is a 7 string guitar hard to play

EXPLAINED: Is A 7 String Guitar Hard To Play?

If you are thinking about changing your guitar playing up and starting to play 7 string guitars, you may wonder if it is harder to play.  You may be asking yourself, is a 7 string guitar hard to play?  Hopefully, we can address that for you here for you to learn how to play it.

I Never Played A 7 String Guitar – How Easy Is It & What Is The Learning Curve?

If it is your first time with a seven string, you may be surprised how quickly you pick it up.  The change was considerably easier than I had anticipated, and I barely made any mistakes as long as I didn’t look at the fretboard and one glance at the fretboard seriously messed me up.

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Is A 7 String Guitar Difficult For Beginners?

Playing a 7-string guitar adds a layer of difficulty to both of these exercises for a variety of reasons.  7 string guitars generally (but not always) have a longer scale length to suit lower tunings on how the guitar tuned.  This implies you’ll have to traverse more ground when switching positions or trying to grab a chord that extends over numerous positions.

The more distortion there is, the more likely the strings are to sound when you don’t want them to.  To avoid this, use your left or right hand to muffle them.  There will be more muting to do with an extra string.  Open chords become more difficult while playing clean sounds (rare) for the same reason.

Picking the proper string with your pick is more challenging because there’s a greater probability of accidentally picking the extra string next to the one you want.

It’s difficult for me to say how significant this change is; it’s evident to me, but it’s outweighed by the additional possibilities that sevenstring guitars provide.

While the most of the resources cover 6 strings, the majority of the techniques may be applied to both types of instruments.  Furthermore, you have the opportunity to fully utilize the current 7 string resources, which others who play 6 strings do not have.

Should I Start With A 6 Or 7 String Guitar?

Personally, I would recommend beginners start with a 6 string.  Learn the fundamentals and improve your dexterity and finger strength.

Not to be pessimistic, but if you’re beginning from scratch, you’ll need to temper your expectations.  However, if you plan on sticking with it for 3-4 years and actually learning to play any music that requires it, you’ll need a 7-string.  If I were you, I’d seek assistance in locating a good 6-string Strat or similar instrument, as well as a guitar teacher, and proceed from there.  You can play any 6-string instrument on a 7-string, but figuring out the 6-string will be enough of a headache when you first start out.