themselves playing.

Having the ability to learn from other students while also getting or giving constructive feedback, can improve your playing, musicianship, and music communication in no time.

Features

No review of ArtistWorks online would be complete without a detailed look into what makes these included features so great. The backbone of ArtistWorks learning experience is the instructors.

Each course, aka the series of lessons for each genre, features the same instructor throughout, giving you the chance to build familiarity with the learning experience.

The lessons are typically short, ranging from a few minutes to tens of minutes, allowing even the shortest of attention spans to follow along lesson by lesson.

One thing that struck us about the lessons was the lack of follow along tablature, We don’t see any option to have it pop up while you watch a video.

Easy to follow tabs or musical notation can be a huge help for young musicians looking to follow along at their own pace and learn where the notes and frets are up and down the neck.

Access, Tutorials & How To

ArtistWorks can easily be accessed via its webpage, artistworks.com, or by googling “ArtistWorks”. Unfortunately, there is no app currently available so that you can take ArtistWorks on the go with your guitar.

Between having no app and no ArtistWorks free trial, it makes the site’s lessons somewhat inaccessible. If someone asked “what is ArtistWorks?”

I’d happily reply that it is a great online community of teachers and students but is strictly computer based, and one of the more expensive online guitar lesson options when compared to alternatives.

Overall, any type of expansion into the IOS world would likely draw in a few more users as the world moves towards more and more mobile entertainment and learning.

Alternative Sites to ArtistWorks

As you’ll find in our other reviews of TrueFire, JamPlay, Guitar Tricks, and Fender Play, there are many different options out there for guitar students looking to learn online.

For your convenience, we’ve put together a complete review of the best online guitar lessons for beginners.

JamPlay is one of many great choices with its diverse lesson options, quality instructors and great lesson toolbox to help you get the most out of each video.

JamPlay has drawn rave reviews for the number of famous musicians who have recorded lessons on how to play their own songs or techniques, something other sites, like Truefire, have begun to compete with.

Furthermore, JamPlay has the history and student testimonials to go against any of those sites. Ultimately, the choice will come down to what instructors or lesson plans you are looking for and how easily you feel you can navigate the website.

If you’re debating Fender Play or Guitar Tricks, or any of the other sites, try a 14 day Guitar Tricks free trial before investing. For those significantly worried about their budget,

Justin Guitar is one of the only completely free guitar lesson sites and should be given careful review as well.

It’s important to remember that for $23 a month, you need to make sure you are getting that much more than you do with free/cheaper sites like Justin Guitar or Fender Play.

ArtistWorks Lessons – Key Points

In Closing, Are ArtistWorks Guitar Lessons A Good Choice?

While doing the research for this ArtistWorks lessons review, we found the service to definitely be one of the most diverse and in-depth musical lesson sites we’ve discussed to date.

But in our opinion, you may have better choices depending on your preferences.

For the price, we feel you are missing too many features like follow along tablature, dedicated song lesson databases, or live lessons.

If you are or are aspiring to be a multi-instrumentalist, then this is no doubt the lesson site for you.

With many guitar, bass, woodwind, and piano lessons available, even mandolin options, you can learn a wide variety of styles and instruments that could further inspire your aspiring music career.

Without the free trial, it may make more sense for some comparison shoppers to take advantage of other sites free trials and then circle back to ArtistWorks if they don’t have what you’re looking for.

Overall, it’s still a great option, just like all the others we’ve reviewed, and especially if you want to become proficient on more than one instrument.

View the Latest ArtistWorks Deal Here! >>

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Key features at a glance:

We certainly hope you benefit from the information we provide in this article! Just so you know, we may receive compensation if you use the links on this page. If you do, thank you so much!

Try GuitarTricks Free >>

Guitar Tricks Review – Are Their Lessons Really Worth It?

Overview

Guitar Tricks is one of the largest, and most well known online guitar lesson sites with 20+ years of guitar teaching experience. In this Guitar Tricks review we’ll go over their various video lesson selections including beginner, song, and advanced guides.

Quick Stats:

• Price: $19.95 a month, or $179 per year
• Free Trial: 14 days
• Lessons: Over 11,000
• Refund: 60 days guaranteed
• Song Tutorials: 1,000+

We’ll also look at some of the extra features that make the site so popular such as the forums, blogs, and informative videos they offer all the for the Guitar Tricks price of $19.99 per month.

With over 8000 lessons and guided programs, students should have no trouble combing through the easy to use website to find something that interests them.

Interested In Improving Your Guitar Skills?

If you’re looking for the best guitar teaching website, Guitar Tricks is certainly one of the top options. Guitar Tricks is best suited for beginners with a variety of linear learning paths aimed at teaching students the genre of their choice.

Though the paths seem limited to three major genres, the linear, step by step features make it easy to navigate the site and follow along as a student.

Some interesting features that will keep students engaged passed the beginner stage include a diverse song list and guitar style lessons.

Once you’ve progressed through the beginner stages, which takes about 4-8 weeks to finish according to Guitar Tricks, you’ll find many, interesting video lessons on a wide variety of topics on their “channel” page.

Lessons ranging from artist-specific lessons, to technical information, to in-depth jazz chord discussions should help push students forward as musicians and players.

What’s Included with Guitar Tricks?

When asking “is guitar tricks worth the money?” it’s important to first understand everything that is included in the subscription deal. In addition to linear beginner lessons for country, blues, and rock guitar, there are a wide variety of extra features.

Guitar styles lessons to expand your horizon after completing the beginner phases include world, funk, classical, and bluegrass just to name a few. And the song list features 500+ lessons for all of those same genres and styles.

Beginner Fingerpicking Lesson

When comparing Guitar Tricks vs JamPlay or Justin Guitar vs Guitar Tricks, Guitar Tricks contains more variety and quantity. If you’re pitting TrueFire vs Guitar Tricks, you’ll be happy to know Guitar Tricks features its own “In the Jam”-style tool called “Jam Station” albeit with more limited options.

Lastly, Guitar Tricks includes a diverse toolbox with scale and chord finders among other features and a helpful chat forum for students to interact, discuss, and learn from one another.

Guitar Tricks Features Overview

One of Guitar Trick’s best features is the engaging instructors and lessons. Take for example this lesson for modern alternative rock hit “Trouble” by Cage the Elephant.

Along with the video lesson you’ll find tablature, lyrics, a description of the lesson, and even gear and tone recommendations by the instructor.

All of Guitar Tricks lessons are similarly detailed and should be explored by you via a Guitar Tricks free trial before you settle on subscribing to a site.

While Guitar Tricks has an overall less diverse toolbox and no famous instructors like JamPlay and TrueFire, it has an incredibly easy to navigate web page that should make it easy for students to jump right in and begin learning guitar.

As mentioned before the Guitar Tricks “Channel” page has access to even more interesting, lessons for a variety of topics meant to enhance your experience. So how much does Guitar Tricks cost? You get access to all these lovely features for $19.99/month.

Online Tutorials & How To Access

Guitar Tricks can be easily accessed via their website, www.guitartricks.com and even has an ios application so you can take lessons on the go.

With a 4.3 rating out of 5 stars on the google play platform, it seems the app may be a reliable additional option for students interested in it.

Guitar Tricks also features a “Beginner Lessons” option right in the middle of their front page that should lead eager newcomers right to the first guitar and website tutorials available.

Even better, once you click on that selection, you’re brought to a page with a “beginners start here” option making it so easy for students to access the correct lessons.

Eddie Van Halen Artist Study

GuitarTricks: The Good and The Bad

Guitar Tricks Review – Key Points

Alternative Guitar Lessons Sites

As you’ll find in our other reviews of TrueFire, ArtistWorks, and JamPlay, there are many different options out there for guitar students looking to learn online.

JamPlay is one of many great choices with its diverse lesson options, quality instructors and great lesson toolbox to help you get the most out of each video.

JamPlay has drawn rave reviews for the number of famous musicians who have recorded lessons on how to play their own songs or techniques, something other sites, like Truefire, have begun to compete with.

Furthermore, JamPlay has the history and student testimonials to go against any of those sites. Ultimately, the choice will come down to what instructors or lesson plans you are looking for and how easily you feel you can navigate the website.

If you’re debating Fender Play or Guitar Tricks, or any of the other sites, try a 14 day Guitar Tricks free trial before investing.

For those significantly worried about their budget, Justin Guitar is one of the only completely free guitar lesson sites and should be given careful review as well.

Final Thoughts: Is Guitar Tricks the Right Lessons Site for You?

You definitely can’t go wrong if you choose Guitar Tricks for your online lesson needs and it rates as one of the best guitar teaching websites.

Thanks to diverse lessons and song options there should be something for every guitar student on Guitar Tricks. The only issue is that the cost of a Guitar Tricks subscription, about $20 per month, may create a financial barrier for some students.

With cheaper options like the free Justin Guitar or $10 per month Fender Play sites, Guitar Tricks certainly has to continue to add bells and whistles to its Jam Station, channel, and blog features.

While the lessons don’t have as complete a toolbox or interface as JamPlay, we think Guitar Tricks features more diversity in its lessons and content.

If you’re still not convinced, take the 14 day free trial to sift through all the information and see why Guitar Tricks prioritizes its students making music on day one.

Overall, Guitar Tricks is an awesome choice for you or the guitar student in your life as long as you’re willing to pay the price.

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The post Guitar Tricks Review (Can Their Lessons Make You “Almost Famous”?) first appeared on GuitarNiche.

JamPlay vs Guitar Tricks: Which Guitar Lessons Website is Right for You?

While both make excellent options, let’s pit JamPlay vs Guitar Tricks and compare them side by side to see which one is best for learning guitar or bass.

Both sites offer technique, song, and genre-specific lessons taught via videos including tabs, musical notation, and close ups of the finger positioning.

Both sites also feature good guitar lessons for beginners and guides from famous guitarists alongside dedicated, professional guitar teachers.

But which is the better choice?

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JamPlay vs GuitarTricks Quick Comparison:

Breaking Down The Details of JamPlay and Guitar Tricks Lessons

Before we get started, let’s go over how we’re going to compare and judge the two sites against each other.

We’ll be comparing both the features and appearance of the websites as how we imagine a beginner and an experienced player will view them.

Furthermore, you want to make sure you’re getting a good value for your Guitar Tricks subscription or JamPlay membership cost, so we’ll be sure to pick the winner that offers the best features for the price.

For example, an experienced guitar player is more likely to be impressed by number of songs or technical lessons available while a beginner will be looking for an easy to follow set of introductory steps or lessons.

The major criteria will be how easy it is to navigate each page, how many features and lessons are available, and how easy each video is to follow. Without further ado, let’s dig into this Guitar Tricks vs JamPlay review.

Guitar Teachers and Basic Lesson Plans

No matter how easy the user interface is, the site will ultimately only be as good as the teachers who are teaching the lessons.

The teacher’s ability to communicate the importance of each technique or lesson and how it pertains to the overall lesson plan is vital.

Without being able to see progress on the instrument and through each site’s student path, beginners are likely to get frustrated, or lose interest. So, let’s see who has the better teachers and lesson plans: JamPlay vs Guitar Tricks.

JAMPLAY

JamPlay Beginner Lessons

Our first impression while doing this JamPlay review was that the instructor list features a lot of big-name guitar players who teach either techniques or their own songs.

While it can be really inspiring and motivational to players to learn from their heroes, We feel this feature has more marketing value than teaching value. The basic lesson play is split into 4 phases, 1-Beginner, 2-Genres & Skills, 3-Songs, and 4-Songwriting.

We really like the flow of this order and think it makes it easy for the student to accumulate skills while constantly using them or learning them in a new context such as “here is a country riff, now let’s play it in a popular country song, finally, let’s write a song featuring this riff”.

Furthermore, the instructors in the beginner series videos we reviewed spoke slowly and clearly, demonstrating years of experience teaching the guitar. However, there are multiple options and pathways for each phase and level which can be confusing or redundant.

For further insight into lessons providers, check out our article comparing JamPlay and Justin Guitar.

GUITAR TRICKS

Guitar Tricks CORE Learning System

Featuring less recognizable guitar instructors, Guitar Tricks seems to prioritize concise, easy to use features over the name recognition and flair of JamPlay.

Guitar Tricks bases their lessons around their “core learning system”. While JamPlay offers multiple different beginner options from different teachers, Guitar Tricks slowly and easily takes you through all the basics with one teacher, and one set of classes, one core step at a time, offering a simple way to play guitar.

We personally believe this linear learning path is much easier for beginners and students as they don’t have to choose from a number of options that they may not be able to differentiate between.

Keeping the same instructor through first lesson step can help breed familiarity and continuity as the student progresses through the most essential part of learning the guitar.

If you’re going to pay the Guitar Tricks subscription cost of $19.99 per month, you should get access to the easiest path to learning guitar.

Winner: GUITAR TRICKS

User Interface

When learning guitar, there are enough small things to frustrate and discourage you enough to quite altogether. One thing that can easily make it worse on a student is a hard to navigate website or lesson plan.

Even for experienced players, you don’t want to have to spend too much time trying to figure out to how to find your way around the song lesson pages or figuring out how to slow down the video or where the tabs load from.

JAMPLAY

JamPlay Account

Overall, the user interface is not difficult to navigate whatsoever, but we wish there was more of an emphasis on getting started with lessons. Once you scroll down a little bit, the viewer is bombarded with course options that don’t seem to tie in together at all based on genre, style, or difficulty.

Once you get to the lessons tab on top of the site, the four phases are easily laid out and you are directed to the homepage for each phase.

However, as we mentioned before, it can be a little bit overwhelming to a new student as there are about two dozen options, split between acoustic and electric guitar.

This site puts the onus on the student to find out which path is best suited for them and the page layout further emphasizes that.

GUITAR TRICKS

Guitar Tricks Home

The home page on Guitar Tricks is set up with a much more user-friendly appearance in our opinion with the left side of the page featuring an easy to read menu.

Better yet, the center of the page features four, large, clickable options for beginner lessons, experienced lessons, learning songs, or learning styles. Once you click on the beginner lessons, it then directs you to the easy to follow core system, with a labeled starting point that says, “start here”.

Even better, on the same page, there are sections for tuning your guitar, practicing, and learning songs below the main core system. We strongly feel if we were starting today, this site would be more appealing based strictly on the appearance and usability.

Keep in mind the guitar lessons landscape is always changing. For a look at where online lessons may be headed, check out our article comparing Fender Play and Guitar Tricks.

Winner: GUITAR TRICKS

Tools and Learning Aids

Along with all the videos and great teachers that makes these sites great, the real value lies within the tools they offer via the website.

Things like tabs that pop up next to the video, the ability to slow down/speed up the pace, built in tuners, or chord finders are all invaluable to students.

JAMPLAY

JamPlay Video Lessons

JamPlay has a very easy to use toolbox that is located right below the video screen of each lesson. It’s simple to find and shouldn’t be too confusing for students as it has helpful labels and links to multiple features.

Students can hit the clearly labeled “Ask A Teacher” button for additional help, take their own notes in “notes”, and control playback speed with an adjustable clicker among many others.

While we have not been thrilled with their home screen and lesson selection user interface, this is clearly a top-notch video lesson webpage. Tools like this are the easiest way to play guitar while you learn.

GUITAR TRICKS

GuitarTricks Lesson Tutorials

The toolbox and lesson interface for Guitar Tricks is much more stripped down and simple than JamPlay which some students or experienced players may prefer.

As someone who has been playing guitar for years, we appreciated the simple screen setup that only has options for slowing down the video speed, while the tab pops up on a screen next to it.

For beginners, it doesn’t have quite the options and resources of the rival JamPlay but it still certainly is enjoyable and informative.

Winner: JAMPLAY

Available Song Lessons

Last but not least, if you’re going to be shelling out your hard-earned money to learn your favorite songs, you expect at least some of those songs to be available on the platform.

JAMPLAY

JamPlay Song Library

While licensing and tablature rights can get legally tricky, JamPlay still appears to have a questionably low number of songs available for its students to learn; somewhere in the range of 200-300 by our hand count.

Hard rock and heavy metal are well represented, as are The Beatles but overall the selection is lot on many classic and modern rock hits such as guitar lesson staples “Wonderwall” or “Good Riddance”.

Blues and Country are similarly understaffed as a dozen or more of the instructor’s original pieces take up valuable space, not something that really justifies the Jamplay membership cost.

A diverse list of songs is a critical part of intermediate guitar lessons, as students begin to advance from the beginner stage.

GUITAR TRICKS

Guitar Tricks Song Library

With over 700 song lessons available, Guitar Tricks is off to a good start in making sure your favorite song or at the very least, band, is represented.

The site also offers a more diverse group of styles such as world, surf, and funk music that JamPlay does not. Specifically, the “Top Hits” includes a great selection of the site’s most popular lessons, including some made easier for the student.

Even just the rock section is wildly more variable with everything from modern day indie rock like Cage the Elephant, to pop rock such as Elton John. When comparing Guitar Tricks vs Jamplay, the former takes the cake here.

Winner: GUITAR TRICKS

Final Recount:

Conclusion: Which Is The Better Lessons Site – JamPlay or Guitar Tricks?

There are a lot of features between these two sites that weren’t compared head to head because of similarities.

First off, looking for the best online guitar instruction, both sites have readily accessible and highly rate IOS apps that can be used to learn on the go or reference while practicing.

Secondly the Guitar Tricks cost and JamPlay cost are identical at $19.99 a month for the basic subscription plans, with yearly subscriptions also available. Both of the sites also offer basic tools such as guitar tuners, chord finders, and discussion forums or group chats.

For those looking for a bargain, a JamPlay or Guitar Tricks free trial is one option if you want to try before you buy (or steal a free month) and every so often coupons will pop up, sometimes associated with reviews.

So which is better, Jamplay or Guitar Tricks?

Guitar Tricks won three out of the four categories, making it far and away the most impressive of the two and our ultimate recommendation to anyone deciding between the two.

Overall Winner:

Overall, we believe you can’t go too wrong with either option based on the number of commonalities between the two as well as the popularity of both, but Guitar Tricks clearly has the upper hand based on song options, user interface, and linear lesson plans.

That wraps up our JamPlay vs Guitar Tricks review, let us know which one you think is the better value or if you learned through either platform.

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