28/08/2026
I was very lucky with the guitarist who taught me when I was young and has continued to teach me through my entire life and became a close friend of mine.
He was a seasoned and highly acclaimed session musician with a speciality in technical jazz who had toured worldwide and played with people including Tom Jones, Rick Wakeman, Ray Charles, Shirley Bassey and Ringo Starr. He was also a highly trained composer and arranger, he would compose full shows of musicians across South Africa, even arranging string parts and more, so from a young age my guitar lessons covered far more than learning where to put my fingers.
I learned to read music, full theory, I did ear training. We talked about harmony, keys, chords, progressions and how music was put together. Our favourite genre to play together has always been jazz. I was taught to listen properly as well as play, and a lot of what he taught me has stayed with me for life.
That background comes into the way I teach now, although I learnt a long time ago that giving every pupil the same type of lesson makes very little sense.
Some people want to know everything. They’ll ask why a chord works, what key we’re in, why a seventh chord sounds the way it does or what they’re hearing when a piece changes direction. I love that and I’ll go as far into it as they want. Others walk into their first lesson and tell me they want to learn everything about music from the ground up, including sheets and theory. So we start with the very foundations.
Other people hear the word “theory” and you can almost see them switch off. So I don’t sit somebody down and announce that we’re doing half an hour of music theory.
We might be learning a song they’ve chosen and I’ll ask, “Do you know what key this is in?” Or, “Can you hear what happens when we move to this chord?” We might talk about it for two minutes and they’ve picked up a bit of theory without feeling as though they’ve been given a theory lesson.
Even a very simple song can teach you an enormous amount if you know what to listen for.
If somebody has no interest in any of that and says, “Charlie, I just want to play this song”, that’s fine too. We’ll get the guitar out, work out the parts and play it.
The advantage of having had that broader training myself is that, if somebody does want to go further, I can take them there. If you want to learn composition, arrangement, songwriting, ear training, prepare properly for a full performance, understand harmony in more depth or get into jazz, I can work with you on all of that. But not every guitarist wants to know theory and I know many successful guitarists who don’t know theory and are also self taught and that’s great.
Equally, if you want lessons to stay relaxed and straightforward and you just want to become a better guitarist, learn the songs you love and enjoy playing more, I’m very happy teaching that way too.
After teaching so many different people over the years, children and adults included, I’ve found that you get much further when you pay attention to the person sitting in front of you. I ask a lot of questions, I want to know what music they listen to, what they can already do, where they get frustrated and how they like to learn.
Then I teach from there.
If you’re looking for guitar lessons for yourself or your child, I teach one-to-one from my guitar room in Kings Langley, as well as online.
You’re always welcome to get in touch and tell me a bit about what you’d like to learn.
Charlie
Charlie Hodgson Guitar Tutoring
www.charliehodgsonguitartutoring.com
