Due to the mirror effect, I’ve always found it easier learning from a right handed teacher. I’ve often wondered if the opposite is true in that right handed players would find it easier learning from a lefty teacher? I see no reason why not…
When I first started playing guitar I always found it easy learning from other players, whether it be in real-life or on the screen. I learned to play using the DVD course from MetalMethod (actually, come to think of it, it was VHS – jeez!) and never thought twice about the difference it made being left handed and using those lessons – I just got on with it.
Years later I realised that the reason I found guitar so simple to learn from other players was because I was playing left handed, and for the most part they were playing right handed. The instructor would appear on screen perfectly mirroring my position, making it very simple to mimic what they were playing.
Now flip this idea on its head – I find learning from another left handed player more difficult. And not even slightly more difficult – it’s blatantly much harder (for me personally). Without the help of the mirror effect, I’m glancing to the right on screen to be seeing what I should be playing on the left on my own guitar, and vice versa. Even if the player was sitting next to me I would still be giving myself a sore neck constantly turning to the side.
Do Left Handed Guitarists Make the Best Teachers?
So taking all of that on board, doesn’t it make sense to suggest that lefty players will make the best teachers for the right handed majority? As a southpaw, if I find it so much easier learning from a right handed teacher, then doesn’t it make sense that right handed players would experience the same effect learning from a lefty tutor? Seeing as right handed players are probably 95% of the market, doesn’t it make sense to cater to them?
To illustrate my point here is a screen grab from one of Justin Sandercoe’s YouTube lessons. In the first image he is right handed, and in the second he is left handed – which one would you find easier to follow? Maybe it’s just me, but the mirror effect wins every time – as a lefty, image one is my choice. Would a righty pick image two? Ask your friends…
Theodore Tziras is a monster player who is left handed, but when he makes a video lesson for his YouTube channel he always flips the image so that he appears right handed. He says he does this so as not to confuse people, but I honestly think that if he left the video untouched it would be so much easier to follow for right handed players. Perhaps right handed players are just so used to 95% of lessons being presented by right handed players that they’ve never experienced the revelation of following an opposite handed player.
Would you agree or disagree with my opinion? I think this concept is just a massive advantage to both left handed players and teachers. Not only can we learn from right handed teachers with ease, but we can also teach the right handed majority no sweat (as long as you sit opposite your student). Great news for all of you budding left handed guitar teachers out there!
Let me know what you think in the comments section below – do you agree or disagree with what I’ve said. Ask your right handed friends to consider this idea and see what they think as well.
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