How Much is a Guitar?

Retrived from Aruna Musical Store

"Hello sir, I want to buy a guitar, I was wondering if you can help me choose the best..." This is the message I hear quite often from guitar lovers ranging from admirers, beginners, amateurs to experienced players. My first question has always been, "What do you want to use it for?" In this post, we'll look at recommendations of the ranges that you can consider before purchasing a guitar. Disclaimer, when it comes to prices, you are free to do as your pocket allows but if you're like me as in you like counting every single coin and ensuring none goes to waste, this post will help you. I will categorize the prices basing on the levels of guitar players:

Admirer's Guitar 

Souvenir Guitars
Image c/o shutterstock.com

Just like we have people who love watching the Rugby sport but cannot stand the imagination of injuries the players go through leave alone playing the game itself, the guitar has more admirers in the world than aspiring players. In this category, the features of the instrument are more aesthetic than musical. The user goes for color, shape and the general appearance as opposed to sound quality. 

Have you ever visited a friend and found a guitar hanging on a wall and you know very well they can't even tell how many strings the guitar has? Well, that is what am talking about. Most of these are usually souvenirs for birthdays, anniversaries of some sort and so forth. If you plan to buy such, I bet the smaller the size the better. Budgeting from $50 (Ksh. 5000)  can get you a good colored guitar. You don't have to worry about which musical shop to get it. Supermarkets all over the place can sort you out. One more thing, the brand doesn't matter as long as you got the right color for the occasion.

Beginner's Guitar
You have been searching for a music tutor for long and someone just hinted to you about Dowe Music and Arts and how their trainers handle students with utmost excellence and expertise not to mention respect. After a tune or two they showcase you get convinced that you should give it a shot but you must buy the guitar first. Which way to go? There is a wide range of acoustic guitars that you can get from the market. By acoustic I mean those that don't have Pre-amps to connect to a PA system. At this stage, you want to focus on ensuring you have a good grip of the guitar itself. Trying to play on PA at this stage will horrify not only whoever cares to listen but yourself as well. So, let's begin where we are. What is our budget recommendation? $80 (Ksh. 8,000) and above will solve your current problem friend.

Acoustic Guitar
Image c/o melbournemusiccenter.com.au

Amateur's Guitar

Guitar with pick-up Image c/o ebay.com

This belongs to people who have been playing the guitar for say two years (notice I said playing not owning). Chances are they have started having a clear picture of the notes on the fret-board and are not slaves of the Capo. I mean, they use it when they want and not as an escape from the barre chords. Though not  yet veryclear, they can a tleast discover the key in which a song is being played and can tune a guitar without dependance on electronic tuners. They own the above Beginners guitar. 

 If the above guitar is in good condition, get a gadget called Pick-up and mount it on the guitar just near the sound box opening. The pick-up acts as a pre-amp for converting analog signals from the guitar strings to digital to be sent to the PA. This should cost between $20-50 (Ksh. 2,000-5,000) inclusive of a cable say five meters long.

Semi-Acoustic Guitar
Image c/o audiomart.co.za

Alternatively, one can decide to buy a semi-acoustic guitar. At this stage, chances are that the player still has little or no gigs at all to enable them purchase a higher quality guitar. This means you have to outsource money elsewhere. Most people on such a lean budget as I was then decide to sell the beginners guitar (of course at a lower price than they bought) and top up the savings to buy a semi-acoustic guitar. Where are we at? Now that you've began to enjoy your own guitar playing, it's time to let the world feel a taste. Your budget needs to upgrade to something like $150 (Ksh. 15000). At this point we start mentioning brands like Yamaha, Fender. Sadly though, you may only afford the Gibsons which has some good invigorating sound vibrations.

Professional Guitar

Yamaha SA2200 Semi Acoustic Guitar
Image c/o rimmermusic.co.uk

We call you a professional guitarist because you are no longer confused with the music theory rules/rudiments. In fact, you are outgrowing them to a point where their boundaries make sense but not enough to limit your exploitative fingers. You bend a few like using a Major Chords where your teacher said you shouldn't. Yes, you can run a number of scales beautifully to any given song or create a chord pattern given just a monotonic melody. The point is, you find no problem understanding this paragraph.

Unfortunately, sometimes you may reach this level but your pocket is still at the admirer's level. I once attended a christian mission where we were amazed that there were three old acoustic guitars but the players distinguished them as Lead, semi-acoustic and Bass. In essence, for a professional guitarist, you can turn any of the above into what you want. However, some audiences are very judgmental. You don't want to lose your show just because of your stinginess. Get a good guitar, with a guitar case that takes care of the instrument well. You should be ready to spend $300 (Ksh. 30,000) and above for the guitar alone while the case chops $30-100(Ksh.3000-10,000) depending on whether you want a bag or a wooded/metallic case.

Electric Guitarists

Lead Guitar Image c/o jiji.nj

Bass Guitar
Image c/o stagefrontmusic.co.au

These are majorly the bass and lead guitars. There are also acoustic electric guitars. For these, we not only mention Yamaha, Gibsons and/or Fender, rather, we work ourselves out to purchasing them since our ears have precision to understand what sound we want. Budget? Anything less than $200 (Ksh. 20,000) will not serve you for a desirable duration. Remember, the reason I have placed this category here is that the players are assumed to have basic music theory and have good musical ears. It will be a bit problematic to learn these if you don't have the basics. However, nothing is impossible in this world. Also, these guitars come with the budget of a PA system. So unless you are buying for a church/band which already has the PA, realize that your budget can not be any less than $50(Ksh. 50,000).

Conclusion
  As stated earlier, sometimes it is your pocket that speaks for you. However, as you can see, you can not start from the last to the first. Life itself doesn't work that way. Even if it does, no one wishes it does. Hopefully, this post will help you in purchasing your next guitar.

The writer is 

a guitar trainer at 

Dowe Music & Arts