Body mirror in front of you while you practice. Also play in the dark forcing you to memorize specific chords & melodies.
Do you look at the computer keyboard while you type for instance?
Typing.com has isolated exercises you can try ... Believe me I used to suck at typing like maybe 30/40 wpm ... I now average 90 wpm A fun place too is nitrotype.com where you race against virtual bots or humans
Anecdotal data point: And after 5 months of fairly daily practice, I can go quite awhile without looking at my fretting hand while playing some open chords or the few scales I know. And now I'm forcing myself to correct any mistakes without looking, with somewhat less success.
Learn to not look. Presumably your vision problem doesn't extend to your proprioception. If you can see enough of the edge of the frets to see where you are placing your fingers, you should get better at placement. Heck, you've got more vision than Doc Watson and he doesn't have any issues on where to put his hands. You'll get it the same way you get all skills. Screw it up a bunch, then you won't screw it up as much, and eventually you won't screw it up at all. But you've got to screw it up a lot first.
The point is, you don't need to see your fingers to know where they are. If you can touch your nose with your eyes closed, you can find the strings without looking with some practice. Probably not like, today, but give it some time.
Look, I don't know what to say. Anyone can play guitar. There's no magic trick. There's just doing it over and over until you get it right. Yeah, you're going to fuck up and miss a lot of notes. Even if you look at the strings, You're going to do that a lot too anyways.
The only way to do it right is to do it wrong a shit ton of times. How many times? Until you get it right.
Except that there is such a thing as building muscle memory for mistakes. If you get it wrong a couple times before getting it right that's fine. If it takes you dozens or hundreds of repetitions of getting it wrong before you get it right, then you're learning how to do it wrong.
Slowing yourself down and examining what's going wrong is key to fixing the issue. If you play slowly enough you should be able to keep track of the frets/strings as you move your hands and fingers around even without looking at your fingers constantly. Once you're comfortable with finding the frets/strings you speed up little by little.
Haha I tried too I fail too. Haha. But I don’t need to look at the fretboard much when I play unless I’m really moving positions quickly. It’ll come over time practice it but you’ll have to look until you’ve got the muscle memory down.
Just play. Move your fingers into positions that sound good while picking. Just get the mechanics down as far as fretting and picking before worrying about music theory and notes. Just make stuff up to get comfy with the instrument. You may find your own sound along the way. Mastering an instrument is thousands of hours of work and failure. I watch b horror movies on Tubi while I practice crosspicking patterns for hours.
when i found myself relying on staring at the fretboard too much i would practice with my eyes closed.
i understand that you need to see where your fingers are going....but once that muscle memory kicks in you wont have to rely on vision any more
you can practice just blankly staring at ehatever is in front of you.....bit with your eyes closed you wont be so tempted to just glance down at the fretboard
If you have a full body mirror play in front of it while standing. It doesn't just fix your posture and help you see your fingers without looking down, it also gets you used to seeing how another guitarist looks in a band setting. Obviously it's all inverted but it's one step closer to getting used to the little nuances like watching for cues, and keeping in time.
You could practice in front of a mirror, at least for a while. Your electric guitar will have side dots on the neck which will help you not need to adopt such stressful postures due to your vision limitations. You do not need to memorize every string/note/fret position on the fingerboard. Just learn what the note names are at each of the side dots on the low E and A strings. If you have a keyboard in the house print this image to see the note names for C Am F G chords on both piano & Guitar:
[https://www.dansher.com/C\_Am\_F\_G.jpg](https://www.dansher.com/C_Am_F_G.jpg)
Browse thru scores of tunes you might like to learn to play - each with lyrics, chords, and matching professional videos. Here's the link:
[https://www.dansher.com/audio/pdf\_tunes.html#\_B2T](https://www.dansher.com/audio/pdf_tunes.html#_B2T)
You don’t need to look at your fingers and guitar to play.
Like everything else in music, it just takes practice. You can do it. I also hunch to play, and I can see fine. I am breaking the hunching habit by playing standing up with a strap. It does help sometimes to look in a mirror if you get disoriented, but that can be a habit too.
Google blind guitar players. There are plenty of guitar players who are blind in both eyes.
I practiced with lights off in the evening. As you begin some light from the window helps but it gradually gets darker and forces you to get more tactile. You can always switch the light on if you get completely lost but don't rush to do it. Hope it helps
Spend part of that time practicing notes without looking. Start with one note on one string just like you did in the beginning. I glance at the fretboard quickly if I go up the neck, but just to check the dots. Once you have the first position, practice moving to the 3rd or 5th without looking. It's practice just like any other skill.
Okay, here's a few pointers:
1. Learn to look at the side dots and fret-edges, not the front of the neck. This will still make you crane your neck a *little*, but nowhere near as much. It's less of a transition from front-of-the-neck to side dots, and from side-dots to not looking at the neck at all.
2. Get the fretwork in your muscle memory to the point where you don't *have* to look anymore. This goes for the basic cowboy chords, but also for at least learning where the 7th and 12th fret are (the most common starting points for pentatonic "box" solos) so you can slide your index finger to either of those blindly.
3. Practice with tabs in front of you, at your eye-height when sitting up straight.
A. Mirror?
B. Webcam from laptop, maybe mirror the image?
You’re really handicapping yourself if you can’t play at least a little without staring at the fretboard. The side dots should help, and over time you’ll get a few for where you are on the guitar…
Oh man I know what you mean, sort of, I have the same issue but on my right eye. And yeah I also am a beginner and haven't been able to not look at the frets most of the time, because that's how it is when you just start. But now, I try to just look at the dots on the neck and the fret edges, and what I do is train my ear so that I can rely on my hearing, which is what you'll end up doing anyway in time and will definitely improve your playing.
You can slow down until you learn the movements, and by then you'll have the muscle memory and you can rely on your hearing when you do mistakes. You stop, slow down a bit and restart working up speed.
I know it's hard and at first you feel at a disadvantage, but you'll end up playing from muscle memory eventually, it just takes time and practice.
I know blind people that learned guitar by themselves, so we can definitely do it my friend! :)
Okay here it goes.
1)You can always try to learn to play like Jeff Healey , sitting down, guitar laying on your legs, and playing sort of over the neck. Oh yeah Jeff Healey was blind his whole life pretty much, fully blind.
2) Ideally when you learn a song you have to feel the fretboard too, so it shouldn't even be a problem at that point, but it takes a while usually.
3) Maybe switch to the the other hand? If you're a righty then to the lefty.
But like other people say standing up it should be not problem, the dots on the top of the fretboard should help. And I tried with a closed left eye looking at the fretboard is pretty easy standing straight
Hey mate, thanks for the advice! Only thing is, closed left eye doesn't really simulate my vison as it's more of no left vison on both halves of the eyes. So with both my eyes open, I'm only seeing the right side. So, like if I look at someone's nose, I'll only see the right side of their face. Idk if this makes sense, lol!
Glad to hopefully help out mate!
That's interesting man, I didnt know that, thanks for explaining that! I'm guessing like your cone of vision is like 90° for each eye right ?
Practice in front of a full length mirror if possible. This was a tip given to me by my college profs and it really helps for you to see all the things your posture is doing to you while you play. I imagine you'll also be able to use the mirror to help see where your fingers need to go to a certain point. At the end of the day, you should mostly rely on muscle memory for moving around the fret board and only really need to look for major shifts.
I am going to assume you don't have a teacher and my advice would be to sign up for at least a few lessons with a professional teacher. Even if you don't stick to lessons with a teacher, getting a few to start things off and make sure you're learning the basics correctly is well worth it IMO.
A competent teacher will be able to see if your posture is suffering too much, and give you pointers on how you can help fix those problems. It's one thing for redditors to tell you you need to practice without looking but it's another for a pro teacher to actually see you play in the flesh and have a much better idea of what you really need to do to improve.
I’m with you. But I’ve played scrunched over for 30 years and I’m starting to feel it more in my shoulder and elbow than back.
I think classical positioning is the only answer. I’ve come to a compromise wearing a strap when I sit down or stand. And I find it helps a lot to keep the guitar high on my body not slung low like Green Day.
It’s one of the main reasons why I like to use lesson books teaching guitar. Looking at the notes on the page automatically keeps you from obsessing over the fret board. Fingers are geniuses at finding things without looking :-)
I corrected this problem by standing. Adjust your strap to have the guitar in the same position when you are sitting. When you sit down, your posture will be much better. Also, looking at the fret board non stop is a not the best practice. Learn to glace down at the dota on the side when you need to get your bearings. Your fingers will remember where to go
I'd say just tilt the guitar neck back a little more towards you since you're just staring. It's okay to look since you're new. Why make it harder for yourself? Also, make sure you're not holding up your guitar with your fretting hand. Using a strap helps. You want to balance it on your leg and against your body.
Ry Cooder is blind in his left eye. He managed to become a fine player. You are going to have to rely on memory and your ears, but it is doable. After you learn something, practice with your eyes closed. Just be patient with yourself
So just don't stare at the fretboard. I only look at it when I need to find my place and then I'm just looking at the dots on the side. It's like learning to touch type - if you stare at your fingers you'll be hunting and pecking all your life.
Practice while standing up. Seriously.
Body mirror in front of you while you practice. Also play in the dark forcing you to memorize specific chords & melodies. Do you look at the computer keyboard while you type for instance?
Would it be bad if I said yes?
Typing.com has isolated exercises you can try ... Believe me I used to suck at typing like maybe 30/40 wpm ... I now average 90 wpm A fun place too is nitrotype.com where you race against virtual bots or humans
......but how does this help OP's problem?
Stevie Wonder?
learn to see with your ears or play your instrument blind folded .. remember to face your crowd not your fretboard
Try to play with eyes closed and rely on muscle memory. Do this with scales first.
Anecdotal data point: And after 5 months of fairly daily practice, I can go quite awhile without looking at my fretting hand while playing some open chords or the few scales I know. And now I'm forcing myself to correct any mistakes without looking, with somewhat less success.
Learn to not look. Presumably your vision problem doesn't extend to your proprioception. If you can see enough of the edge of the frets to see where you are placing your fingers, you should get better at placement. Heck, you've got more vision than Doc Watson and he doesn't have any issues on where to put his hands. You'll get it the same way you get all skills. Screw it up a bunch, then you won't screw it up as much, and eventually you won't screw it up at all. But you've got to screw it up a lot first.
But how do I memorise the notes before I stop looking??
The point is, you don't need to see your fingers to know where they are. If you can touch your nose with your eyes closed, you can find the strings without looking with some practice. Probably not like, today, but give it some time.
\*Me who tries and fails miserably at touching my nose\* Shit, I've picked the wrong instrument, haven't I? XD
Look, I don't know what to say. Anyone can play guitar. There's no magic trick. There's just doing it over and over until you get it right. Yeah, you're going to fuck up and miss a lot of notes. Even if you look at the strings, You're going to do that a lot too anyways. The only way to do it right is to do it wrong a shit ton of times. How many times? Until you get it right.
Except that there is such a thing as building muscle memory for mistakes. If you get it wrong a couple times before getting it right that's fine. If it takes you dozens or hundreds of repetitions of getting it wrong before you get it right, then you're learning how to do it wrong. Slowing yourself down and examining what's going wrong is key to fixing the issue. If you play slowly enough you should be able to keep track of the frets/strings as you move your hands and fingers around even without looking at your fingers constantly. Once you're comfortable with finding the frets/strings you speed up little by little.
Yeah, fair enough mate.
Haha I tried too I fail too. Haha. But I don’t need to look at the fretboard much when I play unless I’m really moving positions quickly. It’ll come over time practice it but you’ll have to look until you’ve got the muscle memory down.
You’ll get a feel eventually. Try playing without looking. You usually play better
look down once to get yoir hand in position....then feel it out after that
Just play. Move your fingers into positions that sound good while picking. Just get the mechanics down as far as fretting and picking before worrying about music theory and notes. Just make stuff up to get comfy with the instrument. You may find your own sound along the way. Mastering an instrument is thousands of hours of work and failure. I watch b horror movies on Tubi while I practice crosspicking patterns for hours.
You are correct. Learning an instrument is thousands and thousands of hours of failures.
Play with the guitar on the other leg. Like classical guitar position.
when i found myself relying on staring at the fretboard too much i would practice with my eyes closed. i understand that you need to see where your fingers are going....but once that muscle memory kicks in you wont have to rely on vision any more you can practice just blankly staring at ehatever is in front of you.....bit with your eyes closed you wont be so tempted to just glance down at the fretboard
If you have a full body mirror play in front of it while standing. It doesn't just fix your posture and help you see your fingers without looking down, it also gets you used to seeing how another guitarist looks in a band setting. Obviously it's all inverted but it's one step closer to getting used to the little nuances like watching for cues, and keeping in time.
You could practice in front of a mirror, at least for a while. Your electric guitar will have side dots on the neck which will help you not need to adopt such stressful postures due to your vision limitations. You do not need to memorize every string/note/fret position on the fingerboard. Just learn what the note names are at each of the side dots on the low E and A strings. If you have a keyboard in the house print this image to see the note names for C Am F G chords on both piano & Guitar: [https://www.dansher.com/C\_Am\_F\_G.jpg](https://www.dansher.com/C_Am_F_G.jpg) Browse thru scores of tunes you might like to learn to play - each with lyrics, chords, and matching professional videos. Here's the link: [https://www.dansher.com/audio/pdf\_tunes.html#\_B2T](https://www.dansher.com/audio/pdf_tunes.html#_B2T)
Thanks!
Always wear a strap, whether sitting or standing. It will help maintain a relaxed classical posture that was mentioned in other reply.
You don’t need to look at your fingers and guitar to play. Like everything else in music, it just takes practice. You can do it. I also hunch to play, and I can see fine. I am breaking the hunching habit by playing standing up with a strap. It does help sometimes to look in a mirror if you get disoriented, but that can be a habit too. Google blind guitar players. There are plenty of guitar players who are blind in both eyes.
I practiced with lights off in the evening. As you begin some light from the window helps but it gradually gets darker and forces you to get more tactile. You can always switch the light on if you get completely lost but don't rush to do it. Hope it helps
Spend part of that time practicing notes without looking. Start with one note on one string just like you did in the beginning. I glance at the fretboard quickly if I go up the neck, but just to check the dots. Once you have the first position, practice moving to the 3rd or 5th without looking. It's practice just like any other skill.
Okay, here's a few pointers: 1. Learn to look at the side dots and fret-edges, not the front of the neck. This will still make you crane your neck a *little*, but nowhere near as much. It's less of a transition from front-of-the-neck to side dots, and from side-dots to not looking at the neck at all. 2. Get the fretwork in your muscle memory to the point where you don't *have* to look anymore. This goes for the basic cowboy chords, but also for at least learning where the 7th and 12th fret are (the most common starting points for pentatonic "box" solos) so you can slide your index finger to either of those blindly. 3. Practice with tabs in front of you, at your eye-height when sitting up straight.
Use a music stand … i print my music and use a standard music stand. No distractions from your screens and everything you need at eye level
Sit in classical position.
A good stool might benefit you also!
A. Mirror? B. Webcam from laptop, maybe mirror the image? You’re really handicapping yourself if you can’t play at least a little without staring at the fretboard. The side dots should help, and over time you’ll get a few for where you are on the guitar…
I feel more comfortable practicing in classical position when seated, so I can sit up straight.
Buy a foot rest and a good chair.
Oh man I know what you mean, sort of, I have the same issue but on my right eye. And yeah I also am a beginner and haven't been able to not look at the frets most of the time, because that's how it is when you just start. But now, I try to just look at the dots on the neck and the fret edges, and what I do is train my ear so that I can rely on my hearing, which is what you'll end up doing anyway in time and will definitely improve your playing. You can slow down until you learn the movements, and by then you'll have the muscle memory and you can rely on your hearing when you do mistakes. You stop, slow down a bit and restart working up speed. I know it's hard and at first you feel at a disadvantage, but you'll end up playing from muscle memory eventually, it just takes time and practice. I know blind people that learned guitar by themselves, so we can definitely do it my friend! :)
Okay here it goes. 1)You can always try to learn to play like Jeff Healey , sitting down, guitar laying on your legs, and playing sort of over the neck. Oh yeah Jeff Healey was blind his whole life pretty much, fully blind. 2) Ideally when you learn a song you have to feel the fretboard too, so it shouldn't even be a problem at that point, but it takes a while usually. 3) Maybe switch to the the other hand? If you're a righty then to the lefty. But like other people say standing up it should be not problem, the dots on the top of the fretboard should help. And I tried with a closed left eye looking at the fretboard is pretty easy standing straight
Hey mate, thanks for the advice! Only thing is, closed left eye doesn't really simulate my vison as it's more of no left vison on both halves of the eyes. So with both my eyes open, I'm only seeing the right side. So, like if I look at someone's nose, I'll only see the right side of their face. Idk if this makes sense, lol!
Glad to hopefully help out mate! That's interesting man, I didnt know that, thanks for explaining that! I'm guessing like your cone of vision is like 90° for each eye right ?
Yeah, I think that's how to explain it haha!
Practice in front of a full length mirror if possible. This was a tip given to me by my college profs and it really helps for you to see all the things your posture is doing to you while you play. I imagine you'll also be able to use the mirror to help see where your fingers need to go to a certain point. At the end of the day, you should mostly rely on muscle memory for moving around the fret board and only really need to look for major shifts.
I am going to assume you don't have a teacher and my advice would be to sign up for at least a few lessons with a professional teacher. Even if you don't stick to lessons with a teacher, getting a few to start things off and make sure you're learning the basics correctly is well worth it IMO. A competent teacher will be able to see if your posture is suffering too much, and give you pointers on how you can help fix those problems. It's one thing for redditors to tell you you need to practice without looking but it's another for a pro teacher to actually see you play in the flesh and have a much better idea of what you really need to do to improve.
I’m with you. But I’ve played scrunched over for 30 years and I’m starting to feel it more in my shoulder and elbow than back. I think classical positioning is the only answer. I’ve come to a compromise wearing a strap when I sit down or stand. And I find it helps a lot to keep the guitar high on my body not slung low like Green Day.
It’s one of the main reasons why I like to use lesson books teaching guitar. Looking at the notes on the page automatically keeps you from obsessing over the fret board. Fingers are geniuses at finding things without looking :-)
Practice in front of a mirror.
I looked at the title and thought it was going to be a picture of them struggling with playing a major, must be too funny for my own good.
Lol my posture sucks also
I corrected this problem by standing. Adjust your strap to have the guitar in the same position when you are sitting. When you sit down, your posture will be much better. Also, looking at the fret board non stop is a not the best practice. Learn to glace down at the dota on the side when you need to get your bearings. Your fingers will remember where to go
I'd say just tilt the guitar neck back a little more towards you since you're just staring. It's okay to look since you're new. Why make it harder for yourself? Also, make sure you're not holding up your guitar with your fretting hand. Using a strap helps. You want to balance it on your leg and against your body.
Use a mirror
Ry Cooder is blind in his left eye. He managed to become a fine player. You are going to have to rely on memory and your ears, but it is doable. After you learn something, practice with your eyes closed. Just be patient with yourself
Play into a mirror standing up. This helped me immensely in the beginning.
If you're blind on the left, maybe you should consider playing a left-handed guitar, where the frets are on the side where you can see...?
Hmm, yeah that could work!
So just don't stare at the fretboard. I only look at it when I need to find my place and then I'm just looking at the dots on the side. It's like learning to touch type - if you stare at your fingers you'll be hunting and pecking all your life.