From Hobbyist to Guitar Guru | Den Lopez

The reason was that I could see this child, 6 years old, holding a huge guitar, way too big for her, learning theory, learning Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, right? Learning how to read sheet music. And to me, that was horrifying. And at that very moment, like instantly, I like to fix stuff. I'm like a systems guy. I like to create systems and that's how my brain naturally works. And I thought, What if there was a way to take chords out of the equation and make her play instantly? What if she could play— this was the idea— what if she could play a full song the first day, right? Learning how to fret chords, I don't know if you've ever tried to fret chords, but it's a horrible experience in the beginning.

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Welcome to another episode of The Profitable Creative, the only place on the internet where you will learn how to turn your passion into profit. I am your host, Christian Brim. Joining me today, the esteemed Dan Lopez with Learning Guitar Secrets.

Welcome, Dan. Hi, Christian, it's an honor to be here. Very excited.

Well, I'm, I'm excited to have you here. So tell us how you got here, like how, how, not, not like here on the show, but like how you came to be an artist and then teaching others.

Great question. So you're asking me first how I started playing guitar in a sense, and then how I translated that to a business.

Yes.

Yeah. So I come from a very musical family and my father and uncle used to play guitar. My grandfather used to sing. And at a very early age, I learned from my grandfather that anyone had the ability to play music. Anyone could do it, right? He used to throw parties for the family, for family and friends gathered at Christmas, birthdays, anything he could get a hold on, he would throw a party, right? And then we would gather around the table, have some delicious food, and Then we would get out the guitars. My father and uncle played, but everyone participated. Like, he made everyone participate. Some people sang, some people clapped their hands, others banged on the tables, or he would just give you a bottle of wine and you would hit it with the knife to create sounds. But that was at a very early age when I was 5 or so. I still remember some of the most beautiful memories are those, right, where Everyone's playing like if it was a band together. So because we grow up listening to music, we already have that as a language in ourselves. I hear so many people say, I'm not musical. Well, if you like musical music, you are musical, right? You just got to figure a way to bring it out of you. And my grandfather showed me that really, really, really at a young age, which I really value.

So were you always a professional musician? You, you just, uh, started down that track, or—

No, no, I played as a hobby for many, many years, and then I don't know how many years ago I decided like it's time to bring it all together. My, my father and my uncle always dreamed of being professional musicians. They had done some things here and there, but I said, you know, I'm going to bring it all together create an album where my father is involved, where my uncle is involved, where my brother, who's also an artist, is involved, and I play their songs, my songs, and we can bring it all together and create some kind of a family legacy to have everything in one place, right? If that makes sense.

Yeah, absolutely. When, when did you release that album?

Can't remember the exact date, but maybe it was like 6 years ago, 5 or 6 years ago.

Is there a follow-up album in the works?

No, no, just one and done. To showing people how to do it now.

Yes, it is. One of my friends who's a musician, he transitioned from performer to producer, uh, because he figured out very quickly that that— and this was, you know, pre-streaming, uh, that that was the way to make money, not, not performing.

So yeah, to add to that, Christian, I heard early on in my, in my journey to trying to build a business, I first started trying to market that album and I learned a lot. But I learned very early on that the bigger the problem you solve, the more money you make. And finding new music is not really a problem nowadays, right? With Spotify and all that, people are saturated with new music. But learning how to play the guitar is something that people really struggle with. So I thought, why don't I transition to this? And I can tell you the story of how it— how the spark happened. But, but yeah, I figured, why don't I transition to teaching people how to play the guitar instead of trying to market my own music?

It reminds me of the story of Levi Strauss I don't know if it was both of them or one of them. Anyway, they got their start in the California Gold Rush. Rather than being an explorer for gold, they just sold them the equipment because there was a lot more money in that, right? Yes, yes.

So smart business.

Yes. So talk about that spark that transitioned you into teaching.

Yeah, so I was right here in this little room practicing my chops for my album. Like, it was a month before the recording, and I was just practicing and practicing daily, right? And a friend of ours came over to visit, and she just stood on the door, said nothing, saw me play for like 10 minutes, and then stopped me and said, wow, that, that sounds really good. And I'm like, oh, thank you. And she said, you know what, I'm actually thinking of signing my daughter up for guitar lessons, and her daughter was 6 at the time. And the first thing I thought, the first thing that came to my mind— and you got to understand, for me, guitar is like hyper important. Being able to play and create music is like almost who I am, right? And the first thing that popped into my head was, do not sign her up. Like, I got terrified of the idea that this kid was gonna take guitar lessons. And I'm a guitar lover, like, I think of guitars all day long. And the reason was that I could see this child, 6 years old, holding a huge guitar, way too big for her, learning theory, learning Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, right? Learning how to read sheet music. And to me, that was horrifying. And at that very moment, like, instantly— I like to fix stuff, I'm like a systems guy. I like to create systems, and that's how my brain naturally works. And I thought, what if there was a way to take chords out of the equation and make her play instantly? What if she could play— this was the idea— what if she could play a full song the first day, right? Learning how to fret chords— I don't know if you've ever tried to fret chords, but it's a horrible experience in the beginning. And taking that out of the equation would give her the ability, just like my grandfather showed me, to bang on the guitar and create music with it, right? So that was the first spark, and I got completely obsessed with it. And I came up with the Guitar in 1 Hour method, which makes people completely from zero— I've never— I don't even know how to hold a guitar— be able to play a song, strum through a song, changing chords in under an hour, which is fantastic.

So were you trained more traditionally, or, or—

yeah, I— let me just give you this stat so you know where we're at in the guitar space. There's a 95% fail rate with people trying to learn the guitar. So 95 out of every 100 people that start playing the guitar quit. And with those stats, once I learned that, I became like completely obsessed with changing those stats, because with 95% of people failing, it can't be the people's fault, you know? Like, it has to be some kind of a system fault with how we teach beginners how to play the guitar. So I learned the hard way, hey, learn your chords, hey, learn this, learn that, right? And, and it take— it took me, I don't know, I can't remember, I was, I was very young, I was, must have been like 13 or 14 But it probably took me like almost a year to be able to strum through a full song, which is very opposite to learning how to strum through a song in under an hour, right? So how, how much further along are you in your journey if you can do it in under an hour? And how much more motivated, and how much more do you believe in yourself that you can do this if you can learn how to play the guitar in under an hour?

Right? Yeah. I mean, I, I, I was trained on the piano at a young age, and it was very much the traditional scales and chords. Uh, you know, that was what you practiced. But to your point, the good stuff didn't happen for a long while. And I, I think it— my musical journey was I, I, I played through high school And I went to a competition and did not perform the way I thought I should. And I gave it up. I stopped. And, and one of the things that I've struggled with as an adult, because now I have a, a piano in my house and I've had it for probably about a year, but I don't play it. And the reason why I don't play it is because I go back to what I, I had been playing, and I, I can't do it, right? And so, and then I, I, I think, well, you know, there's a lot of practice involved to get back to that point, and there's no fun in it, right? Like, that, that, that's the element that's keeping me from doing it. So I, I've thought about— I haven't done, but I've always wanted to do jazz. And so I, I've thought, uh, about learning something entirely different like jazz, where that expectation wasn't there of, of what I used to be able to do. But I, I think it, it, it supports your point that if, if something's not fun, you're not going to continue doing it unless you just really have a passion for it.

Yep, exactly. And I think adding to what you just said, which is absolutely right, if, if you can have fun right off the bat, like you, you're going to want to do it more, right? But also what you just said really struck home because I think it's a matter of belief more than a matter of having fun. If you believe you can do something like Christian, if you believe, if you truly believe that you could play jazz like the greats, you would do it because nothing would stop you. You would hit a roadblock. But because you believed you could overcome that roadblock, you would push through that roadblock. Everyone hits roadblocks, right? But having someone in which you can see yourself in them and being like, oh, they also did it. I, I bet I can do it. Like I tell my students, everyone has false beliefs. I have them too. I used to have the false belief that I couldn't sing. For, I don't know how many years, I used to have the false belief that I didn't have natural rhythm, which is completely false. Everyone has natural rhythm, right? But most of my students have false beliefs around their fingers. They have arthritis. They're too old to learn. They ran out of time. They've never been musical, right? They have short, fat, crooked fingers, whatever it is, right? So I tell them stories about other players that have overcome issues that are bigger than theirs. And then with those beliefs, like for example, I tell them the story of Django Reinhardt, right? I can't pronounce his name, but you know, the, the famous gypsy jazz guitar player, one of the best in the world, only had two fingers. He had five, but only two worked for him, right? He became the best gypsy jazz player to ever live, and he'll probably hold that record forever, right? Or I tell them the story of a guy I found on YouTube. He plays guitar with one hand. One hand. Like, no matter how crooked your fingers are, you've got two hands, you know, you can, you can do better than him. And he, he pushed through and he plays guitar with one hand. So telling those stories and making people that think that—

how do you even do that?

Telling them stories?

No, how do you play with one hand?

I'm like, uh, it's amazing what he does. He uses a looper. So there's one thing I also try to tell my students, like, listen, the guitar is a tool. What you're trying to do is not play the guitar, it's to play music with a guitar. Completely different mindset, right? So there's many ways to play music. Like, music could be just— I don't know if you can hear that basic rhythm. That's already music, right? What he does is he, he puts the pick on the thumb, he frets, he puts his guitar flat like this, and he frets with these fingers, and he strums with his thumb. And then he uses a looper. I don't know if you know what a looper is. No. So you press on it, you record something, okay, on that device, and then you press again and it loops it. Okay. So he could go, right, loop it, and then it sounds, and creates a rhythm with it. And then he stacks up another recording on top of that recording. So he stacks up tracks on top of each other. Amazing player. Amazing player. And he has one hand.

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So, and that's to your point, he's making music. He's not playing the guitar. I mean, he is playing the guitar, but he can't play the guitar like most people can play the guitar.

Exacto mundo. Right. So everyone has a limitation. I also tell them the story of when I blew my tendon off from my finger, like In guitar, being able to bend your fingers like this is very beneficial to fret individual strings, right? So I can't bend this finger, and I remember when I went to buy a guitar for a friend, the owner of that guitar, I was whining and complaining and being like, ah, I blew my tendon off and I can't play guitar. And I had that limiting belief that I would never be able to play the guitar like I used to, right? And he went, "Oh yeah?" And he showed me his fingers, and he was missing like 2 tips and half a finger, and he played better than I did. In that moment, I realized like, "I just gotta stop complaining about this and go and play my guitar the best I can," you know? And sure enough, I play now better than I used to.

So tell us a little bit about the business of teaching guitar. How has that journey been?

Okay, so what do you want to know specifically? Because we can talk about a lot of topics.

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So you want me to frame it more towards someone trying to start a business?

Yeah, I mean, I, I think, I think a lot of our listeners may have— I talk about being an entrepreneur with a certain set of skills as opposed to being someone that has skills that also is an entrepreneur, whatever, whichever you, you prioritize. So rather than being a teacher or a guitar player, uh, you're an entrepreneur with guitar skills or teaching skills. And, and I think that's, that's an important distinction to make because entrepreneurs see problems or opportunities and then find solutions. Their skills may or may not come into play. You know, oftentimes they do, but it's not— it— that's not what's driving the, um, thought process. Because if you, if you limit the problems you can solve to only your skills, you've, you've closed off a lot of opportunity.

Makes sense. So where can I take this? Very good question. And let me see if I can organize my thoughts. So I'm a systems guy, right? Like, whenever I see something, I immediately want to fix it. I can already see little nuances that if you just turn your hand a little bit like that, it'll fix the problem, right? So I am a little bit obsessed in finding those little nuances in guitar. For example, I teach people— instead of chords, I use the word shapes. Guitar is a shape-based instrument. Everyone teaches you chords, and that confuses your brain the first day. The first day they teach you, you got to learn your chords, and now that word becomes a real thing for you, and it stays with you because it's the first thing they taught you, and because that person knows a lot more than you do about guitar. Right now that is real, right? Right. That goes like, you can't change that. Now you change it to shapes and the entire fretboard, like with one word, opens up. The entire fretboard. And people are like, I just shift this word, one single word, and now I understand what I'm doing. I didn't used to understand it. I never understood it for 30 years. You made me believe that one word could change everything, and it does, right? So finding those little nuggets, it's what drives me and what keeps me pushing. Does that kind of answer your question? Yeah.

So, so let's talk about the, the, the business a, a little more detail so that I can get some context. So it's, it's online. It's, it's online. Is it, uh, prerecorded or is it group lessons? Is it individual lessons? Talk, talk about that.

Okay, cool. So one of my coaches, um, always tells me that you can build your life by design, create your life by design, right? So you don't have to do what other people do or, or do what other people tell you to do. You can create what you want to create. That's the beautiful thing of us as humans. We can, from the ether, bring things together put words to them and make them tangible, right? So I knew right from the start that I would never— never is a big word, but I, I didn't want to teach one-on-one lessons. One-on-one lessons, there's only so many lessons you can bring into a day, so your, your, your— the amount of money you can bring into the business is limited. That's one. Plus I can only help like 5 guitarists a day, and I'm working so many hours on each lesson, right? With the model I created, I've helped in 2 years and something over 100,000 people. Wow. Which is very different, right? Right. Completely different. And I do that through books, I do that through courses, I do that— I also have a membership where I teach group coaching. But again, I have 5 or 6 people in the room at one go, and they're all benefiting from what they ask, from what I teach them, from what they play. They have a group to where there's more people, but at one go we have like 5 or 6 people, right? So just creating systems and creating processes to where you can help more people and on the flip side bring in more cash. Was something I really wanted to create.

Yeah, and, and I think for me what resonates there is the, the limitation of the impact. And, and I, I think certainly you can be motivated by money, and, and there's nothing wrong with that, but I, I, I think that if, if entrepreneurs are solely limited by money, they, they run into roadblocks that, that they can't really overcome because the, the passion's not there. But, but you led with the idea that I, I can only teach 5 students in a day versus the 100,000 that you've taught in, in 2 years. That's impact, that's a passion, and the byproduct is more money. But, but you led with your passion, which is to impact more people. And, and I think that's a key distinction because that will scale forever. Like if, if your goal is to impact more people to learn guitar and enjoy guitar, enjoy music, you've opened up the realm of, of limitless because I can sit here and think to myself, well, I'm sure you could apply those skills to teach people different instruments. I mean, there's, there's no limit to guitar just because, you know, guitar, those principles. That you learned in creating what you have. So, and if you were, you might get there if you were motivated by money, but you know, it would end up being like, well, I don't know how to play the saxophone or I don't know how to play the piano. And you'd be like, well, I'm making enough money, so I'll stop.

Yeah. It's a different kind of motivation. Like, let me tell you a story about one of my students. And she came to me, she wanted to play a song for her family at Christmas, and there was only 3 weeks for her to do that.

And she'd— and she'd pick Malagaña or something like that? No.

Okay, all right, good point. Uh, she just wanted to— she just wanted to play some Christmas carols for her family.

Okay, Christmas.

She thought she— that would be cool, right? So We started working together and she knew some chords. She, she couldn't figure it out. She'd been playing for like a year and a half. So in 2 weeks, she was able to learn how to play 3 songs, full songs, for Christmas. One week before, she brought her granddaughters into the equation. They learned the songs too, and they all played them together at Christmas. So right there, what a beautiful memory that is, right? But it went further. The next month she's like, "I wanna record a song." I'm like, "Cool." So she created a song, 2 or 3 simple chords, right? And recorded a song for her grandchildren. Now that right there, Christian, is family legacy. I mean, there's nothing that beats that. She'll be gone and that recording will still be there forever, right? So every day I wake up, of course the money is great, right? But I'm trying to find the next Tresa, right? Or I'm trying to find the next Doug who is 82 and learning guitar right now, right? Or I'm trying to save that little child who is 6 years old and it has been forced to learn music theory or read sheet music before she can even play a song, right? One of my— let me tell you another story really quick. One of my oldest son's friend came over here, and he plays guitar at school. They're trying to teach him how to play guitar, right? And I'm like, cool. He sees my guitars there, he's like, oh, great guitars. I turn on my amp, right, put it on distortion mode, and I'm like, play me a song. Nothing happened. Like, not a single note correct. He's like looking at me like, I don't know what I'm doing. And I'm like, cool. Just do this. I teach him in 5 minutes a simple thing. Bam, right off the bat I'm jamming with him to a simple minor blues, right? And he's tripping. He's like, what's happening, you know? And I'm shredding over what he's playing. And he— now he's suddenly— he's in a band. Yeah. He's like, what do you think that kid is gonna go— when he goes to his parents, what do you think his reaction to guitar is going to be?

Yeah.

Guitar is amazing, you know, like you got to motivate people to keep pushing. And of course, if you want to become Jimi Hendrix, it's going to take time. It's going to require a lot of practice, right?

Yeah. You're not taking away from the practice element. You know, I think— I don't know this, but I think that, well, my adult daughter came to me last year and she's like, I want you to teach me the piano. And I'm like, Okay, so what do I start with? Scales and chords, because that's the way I was taught, right?

Yes.

And, and I, and I think about, and I think about, you know, my teacher. She was classically trained at a conservatory in Europe, and, you know, exactly what you'd think a piano teacher would look like, right? And, you know, I, I, I, I see this in academia too. Like, it's like we, we just do things the way we were taught, we teach the way we were taught. And it takes an entrepreneurial mind like yours to come in and say, is there a better way? Is there a different way? You know, not just being stuck in the, well, that's how I learned, that's how everybody learned.

Yeah, like I'll use on purpose words that technically are not correct, and that people who are very seasoned in the theory and are very seasoned into playing the guitar, like, they bash me day in and day out. Like, I get hateful comments here and there. I don't care because that word is designed specifically to help not you that you know music theory. I'm trying to help the 82-year-old that doesn't know music theory and wants to fulfill his dream to play the guitar. That word's not for you. I don't care about you, right? Yeah, you can say whatever you want. I, I'm trying to help that person, not you. You already know this stuff, right? I'm trying to help that person. So each word is specifically designed, each course, each lesson. Even though it's incorrect, or it can be incorrect to say those kinds of things, it does help that person move forward. And that's the entire goal, moving forward step by step to reach your outcome, right?

Yeah. And I was actually thinking, I'm like, I'm wondering if he gets pushback from other teachers. And you answered the question. Yes, of course you do, because you're not doing it correctly.

Exactly. Like the first page in my book, which is, you can download, by the way, is this: play all minor chords with one finger, right? Okay, all minor chords, any minor chord you want, one finger. And everyone, everyone who's struggling to play, for example, B minor, which is the most difficult chord for a beginner, is like, I can't believe this is true. Now they can play that song they want, right? What do people that know how to play bar chords and can play that B minor with all their fingers, say, oh, if you teach like that, you'll never get good, blah blah blah blah blah. Dude, they're just trying to play the song, right? Now they have belief that they can play the song. They're going to push through and eventually get to the difficult way to play a B minor. But that's perfectly legit. That's a full— you know, there's a triad, right? 1, 2, 3 strings, 3 notes, B minor. There you have it. Why do I need to know there's a B and there's a blah, blah, blah sharp in that chord? I don't need to know it. I just need to know where it is on guitar and play it and understand why I'm doing it.

Hey listeners, are you ready to turn your passion into profit? Then grab a copy of Profit First for Creatives. Click the link in the show notes to purchase a copy. And if you're not ready to make that full commitment, you can download a free copy of the first chapter. Check it out right now. Have you run into any growing pains with your business, challenges that you had to overcome beyond creating the system?

Obviously, yes, many, and most of them technical. Like, I'm a hammer guy. I used to work as a car mechanic and I love working with my hands. Like, that's my jam. And computers, I would hit them with a hammer, but they don't work that way, you know? You gotta struggle and you gotta figure things out. Like, if you just tell me HTML, I even don't know what that is. So building websites, connecting automated email sequences to those websites, making sure people get the products that they purchased, All that has been a big, big struggle. I'm that kind of guy that click here was like a week of indecision. You know, like, should I click or should— if I click, would I lose all the things I've done now? And my wife really helped me with this because she's a clicker. She'll just go boom, boom, boom and get things done. And if they break, she'll try to fix them. And now I'm like that too. I'm just, I'm just going to get this done, you know, and push through it. Now I believe I can do it again, and I get it done. But still, I still struggle with that.

Is there a point where finances or money posed a challenge in, in the business?

Yes, many times. So it was very scary coming from an employee mindset mentality. Both my wife and I have been raised in an employee mindset where job is the most important thing, job is secure, um, you have to go to work every day no matter if you're sick, right? Making that leap to be like, I'm gonna create, generate my own income, right? Those months that maybe you're not hitting your goals, or you see that the bank account starts dipping a little bit, and, or you released a new course and you didn't get the expected sales because you didn't position it correctly, or whatever it is, Those things are scary. Those things are scary. And taxes.

I think that's the first thing that has to change to deal with your finances and business, you know, because most of us didn't grow up with an entrepreneurial household that taught us to view money as a tool as opposed to just like security, which it is to most people. The technical aspects of how to handle money can be learned very easily. And that's, that's what I love so much about Profit First and Profit First for Creatives is, is that you got it right there.

Yeah. Amazing book.

Well, thank you. Thank you. It's not unlike what you did. It takes it away from the accountants and structures it for the business owner, right? And meets them where they are. The technical part is relatively easy. The hard part is getting your mindset around being intentional about your money, being intentional about profit. So did you struggle with that at all?

Yes. The moment that everything clicked was when I discovered that every dollar that came in needed to have a purpose. Yeah, like if you don't give it a purpose, you're just going to spend it. Yes, in coffee or in a new blanket, or I need a new frying pan, right? You know what? Oh, look at that guitar, right? But as soon as you give it a purpose, like 10% of these— this dollar is for saving up for recording the new course, 20% is for the safety account, 30% is for taxes. Ah, right. All those little things. And then when you go and buy a frying pan, you look at your account and you're like, oh, I don't have money for a frying pan today. I'll just figure something out, right? Yeah. And yes, but you never take from the tax account, right? You never take from the vacations account or from the savings account because every dollar that came in had that purpose. Can I afford an ice cream today? I can't, but I can afford my vacations because that one is allocated into that. Yes, I can see in your smile that you're like, yes, yes, yes. And, and that completely changed my mentality around money. And of course, you can get a 15% or 5% or 1%. Of course, there's the profit, but also the risk-free money, like I've got $2,000 saved up and I can do whatever I want with this money, invest it in whatever I— crypto, or I'm not into crypto, but you, you get the point. Like those things that if I lose that money, it's not affecting my lifestyle, it's not affecting my bank account, it's not affecting my family, right? It's separated. I decided before it came in that that 5% was big, was going to be allocated into see what happens, right? So this, this is, this is a fantastic way of thinking about money. And I still got a long way to go with investments and stuff like this, but yeah, it's a fun game.

I love that. And I love that you called it a game because in a lot of ways it is a game. It doesn't have to be a source of stress, which most people come into it. And I think it's really a scarcity mindset. That drives that fear. Because again, as an employee, you know, you're getting the same amount of money every paycheck. And so there is scarcity built into that model. But as an entrepreneur, you know, that was something that was ingrained in me pretty early. Not ever spoken, but just observation was that, well, we can always make more money. Which is true, but, you know, as I've gotten older, I've kind of pulled back on that. Not that that's not a belief I still have, but that about being more intentional with the dollars as opposed to just saying, "Oh, I can make more." You know, they're not exclusive. You can know that you can go make more money, but that doesn't keep you from being intentional about what you have. And that was something that I struggled with for a long time of not being as intentional as I should have been. Yep.

So do you think I— there's a, there's a saying here in Spain that I can't hear anymore, and it's, it's just how it is, you know. Everyone says that. I don't know if in the States they say it too, but it is what it is.

It is what it is. Yes.

Yeah. No, you can make it what you want. Same as with the guitar, same as with building a business, same as with your money, the one you already have, the one you're going to bring in to your household. You can create something different, right? You just got to believe you can do it and find the way to do it.

I absolutely preach, preach. So do you play electric guitar?

I play electric and acoustic.

Yep. Did you know that the electric guitar was invented in Oklahoma City?

My I did not know that fact.

Yes. Uh, Charlie Christian, do you know that artist?

Not at the top of my head.

No, he, he was, he was a, a blues guy in the '20s, uh, and, uh, he, he invented the electric guitar. I don't know what his intent was, like, but, you know, so they have a Charlie Christian Music Festival here in Oklahoma City every year, so Wow.

Tell me more about that.

Well, I don't know anymore or I'd tell you.

Okay.

Okay. I mean, you'll have to do your own research. I don't know. Awesome. All right. Would you grace us with a little music?

For sure. So let me, let me show you. Sometimes Mike's— can you hear that? Oh, yeah. So let me show you how easy it is to play music. Do you know what the most important thing about playing music is?

Well, other than you enjoy it or others enjoy it?

Well, yeah, in, in the sense of what— how is music created?

I, I don't know. I'm gonna play dumb.

So the most important thing in music is rhythm. You can play the most beautiful—

I was gonna say that, so I shouldn't—

I know you were. I know you were. I— so you can play the most beautiful C chord ever, right? Now what? Yeah, okay, now if there's no rhythm attached to that chord, let's say, there's no music. So rhythm can be as simple as— and we can translate it as simple as just— that's already music to me. Very simple, the most simple way of music there is, but it is music. Now luckily for us guitarists, and most people don't know this, is that chords are already created for us on guitar. Okay, so we don't even have to play anything. So the first, the second, and the third string create a minor chord. Okay, and the second, the third, and the fourth string create a major chord. So let's just play minor chords, right? So if I just mute my 3 thickest strings, right, and I just play that, right, that's already very simple music, but already music. Now I can move those 3 notes, for example, over here and play another minor chord. Another minor chord and the original. Extremely simple. But do you think if you grab the guitar right now, could you play something similar to that? Sure. See, now you believe you can play a guitar. Yeah, that's the first step, believing you can do it, right? And of course you can. Reaching that is going to be more difficult, right? But starting out and being able to play music, you could play that right now. I could teach you that in 5 minutes, and we could have a jam. We could have an hour-long jam. I would play an hour to that.

Yeah.

So it would be amazing, right?

What is your— what is your favorite style of music? So I, I love the Gypsy Kings. I don't know what what genre that even is, but I—

it's their own genre. Yeah, yeah. So I like all types of music as long as they're good, as it's good music. Like, I'll listen anywhere from Queen to flamenco to Spanish pop music to, um, I don't know, Pink Floyd, Rosalía. I mean, jazz. You, you should see my playlist. Rap.

They're all over the place.

Yeah, it's good music.

I enjoy it. I'm kind of the same way. I say that my Spotify algorithm is very confused because it can't really decide what's going on.

And then on top of that, I have my kids using my Spotify. So they're listening to their music. So it's just a crazy world. But yeah.

Well, then I very much appreciate your insights, your time. How do people find you to learn learn more about playing the guitar.

That's awesome. Thank you, thank you so much. So if you want to download this little book, it's called The Beginner Guitarist's Playbook. You can download it for free. Just go to learningguitarsecrets.com/free and you'll get a copy, and you'll be included in my email list. So I'll send you a couple emails with these downloads, and you can just reply to any of my emails and get in touch directly with me. My wife and I are the ones managing those emails, and she filters emails that are directly for me. So I respond to emails every day. And yeah, it's the best way.

I love it. Listeners, make sure you go and check out your, your free download so that you can start playing the guitar this weekend. Yeah. If you, if you like the podcast, please subscribe. Please review. Share the podcast. If you don't like it, there's a button there to send us some feedback and let us know. But I don't know what you wouldn't like about Dan and the guitar, so I, you know, thank you. Don't send me any messages on this one. And until, until later, ta-ta for now.

And that's a wrap for today's episode of The Profitable Creative. Until next time, you money lovers. And don't forget, Profit First for Creatives is live via Amazon. Link below.