Accessible Guitar

A complete guitar method for sight impaired and aural learners. It is taught entirely by ear and by feel, works natively with VoiceOver, NVDA, and JAWS, and requires no sheet music.

The method

Most guitar instruction assumes you can see a chord chart, a page of tablature, or your teacher's hands. This curriculum does not. Every concept is taught through sound and touch, in an order built for screen reader users, so a sight impaired student can learn independently from the very first lesson.

It grows out of decades of teaching and performance, and has been refined hands-on with real students.

Why it is different

• Screen-reader native. Designed for VoiceOver, NVDA, and JAWS from the start, not a printed book with audio added on afterward.
• Ear and touch first. Real fretboard fluency is built through sound and feel, without depending on written notation.
• Independent or guided. It works for solo learners and within lessons led by a sighted or sight impaired instructor.
• Proven in practice. Created by a Berklee faculty guitarist and tested with real students.

How it works

1. Start with sound. Students get to know the instrument through touch, finding the strings, frets, and physical landmarks of the guitar, tuning by ear, and learning to hear the relationships between notes. Orientation comes from listening and feeling, not from looking at a page.
2. Build technique through touch. Fingerstyle technique is introduced step by step: right-hand patterns, fretting-hand position, and clean tone, developed through repetition and muscle memory. Every instruction is described in words a screen reader can carry, so nothing depends on watching a demonstration.
3. Play real music early. Skills are applied to actual songs from the start. Through call-and-response and learning by ear, students make real music within the first lessons rather than waiting until they have mastered notation.
4. Grow toward independence. As fluency grows, the curriculum opens into chord vocabulary, improvisation, and composition, giving students the tools to explore, arrange, and create on their own terms.

What people say

"This is absolutely the best accessible curriculum available."

The curriculum has been piloted and demonstrated in collaboration with the Perkins School for the Blind, refined hands-on with educators and students who learn by ear.

Get started

Whether you are a learner, a music educator, or a school for sight impaired students, Bobby would be glad to show you the method. Use the form below to get in touch.