Hi my name is Michael Woodward, I am a guitar teacher. I teach acoustic, electric, classical, bass, ukulele, music theory, Rockschool and ABRSM grades as well as help with academic qualifications. Whatever style you want to learn, be it rock, folk, electronic or jazz, please get in touch and I'll help you achieve your goals.
I offer a free taster lesson where we can discuss your aims and from this, I prepare individual lesson plans, to create a structured progression. Over the lessons I build in techniques to give you all the skills to become a great all-round musician.
Whichever songs you wish to learn I can transcribe, make tutorial videos for, and create versions with differing degrees of complexity to match your requirements. I have hundreds of songs that we can work from but if we can find music that you are passionate about then all the better for practise.
If you wish to take your grades, I recommend the Rockschool syllabus for contemporary music and ABRSM for classical. The Rockschool books offer popular modern songs for a variety of instruments including guitar, bass, and ukulele.
When I started learning guitar my teacher just told me to "play my scales" but didn't tell me the reason behind it. Yes, it's a great way to get your left and right hands working together, but more importantly improvising is just using scales in an imaginative way. I encourage learning scales and arpeggios alongside backing tracks so that you can get accustomed to how they sound next to the chords. This encourages the skills needed for both composing and improvising and makes learning your scales and arpeggios more fun!
It’s a great tool to be able to understand how chords fit together. This helps you to work songs out by ear, compose music and improvise. As you learn pieces of music, we will discuss what scales and arpeggios would fit with the music and why particular chords have been used.
This is an important part of being a musician. It is such a useful skill to be able to hear something and work out how to play it. I can show you how to go about this and put it into practise.
Is another handy skill. I like to separate the rhythm reading and the pitch reading. Once you can do both then join it together. Rhythm reading exercises are great to get you started with this and very handy for strumming ideas.
The first lesson is always FREE so you can meet me and chat about what you hope to achieve with your lessons. After that you pay £50 for three 30-minute lessons.
“Michael has taught my 16 year old for 9 years. In that time, he has gone from absolute beginner to studying for his grade 7 on guitar and grade 6 on Bass. I cannot recommend him highly enough. My son really loves his lessons. Michael has managed to keep him engaged all these years, wanting to practise and learn new songs. It’s never just about exams but enjoying playing which is so important with kids.”
“Michael teaches both of my children. He is very friendly and approachable, teaching in a way that is easy for my children to understand. They thoroughly enjoy their lessons and have shown tremendous progress in their time with him.”
“Mike has been teaching my 8 year old for nine months. He is extremely patient, and we have noticed week-on- week progress. My boy loves playing his guitar and has nailed the riff to Seven Nation Army.”
“The best thing about Michael’s guitar lessons is that they are tailor made for you and carefully balanced between theory and practice. He is well organised, very patient, and always comes prepared for the lesson. Each lesson is divided into sections to include a variety of skills so that you don’t get bored with practicing just one skill. Thanks to Michael’s teaching skills I’m continuously improving and feeling more confident with my guitar.”
“Brilliant bass lessons! I never once got bored with what I have to do. I’m impressed with the patience mike has during lessons. I could have done with finding mike sooner.”
“After a couple of years unsuccessfully trying to self-teach myself guitar, I became frustrated with my lack of progress and looked for some proper tuition. Mike’s flexible lessons and relaxed teaching style have allowed me to make greater progress in a couple of months than I previously achieved in years of unstructured learning.”
“Michael’s guitar lessons have reawakened my love for the guitar. I learn more in a week from Michael’s guitar lessons than I did in several months on my own. He keeps the lessons fun, challenging and constantly varied. On top of that he’s a real nice guy. Highly recommended”
I have 30 years’ experience in playing music. Starting out on the electric guitar at 5 years old and subsequently learning classical guitar, bass guitar, mandolin, and ukulele. I studied the bass at one of London’s finest popular music schools, the London College of Music, where I received first-hand tuition from some of the UK’s best musicians. I use their techniques in my teaching to this day.