Where to learn Theory for beginners

To Learn guitar Music theory, Stringed instruments in general and guitar specifically are the perfect slide rules.

Now most who want to learn guitar will read this and have no clue what a slide rule is so maybe that is a bad analogy.
But my point is that to learn guitar, guitar and stringed instruments are setup to take advantage of music theory.

So I think it is essential that learning guitar music theory is something to be learned from the very beginning.

When you learn guitar scales are in physical patterns.
when you learn guitar chords are in physical patterns.
These patterns represent music thoery.
That is why there are chord charts and scale charts in addition
to classic music notation.

Scales on a guitar can be learned as forms and each form
can be used for any key signature.

On the piano, organ, wind instrument (oboeor, clarinet, flute etc.) or brass (trumpet, trombone, tuba, etc.) scales
for each key are a completely different fingering.

Early guitar instruction came from the classical school. Any one who took a lesson and
was told to go out and get a Mel Bay book was taught in the classical tradition.

But most guitar players want to learn non-classical guitar and in this day of instant gratification
want to learn guitar songs fast.

And Basic Music theory is simple.

Perhaps they should be renamed Music Rules so people are not freaked out!

Say the word theory andn the first thing people think is:

I'm not a GEEK I can't learn that!

But Music theory is as simple as counting to 7

The major scale is ONLY 7 notes.

Do = 1
re = 2
mi = 3
fa = 4
so = 5
la = 6
ti = 7

Once you have this basic concept down it is a matter of combining
and rearranging these 7 notes.

In applying them to the guitar the simplest method is using the
CAGED system. You can learn more about that here:

http://www.guitar5day.com/tufg.html

I would love to hear where people are getting stuck in understanding theory while they learn guitar.

I wouldn't suggest using the CAGED system, its not the simplest way to look at things.

I agree. Pattern based methods are limiting for understanding theory.

Guitar5day is also off historically, and if we're going to talk about why standard notation or CAGED and other patterns are better for learning theory, the historical context will help explain things.

Western notation started off with the dots and squiggles of neumes to represent notes. At that time, music was monophonic - single notes - and it really didn't matter how it was written; there wasn't much in the way of music theory*

Around the 11th century, free organum began to develop - two moving voices. Now we at least had intervals to play with; at this point we have intervals, and music theory as we know it can get under way.

At about the same time, fretted instruments start appearing in Europe. Wherever fretted instrument are, you find tablature - and tablature in Europe goes back to at least 1300. Older tab probably existed in Europe but hasn't survived; other cultures with earlier fretted instruments have older examples.

Most of the Renaissance lute music that's been transcribed for the guitar was originally written in tab. Tab isn't the result of some modern desire for instant results - it grew from the patterns that naturally occur on all fretted instruments.

Now this early music used only 'natural' notes - the letter names. Accidentals were slow to develop, with Bb appearing first. Fretted instruments used moveable frets (they were tied around the fingerboard), and if you wanted to play in what ended up becoming the 'key of F', you simply moved your frets a bit.

This early music didn't recognize the "key" concept of music theory: scales and keys use notes differently. Music was either musica recta ("right music", which used B natural) or musica ficta ("false music", which used Bb).

Up until this point, music theory was really as simple as guitar5day says - counting to 7. With only 7 notes, tablature was widespread... for ALL instruments. Keyboards used note letter names, lutes used scale step numbers.

Then music changed.

Around the 15th century, F# was invented. Up until then, Bb could have been seen as an abberation used in certain pieces, and tablature included various notations to tell a performer when a fret should be moved. Once we had the understanding that any note could be raised or lowered, the idea of using other keys could develop - at this point, music theory really takes off, and tablature begins dying out.

That's because the central ideas of music theory from the Renaissance through the Romantic period developed around the concept of tonality - how sounds relate to the tonic, the beginning of the scale used. Because standard notation allows for enharmonic notes, you can differentiate between Bb and A# - they are different NOTES. (Prior to the development of temperament, they were different sounds too - early keyboards had split black keys so you could play the correct pitch as needed).

Numerical tablature can't identify the note. The third fret of the third string identifies only finger placement. In some ways that's enough, since a finger placement generates a PITCH - about 233 vibrations per second for that Bb - but understanding theory requires identifying the NOTE. At times that note will be Bb, at other times that note will be A#, and on rare occasions that note will be Cbb**

For performance, tablature has a much shorter learning curve than standard notation, and for that reason tab regained popularity for the guitar beginning in the 1970s. But for learning music theory, tablature is limited to diatonic structures - the ones where you can count to seven. It will not help you compare the structure of chromatic pieces, because it does not identify note relationships to the tonic. Tablature limits your understanding of music theory to what was understood about six centuries ago.

Standard notation has its shortcomings for theory too, especially in some styles of post-Romantic music. Atonal music is difficult to grasp through standard notation, because standard notation (and the associated "common practice" period of music theory) grew up to write and classify tonal music. Ironically, tablature methods are better at analyzing this music than standard notation is - because this music is organized by pitch relationships, rather than note relationships.

But here guitar tablature is completely unsuitable for the task. The tablature methods being used by theorists like Alan Forte assign numbers to pitches - if you decide that 3rd fret Bb should be "3", that same number "3" must be used for all matching pitches - so you'll need another "3" at the 8th fret of the 4th string, and so on.

If all you ever want to do with music is play diatonic stuff, pattern systems will allow you to grasp "applied" theory. But if you want to understand "music theory" you'll barely be scratching the surface, and you'll reach a point where standard notation is required.

*- earlier music theory existed, but developed into today's science of acoustics; modern music theory really dates to the development of free organum, which eventually became counterpoint.

**- in tertian harmony, a chord like Ebº is properly spelled Eb-G-Bbb, and a chord like B+ is spelled B-D#-Fx; these are often written enharmonically for performance, but seeing the underlying theory requires the use of double accidentals.

I wouldnt call them "Music rules" either

Its like painting, a painter uses a bunch of colors red, green, white, black. He uses these labels on his colors so he knows what he's done and can communicate with other people. "You used a little too much yellow" He can mix these colors to make more colors (harmony).

Learning intervals is like naming all of your colors so you can reach into your bag and pull out the one you want when you want it.

Using standard notation gives you a visual easy to write symbol to associate with any sounds you might make.

I wouldnt call them "Music rules" either

I agree. That term suggests a very dry and authoritative, "Do it this way and don't ask questions" kind of approach, whereas "theory" feels like an honest enquiry into the fascinating nature of music.

It suggests something that is continually evolving and modifying itself in the light of new discoveries both artistic and scientific.

CAGED is named really appropriately also. You can tell in 10 seconds if a guitarist uses them, you can see the patterns etched out on their fretboard as they move strait up and down the scale, sometimes avoiding the 4ths and 7ths entirely.

Of course most people will think this sounds incredible, especially if it's fast.

Using tabs and patterns you will sound alright in a relatively short period of time. And then you will sound alright, and in 5 years you'll probably still sound alright.

It only takes about a year to get comfortable with the physical aspect of playing the guitar, then the question becomes what to play. If all you ever do is use tabs and never understand the structure of the music your learning, your not really learning anything when you learn that solo at the end of your favorite song.

hi - new guy here.

i like the system of using numbers rather than letter or solfeggio names. it's especially well suited on the guitar, since you can take these numbers and slide them up and down the neck and apply what you learn in one key to every other key. anyway, when you play a 7 or a b7 and you think "7" or "b7" in your mind, it reinforces ear training. does that make sense?

at any rate, there's an article or 2 on a website addressing modes at http://modes4guitar.com that might be worth reading, if anyone's interested.

hi me again i was just reading this post and im lost as to what makes a position, box or a pattern like i thought while playing in position 1 you would be on the 1st fret, then 2nd fret for 2nd position ect.like how does one figure out where the postions are also does this all change in different scales aswell?

quote="


A Minor Pentatonic/ C Major Pentatonic 1st postion
e-------------------------------5--8-
b-------------------------5--8-------
g-------------------5--7-------------
d-------------5--7-------------------
a-------5--7-------------------------
e-5--8-------------------------------

A Minor Pentatonic/ C Major Pentatonic 5th postion
e-------------------------------3--5-
b-------------------------3--5-------
g-------------------2--5-------------
d-------------2--5-------------------
a-------3--5-------------------------
e-3--5-------------------------------


.

Now this early music used only 'natural' notes - the letter names. Accidentals were slow to develop, with Bb appearing first. Fretted instruments used moveable frets (they were tied around the fingerboard), and if you wanted to play in what ended up becoming the 'key of F', you simply moved your frets a bit.

Around the 15th century, F# was invented. Up until then, Bb could have been seen as an abberation used in certain pieces, and tablature included various notations to tell a performer when a fret should be moved. Once we had the understanding that any note could be raised or lowered, the idea of using other keys could develop - at this point, music theory really takes off, and tablature begins dying out.

This might well be pointless, and I'm gonna have to read this thread in full at some point, but............

why Bb?

If, like me, you've gotten really used to the notes and note-names of current western music - i.e. what's on a keyboard with the addition of occasionally bending slightly sharp on a guitar, this just seems really odd. like, how did we 'invent' the seven notes, and then later 'invent' Bb? And why Bb? Why was that the first accidental, and not Fsharp? Or Eb? And why have we stopped inventing accidentals? Can't we invent more of them? (I'm aware of microtonal stuff, I just don't get how the modern keyboard came to be, that's what is bugging me about this).

Pointless question, yes. But I'm bloody curious.......

hi me again i was just reading this post and im lost as to what makes a position, box or a pattern like i thought while playing in position 1 you would be on the 1st fret, then 2nd fret for 2nd position ect.like how does one figure out where the postions are also does this all change in different scales aswell?

quote="


A Minor Pentatonic/ C Major Pentatonic 1st postion
e-------------------------------5--8-
b-------------------------5--8-------
g-------------------5--7-------------
d-------------5--7-------------------
a-------5--7-------------------------
e-5--8-------------------------------

A Minor Pentatonic/ C Major Pentatonic 5th postion
e-------------------------------3--5-
b-------------------------3--5-------
g-------------------2--5-------------
d-------------2--5-------------------
a-------3--5-------------------------
e-3--5-------------------------------


.

This is where nomenclature gets confused. What he was trying to say is "1st pattern". 1st position is as you have learnt it.
There are 5 patterns, which are numbered 1 to 5 - there was a thread, a couple of weeks ago, where there was even a discussion on which is pattern 1!

chopzy, I have a problem with your nomenclature. When I see b7, I see an extension to a chord, not a scale degree. As soon as you get into the world of tab, you have the immediate confusion of whether it's a fret or a scale degree, that's being referred to. But that's maybe just me

Someone said "Music rules" instead of theory. No chance! Music theory is the grammar of music. It is the condensed knowledge of musicians, spanning many centuries. It is their hard-earned experience, laid down in writing (but not in stone)for others to benefit from.
Music theory says "We have found this to be the best way to do this (whatever it maybe)". It does not say that there is only one way for something to be done.
When you learn guitar scales are in physical patterns.
Yes....and no. Yes, the physical patterns are a result of scale construction, not the other way around. Your "rule" falls apart, as soon as the guitar is in anything but standard tuning.
when you learn guitar chords are in physical patterns.
Yes, but, again, they are in patterns because of the construction of the scales being used. The chord patterns have not determined the scale construction.
These patterns represent music thoery.
That is like saying that a diagram of a car represents automotive construction.
From the patterns, alone, it is impossible to discern the theory behind them. It is only by knowing the theory that the patterns make any sense.
Sorry, if I sound to be nit-picking, but, to me, your phraseology gives precedence to the patterns and not to the underlying theory. The patterns, themselves, are a contextless application of theory. For the most part, patterns don't even bother to show the root, so I have 7 choices of scale, from which to choose - major, relative minor (of a different major scale), or one of 5 modes (Ionian and Aeolian have already been mentioned).
Scales on a guitar can be learned as forms and each form can be used for any key signature.
Learning patterns and their associated root notes, will give you the ability to play the patterns in any key. It will not teach you any theory whatsoever and it will not teach you any scales, because they don't teach you note names or intervals.
Again, the patterns (or forms) fall down as soon as you leave standard notation. It is only by knowing the notes and intervals and how they apply to the fretboard, that you can move into alternate tunings.

All in all, patterns are a very blinkered view of guitar playing.

This might well be pointless, and I'm gonna have to read this thread in full at some point, but............

why Bb?

If, like me, you've gotten really used to the notes and note-names of current western music - i.e. what's on a keyboard with the addition of occasionally bending slightly sharp on a guitar, this just seems really odd. like, how did we 'invent' the seven notes, and then later 'invent' Bb? And why Bb? Why was that the first accidental, and not Fsharp? Or Eb? And why have we stopped inventing accidentals? Can't we invent more of them? (I'm aware of microtonal stuff, I just don't get how the modern keyboard came to be, that's what is bugging me about this).

Pointless question, yes. But I'm bloody curious.......

I'll try to satisfy your curiosity, Scrybe...

Melodies came first. People sang stuff, and they didn't really care about note names. But a few thousand years ago, music moved beyond mere vocalization and instrumentalists started to pop up. With an instrument, it becomes handy to have names for the notes - it's quicker to accurately communicate than "play it like this" followed by a demonstration.

We could have used numbers, but people chose letters instead... giving one letter to each note. The range of instruments then was roughly two octaves, and (at least in the Western tradition) the sung melodies were pretty well contained within the diatonic scale - so the ancient Greeks had about 15 different letter names to describe notes.

They started to figure out other stuff too - Pythagoras realized that some notes were vibrational multiples of others. But they didn't recognize octaves by the same name - that happened somewhere around the 5th century CE.

And right about that time, church music - Gregorian chant - was really getting rolling. Gregorian chant used eight basic scales, four of which survive today (as the Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, and Mixolydian modes). The other four were identical to these, but had a different melodic cadence - they called these by "hypo" names, as in Hypodorian - a distinction we don't use anymore, as we've come up with other ways to describe melodic elements.

Anyway, the Lydian mode starts out F-G-A-B. But that sounds a bit odd, and singers sometimes adjusted by singing that fourth note a bit flat. By the 11th century music theorists were discussing this problem, calling the series F-G-A-B as "musica recta" (right music) and the series F-G-A-Bb as "musica ficta" (false music). Over the next couple of centuries they started to codify when notes should be sung as written, and when they shouldn't.

With two B notes, they needed a way to talk about them. They started out calling the written B as "B quadratum" (square B), and the musica ficta version as "B rotundum" (round B). This ended up evolving into a musical shorthand, with text discussions showing b for round B, and a squared-off version for the "hard" B.

This notation eventually found its way into the staff - the round B is our modern flat sign. Square B ended up becoming our natural sign - some folks believe the downward stroke of the natural symbol is the result of sloppy penmanship... it was supposed to be a square B, but the pen nib just kept going.

Anyway, that's why the flat came first, and why it ended up being Bb. Sharps were added in the middle of the 15th century, probably by Josquin des Pres - he used an F# note. The logic he used in creating the symbol was that if a note could be lowered, you could also think of it as raising the note below... and he used a natural sign with an "X" drawn through it to get this idea across. That evolved into our sharp symbol.

It only took another hundred years or so before we had the full chromatic gamut.

Thanks Noteboat. I find the history info to be so interesting.

Thanks Noteboat. I find the history info to be so interesting.

+1

Satisfied (for the next ten minutes, anyway).

Edit: I see NoteBoat's beaten me to it - but I'll post my answer to Scrybe's question anyway.
Even older than the 7 note arrangement that we inherited, is the 5 note 'pentatonic scale'. It has been found in virtually all cultures, ancient and modern which suggested that the notes, or rather the intervals between the notes, have a special acoustic relationship, to which people naturally responded, similar to the way we respond easily to visual patterns such as circles, triangles, etc. (hence, constructions such as Stonehenge and the pyramids).
Six and seven note scales are assumed to be a natural expansion of the 5 note scales, although no historical evidence exists to support or refute that.

Pythagorus, around 500 BC, set about studying the relationships between the notes that songs consisted of on his 'one string instrument' (he wasn't much of a guitarist) and discovered that there was indeed a relationship between the notes that people used when singing, the most important being that what we now call the octave was produced if the string length was exactly halved. Other 'good notes' were also found to be produced by string lengths that had simple ratios. The Greeks then set about standardising these pitch relationships and came up with various arrangements to which they could standardise the tuning of their 4 string lyres and other instruments. Combining these so-called tetrachords would produce an 8 note arrangement, with the eighth note being the octave.

Moving on a thousand years or so, the seven note arrangement (or 8, if you count the octave) was firmly established and served its purpose well for composing purely melodic music.
But then harmony came along when 'Church composers' (mostly monks) started combining notes that were spaced 5 notes apart and found that they produced a powerful effect that soon became standard.
But there was one horrible exception. Combining the notes B& F didn't work. That's because the distance between B & F isn't the same as any of the other pairs like C & G. Unlike those pairs that sounded (and were called) 'perfect', B& F was 'diminished' and thought to be the work of the Devil.

This was a major nuisance for composers who sought to avoid that interval at all costs. The solution at first was to either avoid the interval completely or to direct the church choirs to sing the note B a shade lower so that the interval was then enlarged and sounded perfect again, even though it wasn't strictly B. (called musica ficta, i.e., false music)
Later, composers indicated that change in written music by writing the note name b instead of B. So the note B flat was officially born and introduced into keyboards. Later still, the lower case 'b' came to mean any note that was similarly lowered and is now our flat sign.

cheers Fretsource, that added to Noteboat's explan sufficiently to dispel any queries for now. :D

Except one..........

If the B-F 'diminished' interval is the work of the devil...............why weren't diminished chords used heavily by Robert Johnson?

j/p :roll: