JS 1000 or JS 1200 for beginner

[P. Aaron]

Originally Posted by piccyman

I am not really worried about the cost, i just prefer to buy very good quality.

So I guess either JS would be ok

If money is no object, Get a 'Joe' but take good care of it too.

A nice way to "start" one could say.

[S-man]

Yeah...good advice...take care of it. I look at some of my old guitars from 20+ years ago and am amazed at how beat up they are....youth.

AS far as playing without wrapping your thumb around...it's almost required to gain speed and accuracy. That's my experience.

[piccyman]

peter cook have one for £999

[Dino]

I like the 1000 a little better than the 1200...

[piccyman]

In what way?

Originally Posted by Dino

I like the 1000 a little better than the 1200...

[Passion_and_Warfare]

Keep your eyes on the Bay. There has been a few selling on there lately for cheap.

[Eggy]

Originally Posted by Scali

Thin necks are bad for beginners. Thick necks are good.
The thumb needs to be BEHIND the neck people, not wrapped around it!
That's also why many guitar teachers want their students to start out on classical nylon string guitars. You HAVE to have a good technique there, with the thumb behind the neck. That's the whole point (I learnt on a nylon string myself, and an Epiphone Les Paul was my first electric guitar. Still have it, still play it a lot, great guitar, superfast neck, mega tone).

Learning it the right way makes you a better player in the end. Neck thickness won't matter much after that... And you can still get an Ibanez and shred the heck out of it later
Heck, you could go for a 7-string

Originally Posted by Scali

This is YOUR problem, not the guitar's problem.
You are making your wrist hurt by playing in the wrong position. Millions of players play Les Pauls every day. Even women, with small hands, and they too can do bar chords. A lot of them even play nylon string classicals.
In fact, one of the best classical virtuosos of our time is a Chinese woman by the name of Li Jie. Talk about small hands! Does it limit her ability to play? Heck no, she has technique. Look her up on Youtube, you won't be disappointed.

I don't agree with jemjem. If the student cannot bring up the discipline by himself, then he needs to be forced into proper technique by playing guitars that won't allow any other way. This makes it easy for the teacher too. He can just say "See, you're doing it wrong, this hurts. If you do it right, it won't hurt".
Lesson #1: Point the neck upwards, put the wrist under the neck, and the thumb behind the neck. That's the way to play bar chords, do any amount of stretching etc. People have been playing like this for decades. They have their reasons.
In fact, I know of teachers who tell their students to first practice without using the thumb whatsoever. Just make the bar chord from the wrist.

Piccyman you're new here so can I start off by saying Hi and Welcome !

As for what's quoted above. Have you ever heard this guy play before? Have you been out for a meal with him, got to know him ? If the answer to all these questions is no then perhaps his advice should be taken with a pinch of salt.

Getting barre chords down is a big hurdle to get over although once it's mastered it's down forever so keep cracking on you'll get there soon. As far as guitars go I'd advise going for one that realy puts a fire in your belly regardless of neck size. The more you realy love a guitar the more you'll play it and the better you'll get. In answer to your orininal question both those JS series are very good guitars. I don't own one but I have played them and I'd recomend them to anyone, beginer or pro.

Hope that helps,

Ben

[Scali]

Originally Posted by Eggy

Have you ever heard this guy play before?

I hope he has, soundclick page is in my profile.
By the way, quite a bit of the stuff on there is played on a Les Paul.

[chris101]

Dino: "I like the 1000 a little better than the 1200..." Please explain!?

[Eggy]

Dude, *shakes head* The guy is 8 posts into his jemsite time. What kind of delusions of grandure make you hope he might have accessed your profile then taken the time to go and visit your soundclick page ?

Maybe you should re-read your posts and ask yourself if you're helping this guy out or if perhaps you sound like some sort of elitist know it all spouting down fountains of commands from the high mountain.

[Scali]

Originally Posted by Eggy

Dude, *shakes head* The guy is 8 posts into his jemsite time. What kind of delusions of grandure make you hope he might have accessed your profile then taken the time to go and visit your soundclick page ?

Oh I don't know, you brought up the question whether he heard me or not.
I was just saying that if he felt that way too, he could have checked my profile and read back some of my posts or listen to my music, to see if I have any kind of credibility at all.

Originally Posted by Eggy

Maybe you should re-read your posts and ask yourself if you're helping this guy out or if perhaps you sound like some sort of elitist know it all spouting down fountains of commands from the high mountain.

I'm quite sure I'm helping the guy out, thank you. What are you trying to achieve with these posts of yours, other than a flamewar?
Now back off. If he isn't interested he can just ignore my posts. He doesn't need you to start a fight over it. What's your problem anyway? If you look at this thread, you'll see that others have agreed to what I have been saying. It's good advice.

[Eggy]

I apologise. No flame war intended. I just wanted to offer another angle on your advise about thumb placement and neck thickness. What I should've done is counter your argument with the thought that if Hendrix had stuck to your rules that perhaps he wouldn't have sounded like he did. You typed those things in bold to make them stand out as a point of rule rather than opinion. I just wanted to point out to the original poster that they are in fact opinion and do not need to be a rule.

[Mike239]

When if first started i had a Jackson with a very thin neck (Possibly Wizard) and my thumb placement was all wrong. This was not due to the neck thickness, but my inexperience with how to play the guitar. I soon learned that the thumb is meant to be on the back and not wrapped around the neck, and soon i had proper placement of my thumb while i continued to play a guitar which had a super thin neck. IMHO neck thickness has nothing to do with thumb placement and what-not, if its anything a jem sized neck or even thinner is ideal for a beginner.

Anyway to the original poster, just to reinforce what Eggy said, get a guitar that you like and is comfortable to play, the more comfortable and fun it is to learn on the more you will want to learn. If you really like the JS, and find it fun to play and you like the look of it then buy it. IMO one of the best guitars to begin on.

[Scali]

Originally Posted by Eggy

I apologise. No flame war intended. I just wanted to offer another angle on your advise about thumb placement and neck thickness. What I should've done is counter your argument with the thought that if Hendrix had stuck to your rules that perhaps he wouldn't have sounded like he did. You typed those things in bold to make them stand out as a point of rule rather than opinion. I just wanted to point out to the original poster that they are in fact opinion and do not need to be a rule.

That argument is flawed, since Hendrix had exceptionally large hands. Besides, he didn't actually use classic bar chords much. He preferred playing the bass notes with his thumb.
This worked, but it worked for him, because he had big hands. So I would rather say that Hendrix 'got away' with his technique rather than that he is an example of how everyone should play. The topicstarter has already stated that he has small hands, so I wouldn't suggest him to learn to play like Hendrix. As I already tried to explain with the example of Li Jie, with small hands it is ESPECIALLY important to develop a good technique.

Anyway, bottom line is that I think you will be disappointed if you buy an expensive JS guitar, and find that playing will still be troublesome and painful (not to mention the heart-attack when you restring your first floating tremolo). As mentioned already, the JS doesn't have a particularly thin neck. The JS neck is modeled on Joe's old Strat, and an old Strat has a neck nearly as fat as a Gibson. Other than that, a JS has a longer scale than a Gibson, so you will have higher string tension, which also means it will be harder to play bar chords.

So again, I think it's better to invest in your technique than to invest in a new guitar. Now if you don't agree with my opinion, that is fine, but I would appreciate it if you didn't question my credibility, because frankly I find that insulting. But okay, you apologized, so let's forget about it.
Buying the JS won't hurt ofcourse. It's a great guitar, and it will hold its value well over the years. I just don't want anyone to think that a new guitar will magically make them a better guitarist. So don't be disappointed if it doesn't.
Practicing on your technique on the other hand, is pretty much guaranteed to make you a better guitarist. I don't think anyone will argue that.

[Scali]

Originally Posted by Mike239

IMHO neck thickness has nothing to do with thumb placement and what-not, if its anything a jem sized neck or even thinner is ideal for a beginner.

Agreed there. If you have proper technique, the thickness of the neck is not important (I already said that earlier).
But you can take that both ways. You could say the JS (or a guitar with actually a thin neck) won't be bad for a beginner, so it won't hurt to buy it.
On the other hand, you can also say that you might aswell save yourself the money and continue playing on the Gibson.
As you say, you need to figure out the thumb placement anyway, whether you do it on a thin or a thick neck doesn't matter.
The only problem is that a thin neck will allow you to play with bad thumb placement better. So there's less of a need to learn the proper technique.
This is why I think it's a bad idea to buy a new guitar that encourages your lacking technique rather than doing what you should be doing: get your technique sorted.