Parts of the Guitar

The first lesson in the beginner guitar lesson section is on the anatomy of the guitar. It is important to understand the common names and functions for the various parts of the guitar. This is of particular importance in the technical guitar lessons (e.g. palm muting and harmonics) which would require guitar playing using some specific parts of the guitar. You wouldn’t want to be playing the wrong part of the guitar and end up frustrated just because you missed this introductory beginner guitar lesson.

Without further ado, below is a labeled diagram which shows the guitar parts.

Beginner Guitar Lesson : Parts of the Guitar

Head

The head’s primary purpose is to hold the tuning mechanisms/gears and ends of the strings of the guitar. Do you know that the guitar’s resonance is transmitted through the head when the guitar is played? Try this. Put one of your hands on the head and strum the guitar with the other hand. Have you felt the strong vibrations on the guitar head? The guitar head helps in sustaining the played notes (Hence, "headless" guitars tend to have less sustain than normal guitars)

You might have also observed that the design of the head of the guitar might vary across different guitars (usually slotted on classical guitars and fully solid in acoustic and electric guitars). Well, don’t worry. The design of the guitar head is catered to tuning the guitar and has little effect on the tone of the guitar.

Tuning Peg

Tuning pegs are found resting on the head of the guitar and as the name suggests for itself, they are used to tune the guitar by tightening or loosening the strings.

Nut

The nut is found at where the guitar head meets the neck of the guitar. It is simply a piece of material (e.g. plastic, bone) in which small grooves are carved out. These small grooves hold the strings in the proper position and guide the strings up to the tuning mechanism.

The  height of the nut influences the action of the guitar and worn out guitar nuts would cause open strings to buzz. Do seek professional advice if you intend to make any adjustments to the nut.

Fretboard

The fretboard is also known as the neck of the guitar. The fretboard could be broken up into many smaller sections by thin metal bars called frets. By pressing down a string above a particular fret and playing it, the string will give a pitch at that fret.

Position markers

Position markers are indicators that can be found on certain frets. The position markers can be found usually on the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, 12th and 15th frets. These markers serve as a fast way for guitarist to locate the frets when playing the guitar.

Note that the 12th fret has a marker that differs from the rest of the markers on the fretboard (normally shown by 2 white dots in most guitars). This is because the 12th fret of a string produces the same note (octave) of a higher pitch an open string.

Pickup/Soundhole

Most acoustic and classical guitars have hollow bodies. A soundhole is an opening in the hollow body designed to project the sound of the guitar. Basically, you can think of the sound hole as an amplifier which makes the pluckednote sounds louder.

On the other hand, most electric guitars have a solid body with rectangular magnetic objects called pickups. These pickups are designed to pick up magnetic fluctuations caused by a vibrating string above it. After which, electrical signals are sent from the solid body guitar to amplifiers via cables. Pickups have the same purpose as that of a soundhole. The tone and loudness of the guitar can be controlled using the Tone/Volume Controls.

Body

The body of the guitar comes in all shapes and sizes. Regardless of which, the guitar body holds the bridge, strings, strap holders, pickups (in electric guitars) and volume/tone controls. In general, the quality of the wood as well as design of the body can have a big influence over the tone of the guitar. This is one of the reasons why some guitars can cost up to 10X more than that of another one.

Bridge

The bridge is a piece of hardware where the strings are anchored to the body guitar. In hollow bodied guitars, the bridge  transmits vibrations from the strings to the guitar body for amplification. The height of the bridge also determines the action of the guitar. So if you ever need to change the action of your guitar, this is one of the key places to make adjustments.