Music Theory Thread

OK, I'll copy in my posts from the other thread which explain a few of the basics. If anyone has any more questions, shoot them up here and if it's something I know a bit about, I'll try to answer in relatively simple terms. I see that a lot of the explanations on the net quickly use a lot of specialist jargon that not everyone will understand.

My first post was about scales...

I'll try to explain the relationship between the major scale and all of the notes. A scale is simply a collection of notes that sound pleasing to our ears in relation to one another. There are fixed mathematical relations between the notes, as I alluded to briefly before, but I won't go into that (and I don't know much about it either).

There are 12 different notes in an octave, with the octave note (e.g. the top C if you start from a lower C) being the 13th. Each of these notes is a semitone apart (semitone = 1 fret). So the full chromatic scale contains all of the notes like this:
C - C# - D - D# - E - F - F# - G - G# - A - A# - B - C
I used only sharp signs to avoid getting into the subject of sharps and flats. You don't normally see some of these, particularly A# for example which is usually written as Bb, but they are the same note.

Secondly, we have the major scale which contains a subset of these notes, 7 of them (8 with the top C again), which make a more pleasing set. These are:
C - D - E - F - G - A - B - C
To make this scale, we have dropped all of the sharp notes, which are the black notes on a piano.

Thirdly, we have a scale that is more familiar for guitarists, the pentatonic scale. Pentatonic means "five tones", and a pentatonic scale contains five notes out of the twelve (plus the octave). The most commonly used pentatonic scale on the guitar is a minor scale, not a major one, and this is the minor pentatonic scale in C:
C - D# - F - G - A# - C

Lastly, there are the infamous arpeggios, which form another scale with only three notes. The basic major arpeggio is as follows:
C - E - G - C

Arpeggios are where we make the link into chords. The three notes of an arpeggio are called a triad and these three notes make a major chord. If you play a C chord on the guitar (x-3-2-o-1-0) they are all Cs, Es and Gs (the corresponding notes are x-C-E-G-C-E). Therefore a major chord is simply a major arpeggio with all of the notes played together, and usually with one or more of them duplicated. Generally, the lowest pitched note in a chord should be the root note (i.e. the first note in the scale) - that's why we don't play the bottom E string in a C chord, even though E is one of the arpeggio notes. A triad with a different bottom note from the root is called an inversion.

As you may have spotted, there are many variations on these scales. The variants of the major scale are the modes which you may have heard of - Lydian, Aeolian, Phrygian etc. These modes are simply a different selection of notes that makes a different sounding scale. Similarly, there are the different pentatonic scales, although they all use the same notes (a major pentatonic is the same as a minor pentatonic, but the root note is the next one up, i.e. the C minor pentatonic earlier is the same as a D# major pentatonic). Similarly, there are variants on the arpeggios and chords, changing notes or adding extra notes in (such as a 7th). All of that gets very complicated, though, and I just wanted to cover the basics here.

Finally, to answer the question about "why is that a perfect fifth", the interval from C to G is a fifth because it spans five notes on the major scale (C-D-E-F-G), which is the scale of reference for intervals. Intervals are another topic, though, and this is already too long! :)
 
Scales, mathematical relationships and tuning

I didn't realise before today that the scales are not actually consistent, which I've been reading about. In other words, the notes of the chromatic scale in C are not the same as the chromatic scale for A, for example. I will try to briefly explain this mathematically.

I already mentioned that an octave is a 2 to 1 ratio of frequencies, i.e. an octave above your root note is twice the frequency. If we take a base frequency of 100 Hz (about 1.5 octaves below middle C), an octave above that will be 200 Hz. Similarly, a perfect fifth is a ratio of 3:2, i.e. a fifth above our 100 Hz root note is 150 Hz. This, by extension, gives us the ratio for a perfect fourth, which is 4:3, i.e. 200 Hz to 150 Hz (going up from our fifth note to the octave note instead of down, i.e. G - C instead of C - G).

The next most common "pleasing" interval is a major third. Surprise surprise, this is also a very simple mathematical ratio - this time it's 5:4. Hence a major third above 100 Hz is 125 Hz.

All of the other notes on the chromatic scale have similar, relatively simple ratios. I won't go into all of them but I found this article which explains it well. I'll just mention a major sixth (C - A), which is a ratio of 5:3, and I'll explain why.

In the examples below, I'm going to pretend that 100 Hz is a C on the major scale. It's not, but I will do this to make the calculations easier and so that I can label the notes more easily!

Taking our 100 Hz "pretend C" root note, a major sixth above that (the A) will be 100 * 5 / 3, i.e. 166.7 Hz. A is also three notes along the circle of fifths - i.e. it's the fifth of the fifth of the fifth (the circle goes C - G - D - A etc with each note being the fifth of the previous one). But the maths breaks down.

Let's work out the notes in the circle of fifths using two methods. For the first 5th, G, we just apply the 3:2 ratio, so that's 150 Hz. That's easy, no problem.

The second note is D, a fifth above the G. If we calculate 150% of the G, that makes 225 Hz. A major second is a ratio of 9:8, so to calculate this D from our 100 Hz C, we do the following:
100 * 2 (an octave up) = 200 * 9/8 (the second) = 225 Hz.

Great, both of these agree. Let's go up another 5th to the A above that. Firstly, a fifth above the 225 Hz note is 225 * 150%, i.e. 337.5 Hz. But if we start from the C and use the major sixth ratio (5:3), we get the following:
100 * 2 (octave up) * 5 / 3 (major 6th) = 333.3 Hz

Oops!

This difference illustrates the problem of tempering of scales. It arises because the ratios between the notes on one scale don't give the same results as the ratios of the notes on another scale, i.e. some of the notes on a C scale are not actually the same as the notes on, for example, a scale in Eb. This is why there are different ways of tuning instruments like guitars or pianos to try to compensate. On some instruments, particularly brass instruments, this is simply not possible since they just a few valves and are tuned to a specific scale. This is also why the frets on a guitar are an approximation, and why we have seen a strange tempered fretboard on some guitars (the True Temperament system that someone noticed a while ago). Even that won't solve the problem, because it's just a different way of choosing your note tunings.
 
'Perfect' intervals

A bit of reading reveals that the term "perfect" goes back to Pythagoras, and nobody really knows why he termed these intervals perfect, but the bare bones are as follows. Firstly, there are actually four "perfect" intervals - unison (two of the same note), fourth, fifth and octave. These are the simplest ratios - 1:1, 4:3, 3:2 and 2:1 respectively. A perfect fifth (C to G) is 150%, and a perfect fourth is its inversion (G to C, i.e. 150 to 200 in our "C=100" scale).
All other intervals, when inverted, switch from Major to Minor as follows:
Major 2nd - Minor 7th (C-D, D-C)
Major 3rd - Minor 6th (C-E, E-C)
Major 6th - Minor 3rd (C-A, A-C)
Major 7th - Minor 2nd (C-B, B-C)
Also, as in my previous message, the tunings of the other notes will tend to be approximations due to the fact that we want to play in different keys on the same instrument.
 
The Problem of Guitar Tuning

I mentioned that guitar tuning is problematic because the intervals don't always add up, and I thought I'd show how that works out mathematically. Guitar strings are pitched either a perfect 4th (5 frets) or a major 3rd (4 frets) apart, and the ratios of frequencies are 4:3 (perfect 4th) and 5:4 (major 3rd). Therefore we multiply the frequency of each string's open note by the appropriate ratio to get the frequency of the next string's open note.

The bottom and top strings of a guitar are two octaves apart, which means doubling the frequency twice. The frequency of the low E on a guitar is actually 82.4 Hz, if we use A440 tuning, but we will stick with my notional base note of 100 Hz (it's not so far out anyway, that's about 3 or 4 semitones higher). Hence the top string should be at 400 Hz.

So if we go up string by string, we get the following:
E - Pitch of lowest string = 100
A - Up a fourth (4/3) = 133.3
D - Up a fourth (4/3) = 177.8
G - Up a fourth (4/3) = 237.0
B - Up a third (5/4) = 296.3
E - Up a fourth (4/3) = 395.1

So we reach 395 Hz instead of 400 Hz, which is about a fifth of a semitone out. And that's why you can't tune your guitar! :)
 
The Circle of Fifths

This was the original question that started the discussion and I've posted it a bit out of order but hopefully this isn't a bad place to address the infamous Circle of Fifths.

The Wikipedia page on the Circle of Fifths explains the theory, but with quite a lot of musical jargon and so anyone without at least some knowledge of theory is going to get lost.

To try to explain the basics, the Circle of Fifths is just a representation of all of the possible key signatures, showing the closest relationships between them. It's called the Circle of Fifths because (a) the interval between each note and the next is a perfect fifth (7 semitones, e.g. C to G), and (b) if you keep jumping by a fifth, you go through all 12 notes before you end back on your starting note (hence the circle).

So the full sequence is:
C - G - D - A - E - B - F# - C# - Ab - Eb - Bb - F - C (back to the original note)

The sharps or flats can be expressed differently, i.e. F# can be written as Gb, but what I used here is generally the most common notation.

You probably know that an octave represents a doubling of the frequency of the sound waves. Hence the classic A440 tuning uses 440 hertz as the base A note - that's the A above Middle C on a piano. The A an octave above that is therefore 880 Hz. A fifth is half way between the two, i.e. 150% of the frequency, so the D above that A is 660 Hz.

BUT.....that's not quite true. If you follow the circle right round to the original note again, going up a fifth each time, you end up 7 octaves higher. If you do this mathematically, starting from a note of 100 Hz and increasing by 50% 12 times, you reach 12,975 Hz. If you go up the octaves, doubling it seven times, you reach 12,800 Hz. So-called "true tempering" adjusts the intervals to resolve this problem. Note that this is also why it's so hard to tune a guitar by tuning to the string below - essentially, the maths doesn't quite work (don't ask me why!).

A key fact about moving up a fifth is that you only need to change one note in the scale to do that. To illustrate, here are the notes of a C Major scale:
C D E F G A B C................and now a G Major scale, which is next to it on the circle:
G A B C D E F# G
You can see that the only note that's different is the F#. This progression continues around the circle, adding a sharp each time - F#, C#, G#, D#, A#, etc. The notation switches to flats half way through, but that's only a convention of notation which is a consequence of the choice of C Major as the basic scale with no accidentals (sharps or flats).

This means that shifting a fifth is harmonically very easy, since only one note changes, and only by a semitone. The same is true when you go up a perfect 4th, but this time one of the notes is flattened (going from C to F is achieved by changing the B to a Bb). That's why these three chords (I, IV and V - upper case numerals indicating major chords) are the base of a lot of simple harmony.
 
So we reach 395 Hz instead of 400 Hz, which is about a fifth of a semitone out. And that's why you can't tune your guitar! :)

Ah that explains all my problems, if the guitar was in tune I'm sure I'd learn a lot faster. :D

The old tutor was a bit like your's Sean. We would dip in and out of bits of theory as we went along, which I'd often find over my head and forget about a few weeks later. My new tutor is completely the opposite and every lesson is based around the modes.

Don't think we have had a lesson where we haven't referred to the following chart. On the plus side some of it seems to be going in, although my daughter is learning as quickly as me :)

MAJOR SCALES.jpg
 
The modes were one of the first things that my tutor taught me years ago, a lot to do with improving finger dexterity playing them rather than anything else.

If I remember rightly modes are basically the scale starting from the next not along. I think :)

SO Ionian (Major) would start with C as the root, the next one would start with D and so on. Please correct me if I've got that wrong, it was a long while ago :)
 
Yep I learnt it pretty early and left it but my current guy gets us to work everything out on this chart. I'll try and explain but it hurts my head, it's easier in the lessons as the guy corrects me when I get it wrong.

One example is that it's easy to overlay the chart to work out what notes are in a scale. So using D as an example that is position 2 which which is the Dorian scale, if you want to know which notes are sharp simply overlay the Ionian. So the 3rd is higher (F#) and 7th is higher (C#). Likewise for F which is position 4 the Lydian, if you overlay the Ionian there is only one difference a flattened 4th (Bb).

Using the same diagram you can also work out if a song has the chords D major, C major and G major then the key is likely to be G. Looking at the chart only 1, 4, 5 don't have a flattened third (i.e. half step) so it is a major chord as per the I,II,III,IV,V,VI,VII (Maj,min,min,Maj,Maj,Dim7) rule. If we tried C then D would be minor and for G it would be C minor. However if the lead is played in a different key for example mixolydian then this would then become D Mixolydian instead of G Ionian as starting from G the Mixolydian is at the 5th position (i.e. G+5 = D).

On a similar point by adding a couple more notes into the pentatonic you can change the feel of a lead piece. Aeolian and Dorian for example as these only add two extra notes and one of them is the same. My instructor explained some rules around chords which beats me if I can remember, but it was something about it can sound better if the notes match the chord progression. So if the progression changes it can be easy to switch modes if the chord notes are in the scale. A bit over my head as I can never remember the notes in a chord and scale at the same time.

I'm still picking this up so if it sounds a bit confused it is and happy to be corrected where I've misunderstood...probably all of it :laugh:
 
Barre Chords pt 1

I've been messing around a little with barre chords and thought it would be useful to try to tie them together a bit. You probably already know that the three most basic chords are the I, IV and V - that is the root, fourth and fifth (major) chords. These are also known as the Tonic, Subdominant and Dominant. I thought I'd check how they work out as barre chords, which we've seen in a lot of SOTWs, and it's quite easy.

This will be basic knowledge for some of you, but it might be helpful for others.

The four basic chord shapes

Firstly, you're probably already familiar with the four basic barre chord shapes which are the E, Em (E minor), A and Am shapes. So these are as follows, where the barre is on any chosen fret.

.....E . . . . . . .Em . . . . . . A . . . . . . .Am
1 - - - 1 1 .. 1 - - 1 1 1 .. x 1 - - - 1 .. x 1 - - - 1
- - - 2 - - .. - - - - - - .. x - - - - - .. x - - - 2 -
- 3 4 - - - .. - 3 4 - - - .. x - 2 3 4 - .. x - 3 4 - -
..............................(or 2-2-2)


I hope the above is clear! The x indicates the bass string which is not played on the A shape chords.

Being Status Quo
(i.e. the three chord wonders!)

I mentioned that the three main chords for any key are the I, IV and V chords. These are all major chords so we only use the two major shapes, E and A. Pick anywhere on the fretboard (from fret 2 upwards), and they will be as follows:
I - A shape on your chosen fret
IV - E shape two frets lower down
V - E shape on your original chosen fret

For example, if you want to play in the key of C, you would have:
C major - A shape with the barre on the 3rd fret
F major - E shape with the barre on the 1st fret
G major - E shape with the barre on the 3rd fret

If you want to play in the key of D, you put all of those up two frets, etc. etc.

Later on, I'll show how you add more of the standard chords for any key to these three.

Let me know if this is useful or not...
 
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Nice one Jon, useful and written in a way that's understandable.
 
Wouldn't that be...

For example, if you want to play in the key of C, you would have:
C major - A shape with the barre on the 3rd fret
F major - E shape with the barre on the 1st fret
G major - E shape with the barre on the 3rd fret


Using what I've learned from my lessons today, then if you are using the above, you can simply slide forward two frets from the C and play in A minor pentatonic.

Tutor was also explaining while you play F you can also play the minor of F and same with G. Not sure I really understand but it it sounded fine in the lesson.
 
Was just typing the same when our post popped up Christian :)

The first bit, anyway :)

I wondered if by barre Jon was referring to barring the three strings together in the A shape, whereas when I talk about a barre as in a barre chord, the barre would be the index finger.
 
Wouldn't that be...
Yes, thanks, I've corrected my post.
I wondered if by barre Jon was referring to barring the three strings together in the A shape, whereas when I talk about a barre as in a barre chord, the barre would be the index finger.
I was referring to the barre as the index finger going across the whole fretboard (or 5 of the 6 strings, for the A shapes). The barre for the DGB strings, if you play it that way (as I usually do), is often called a mini-barre, I think.
 
Barre Chords pt 2

With a bit of help, I covered the major barre chords earlier. Of course, focusing on barre chords is a bit misleading since what I'm talking about is the basic chords for each key, but if we figure out how to play them all as barre chords, that means we can play all of the basic chords in any key, just by moving the patterns up or down the fretboard.

The Chords

As a general rule, the chords on notes I, IV and V are played as major chords. The remaining notes, ii iii vi and vii, are minor or diminished chords. The reason for this is quite simple - all of these chords use the notes that are in the scale of your key.

To explain this, it's easiest to look on a keyboard instrument (piano, synthesiser etc) and consider the key of C. This key uses all of the white notes on a piano, and none of the black notes. Each of the standard chords consists of three basic notes, and this is called a triad. These notes may be repeated - for instance, a basic C chord on a guitar (not the barre version) has five notes, including two Cs, two Es and one G. [As an aside, you don't play the bottom string on a C chord, even though it's one of the three notes (an E), because the lowest pitched note should be the root note of the chord.]

Anyway...all of the chords are triads using three notes in the scale, basically your first note and then a third and a fifth above that. For a C chord, that's C E and G, which is a major chord. If you move up to D and play the corresponding three white notes, they are D, F and A. That, however, is a minor chord. I show all of the chords in the key of C below:
I: C E G = Major
II: D F A = Minor
III: E G B = Minor
IV: F A C = Major
V: G B D = Major
VI: A C E = Minor
VII: B D F = Diminished (come again?)
So we have three major chords (I IV and V, as before), three minor chords and a diminished one. What's the difference? Well, this is how you make the chords:
Major = root note + major third (4 semitones up) + minor third (3 semitones up)
Minor = root note + minor third + major third
Diminished = root note + minor chord + minor chord, i.e. the 3rd note is a diminished 5th, not a perfect 5th as in the major and minor chords.

The other four barre chords

I showed in part 1 how to play the three major chords. Now let's find the other four chords. For the minor chords, we'll be using the Em and Am shapes shown in part 1. For reference, I reproduce the four basic chord shapes here.

.....E . . . . . . .Em . . . . . . A . . . . . . .Am
1 - - - 1 1 .. 1 - - 1 1 1 .. x 1 - - - 1 .. x 1 - - - 1
- - - 2 - - .. - - - - - - .. x - - - - - .. x - - - 2 -
- 3 4 - - - .. - 3 4 - - - .. x - 2 3 4 - .. x - 3 4 - -
..............................(or 2-2-2)


Here's where you play the three minor chords. Note that often the minor chords are designated by lower case roman numerals, instead of the upper case for the major chords.
ii: Am shape two frets up from your root chord
iii: Am shape four frets up, or Em shape 3 frets down
vi: Em shape two frets up

Lastly, we have the diminished chord for VII. This is a tricky one and I don't think it's actually used very much. It would be the following shape, played 1 fret down from your root chord.

x 1 - - - x
x - 2 - 3 x
x - - 4 - x


That completes the seven standard chords in the key. After that, you can mix things up by using more complicated chords such as 7ths, suspended chords etc. but I won't go into those here in order to try to keep this digestible.
 
Thanks Jon I learned something there, it makes sense when you look at the chords from the C scale and why VII is diminished now. It has C and F which are a single semitone, no black notes in between.

I do wonder if a lot of this theory stuff makes a lot more sense if you come to it from a Piano rather than a guitar.
 
I do wonder if a lot of this theory stuff makes a lot more sense if you come to it from a Piano rather than a guitar.

Got to be easier I reckon, all the notes are next to each other for a start and the sharps and flats are black.
 
I've always thought of the Quo/12 barre/Rock n Roll 1/4/5 barre progression as:

E barre at any fret, A barre at same fret and A at 2 frets up.

So in G, 3rd fret, you have G, C, D

Amounts to same thing as you described Jon, but seems less higher tone on first Chord.
 
Thanks Jon I learned something there, it makes sense when you look at the chords from the C scale and why VII is diminished now. It has C and F which are a single semitone, no black notes in between.

I do wonder if a lot of this theory stuff makes a lot more sense if you come to it from a Piano rather than a guitar.
I think that some of it is certainly helped by the sort of musical theory that you learn for playing the piano, but I've also found that what I've learnt in the past for piano playing and singing is a very incomplete picture of musical theory. It's very interesting to see things from a different perspective with the guitar.

I still wish I'd pursued more music studies earlier in life. I wanted to do A level music at school but the music teacher wouldn't let me do it. I think it was because he didn't want to run an A level class for just one student, but now I look back and see it as one of those random events which can potentially shape your future.

I did take French A level, even though I was the only student for that at first (snother boy joined the class half way through the first term), and that led me to the offer of a job in Belgium, which has also had a profound impact on my life. C'est la vie!
 
Always feel I'm on delicate ground with theory, never really bothered with it, tried learning the CAGED system a while back, didn't get very far but some of it might be useful to others.

CAGED stands for the open A C D E G chords, B and F are made from barring an A shape (2nd fret) and E shape (1st fret) respectively.

Idea is you barre the rest of the open chords C, D & G, just like you barre E & A. Not exactly nice to barre but hopefully I can give an example or two where they come in useful/open up the fretboard. It's basically 5 different shapes that link up, like pentatonics.

Start with any scale, say E major (C# natural minor, pent blues in C#) along the low E,
01-E-SCALE.jpg

Chords from the notes, using the harmonising pattern already mentioned; Major, minor, minor, Major, Major, minor, diminished. Ignoring the diminished it's either an E major shape, or E minor shape barred.
02-E-CHORDS.jpg

E major scale again, same notes just an octave higher and up/down in one position. There are 5 of these standard positions, look them up:D
03-E-SCALENEW.jpg


I picked this one to start with, calling it 3rd as 3rd position pentatonic fits over it.
Full scale over all strings
04-FULL-SCALE.jpg

Pentatonic notes in same position
05-3RD-PENT.jpg

Using the same harmonising 'Maj, min, min, Maj, Maj, min, dim' but following this scale shape/between 4th-8th frets.
06-CHORDS.jpg

E Major (C shape barred at the 4th fret)
F# minor (Dm at the 4th)
G# minor (Em at the 4th)
A Major (F at the 4th, imagine a capo at the 4th and playing an F barre)
B Major (G at the 4th)
C# minor (Am at the 4th)
D# Diminished (Bdim at the 4th, not often used)

Notes in brackets, C, Dm, Em, F, G, Am, Bdim, same thing if you stuck a capo on the 4th fret and played open chords. Guess this CAGED position is called C as the 1st E Major chord (barred at 4th fret) is C shaped.
07-E-CAGED.jpg


The next E Major/CAGED shape starts at the 7th fret (A shaped). Next E Major after that is barred at the 9th, (G shape) and so on, making up the C A G E D shapes.

The other 4 shapes are a lot harder to go through all 7 chords, but hopefully this one shape might make sense. Bit like pentatonics, start on an easy shape, learn it and expand outwards.

Why is it useful? instead of playing the usual open chords or E/A barres shapes, you can play 2/3/4 strings for harmonsing, arps, hendrix style double/triple note chords, etc, it opens up the fretboard.

I'll try updating this post with a few examples, applying simple chord progressions, different key/scale like G major/natural E minor G D Am/C (Knocking on Heavens Door style, etc).

Edit:: Added a guitar pro file with some CAGED chords/scales, only got the first two shapes down but something to practice.
 

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Too many attached pics so I'll continue here.

Say you have a chord progression, G D C, (G Major, E natural minor, blues in E), two guitarists are playing and you don't want to play the exact same thing. Transpose the previous scale/CAGED shapes up or down the fretboard to the fit the key (E to G is 3 semi-tones so shift everything up 3 frets).
08-G-SCALE.jpg


Pick out the G (C-shaped) D (G-shaped) and C (E-shaped) chords, you could play full chords but C & G shapes aren't nice to barre so I'm going with 4 strings instead. Just harmonising here, as long as the other guitar is playing full chords/root notes it will sound fine (works without root note too, no strict rules). Should have something like this.
09-GCD.jpg

Arpeggiated version, simple enough, works over the G D C chords (attached gp5 file so you hear it over chords).
10-APR.jpg


Like any theory, I'd recommend putting it into practice to make it stick. Pick a song with a simple chord progression (pop music works well), try playing over the top using the above CAGED shape, make your own 3/4 note chord shapes, arpeggios, etc.

I tried it with Lana Del Rey's Born To Die. Recorded the basic open chords G D, C Em as a rhythm track (G-Major/E natural minor scale, same as above). Sounded a bit dull so used CAGED shapes to build a lead with broken chords/arps, my attempt at Hendrix/RHCP style:D.
Lana Del Rey - Born To Die (Rough Rock Rhythm Cover) by badchopsuey | Free Listening on SoundCloud

Think if I spent more time practicing it manually I could learn to do it on the fly, at the moment I'm having to write everything out by hand, was never big on chords. I don't think remembering the names of the chords are that important but recognising the shapes definitely helps.
 

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Whenever I've asked my tutor for recommendations for learning theory, he pretty much says to not try and learn it from a book as it's far too dull and it'll make little sense and it won't stick.

It's much easier trying to actually do it on the guitar as you go. Keep it musical, always.
 
Sounds like good advice :). I watched a few videos on CAGED and didn't really get what it could be used for. Started working it out by hand and it made more sense.

My post was how I approached it (probably back to front:laugh:), might help it click with someone who has looked at it before but not put it into practice:thumbsup:.
 
See as I might as well been reading Japanese on the above posts I thought I would man up and try and get my head around this theory malarkey.

So I bought this which seems highly rated on Amazon. Will see if it helps. Anyone else got it?
 

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I've started reading through this, which I bought a while ago but never really got into. So far it's mostly stuff that I know but I've picked up the odd addition to my knowledge. Later in the book I expect it will all be new to me.
Tonal Harmony: Amazon.co.uk: Stefan Kostka, Dorothy Payne: 9780072852608: Books

It's currently out of print, which is why it's expensive on Amazon now. I can't remember what I paid, but I think it was under £20 at the time.
 
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