Main description:

An escapist manifesto for the life-changing benefits of playing the guitar

Research shows that guitar playing helps you live longer, be fitter, feel happier, earn more, reduce stress and stimulate creativity. So why do so many people give up the guitar, lamenting that they 'lack the talent', or just never progress?

In The Way of the Guitar, virtuoso classical guitarist Stewart French argues that where most people go wrong is to mix up playing the guitar with actually learning the guitar. The incredible physical and psychological benefits that guitar-playing has to offer don't come about through occasionally strumming along to Hotel California. Instead, he argues that it is the process of acquiring the unique skillset involved in guitar-playing that leads to true fulfilment and wellbeing.

Using scientific evidence, analysis, interviews and his own story of growth and achievement, French explains how training the body - and quieting the mind - is the only enjoyable, effective and fast way to begin the journey into a life of guitar-playing. And by providing a complete, detailed blueprint for how to hack the guitar with a radical five-step approach, he shows how the joy of physical learning can jump-start a lifelong adventure in music, creativity and wellbeing.