Where do we go from here?

[huw]

...But I've noticed those kinds of negative, "I want to play guitar but I don't want to do any work for it." ....threads get ignored. ...

What Mal says is quite true.

I can't speak for anyone other than myself here, but I 've always felt that it's respectful to the thread-starter to, firstly, read what they have written, and, secondly, to answer their specific question(s) rather than just posting everything that I know on the subject.

The 'information overload' thing is not just 'too much' - it's also impolite. At least, that's how I see it. So when someone starts a thread with a variation on the "I don't want to learn theory" riff, then I'll respect that and not waste their time (& mine) with a shit-load of stuff they didn't want.

But if someone comes here and says "I'm learning this song, and there's this thing in it that I don't understand..." then that's my cue: that's a situation where one can say "it works because..." which is a great way to learn things of practical value.

Anyway, I'm rambling a touch here, but basically just echoing Mal's "be careful what you wish for" statement.

 

[DanL]

I agree sheet music seems more intimidating than tabs, but how do you account for rhythm, timing, or skipped beats while reading tabs? If you're not familiar with the song, is it possible to play it correctly given only a tab and no audio to verify the timing? Just curious, this was my biggest concern with tabs and why I stuck mainly to sheet music, but lately I've been working on my ear and don't use either. Go figure.

 

[Kamen_Kaiju]

I can play Tabs with rhythm,..but it's because I look at the timing, the sheet music,...and then I play a little game....


remember the old side scrolling Nintendo games? Metroid? Mario?...remember you'd start running then hit the middle of the screen and your character kind of pushed the background along at the speed you ran?

I treat Tab like that. I pretend there's an invisible line top to bottom that moves at a set speeed. Once you start playing (running) that speed is fixed,..and it's a game of 'Keep Up!'

So I will count to get my bearings initially,..so to speak,...but mostly I just try to Keep Up and hit the note (number) at the same time my Invisible Line crosses over it.

Once you start playing you can generally feel the rhythm.

What makes it tricky is ....idk,..due to the nature of guitar there are things you can do on it that don't really happen in other (trained) instruments. There's stuff you see in lead guitar sheet music you just don't see in other instruments. ..broken fractions.

You can rush and blur licks together in a way that sounds cool to your ears, but on paper looks like a nightmare. It'll be a flurry of like 32nd, 64th notes,..but maybe some are 16th notes and there's like one 8th note in the middle of the run.

...in those instances it really helps to hear the original recording so you can get a feel for the speed of the run and where exactly the urgency and rushing seems to be most pronounced. ...at least that's what works for me. I remember having this problem with SRV music when I was studying him. Because he could rush the beat or drag the beat,..it made it hard to make it "sound right" going just off the paper. You had to listen to it and get a feel for the way he flowed.

But I did after a couple years teach myself to read music, and that made reading the Tab a lot easier,..because I could go back and forth, comparing one to the other.

...I still read Tab better than sheet music though. Sheet music I have to think about a little,..Tab I can just stare at and go on autopilot, my hands know to copy what my eyes see.

It's a 'game' I've been playing since I was 10,..I'd hope I'd be pretty good at it by now.

 

[DanL]

Ha! That's a good way of thinking about it. To be honest sheet music was created for a keyboard and was never intended for the guitar. There are similar octaves for the same note and the trouble of figuring out fingerings makes it nearly impossible to read and perform on the fly like a keyboardist can do.

I might give tabs a try but from my experience I have better success looking at people's hands as they play something. That's how I learned a lot of Hendrix stuff because I couldn't figure it out by ear and all the tabs I found sounded wrong.

I do wish my ear was better, but who doesn't right?

 

[QuarterTone]

So to anyone still reading, is there any advice for moving along at a good pace, without digging too much into the theory side of things? I dont get a massive amount of time to practice, maybe 45mins a day, and dont want it to feel like a chore. Im enjoying the gnr stuff , what scales should i be looking at for this style of music?
My current plan is just to master the blues scale so i can improvise anywhere around the neck to backing tracks. And to continue learning songs in full one by one. See where that takes me.
Any processes that you guys have followed the have given good progress jumps or big turning points? I know everyones different but just looking to broaden my horizons really being a bit of a newb in a sense.

Cheers for reading, hopefully get some interesting feedback

You don't need to dig in too deep to get some good basic practical theory under your belt. Here's a good free website that has some great material:
Welcome To The Essential Guitar Guide

For paid stuff I'd recommend Desi Serna's Fretboard Theory - I got a lot of mileage out of it.

The reason I go right to theory even though you said you don't want to spend much time on it is because, learning theory really helped me out a lot. When I was a kid I tried to self teach myself, and progressed to the point that I learned some Metallica songs from tab books. I never had any clue what I was doing or why, I just learned some basic technical playing ability to reproduce those songs.

After a 15 year break I came back to the guitar 3 years ago and was able to apply some wisdom, maturity, and love of learning to the process. I learned basic theory and it changed everything about my approach. As I began to understand the how and why things work the way they do, it accelerated my learning speed, understanding, and enthusiasm to learn more by leaps and bounds. I am certain it will do the same for you, but you do have to put in some effort.

All that said, yes at minimum you're going to want to learn minor pentatonic and blues scales in all positions cold up and down the neck. Start learning some lead licks and how to connect them as well. All of this will come naturally as you learn songs inside and out. The theory will teach you how to deconstruct the songs you learn down to what key they are in, what scales are used, why, the timing of the songs, what beat you are playing what chord change on, etc.

It all comes together, but I don't think it can without learning just the basics of theory - it couldn't for me anyway. So you are going to need to learn the major scale, basics of chord construction, rythmic subdivisions, etc. As Jimi said, if you work at it you're gonna be rewarded - it's definitely worth it.

 

[MorganPeline]

Don't like TAB....then go for video lessons!!!!

Rock: Rock Guitar Lessons with Paul GIlbert | ArtistWorks

Blues: Blues Guitar Lessons with Keith Wyatt | ArtistWorks

Various: https://truefire.com

And this will teach you how to play the major scale, minor scale, major pentatonic, minor pentatonic and blues scales in all the positions using octaves as a starting point....

Fretboard Phenom - Guitar Lessons - Tom Dempsey - TrueFire

No TAB required....

 

[Apocalyptic]

Some great links and info there guys cheers. What i have been doing since this thread is basically go straight to learning the fretboard. Basics. I found an interesting page which has already explained a few things to me that i just point blank had no idea about. Basics.

So ive been spending my spare time on that at present, and intend to learn the fretboard before then going back to learn the rest of the blues scale.
Should keep me busy for now. Small doses.
Just to reiterate it seems the flow of consensus now points to me being a lazy f**k who wants to be an awesome guitarist without any effort.
Thats not the case, to quote myself
"What i did do is milk the lessons for all they were worth" thats theory right? Even in a fun/easy video format.
"I learned a section of the blues scale" theory again?

"Never had the patience to learn a full song" that was 4 years ago
"Im now concentrating learning full songs one at a time" this is now. Progression?

"Any advice for moving along at a good pace, without digging TOO much into the theory side of things?" Happy to learn theory, dont want to go as far as take a music course etc.

Just wanted to make that clear as i definetly didnt say "i dont want to learn theory". I realise things dont just happen by magic and the more you put in the more you get out etc.

From the video stuff ive used so far ive found a few people whos teaching techniques are very easy to follow and others not so much. I like the usual stuff like marty and justin just because of the ease of availabilty. However i learned a lot of intersting stuff from a guy called mark who has the youtube channel mastertheguitar. Scottish guy, really like his teaching technique. Also this guy danny gill has a teaching style i find really easy to follow, would reccomend a quick look at both of those fellas to anyone.

Il definetly check out the above videos and linkys.

 

[Apocalyptic]

Just that initial page ive started working from
Learn The Guitar Fingerboard Thoroughly in 16 Days

 

[Kamen_Kaiju]

Just to reiterate it seems the flow of consensus now points to me being a lazy f**k who wants to be an awesome guitarist without any effort.
Thats not the case

to be fair you do see a good amount of that in the guitar world.

I call them, "Baby Birds" they want to sit there with their mouth open doing nothing while you pour information down their throat.

 

[JonR]

"Any advice for moving along at a good pace, without digging TOO much into the theory side of things?" Happy to learn theory, dont want to go as far as take a music course etc.

Study songs. Then when you want to how they work, or what the names of all those chords and chord change effects are - that's when you can ask theory questions.

There's no point in studying theory unless you know what each concept sounds like. So you need your guitar (or a keyboard) in hand as you read.
Even when you do understand the sound of each concept (or rather can identify the sound with a theory term), it still won't really make sense until you see it all working in real music.

The problem with studying theory first (or too much) is that you can then find songs which "break the rules". You look at a song and wonder what that "wrong" chord is doing there. That's putting the cart before the horse.
The chord is right. The sounds are always right (assuming they sound right). The theory comes later.
If you think rules are being broken, that's because you're applying the wrong rules (you haven't read that bit of theory yet that explains it).

Always remember that the greatest pop/rock songwriters never studied theory (except maybe the very basics, that you probably already know). They just studied songs: 100s of them.

The best use of theory is to enable musicians to discuss music with each other - to give us words for the sounds we're using. That's why it's important to get the terms right. But it doesn't help us actually use the sounds (IMO).

 

[Kamen_Kaiju]

Always remember that the greatest pop/rock songwriters never studied theory (except maybe the very basics, that you probably already know). They just studied songs: 100s of them.

 

[alstev]

I'm not trying to hijack this thread but I can really relate to the OP, I'm pretty much in the same boat, except I want to play with people, and I still dick around too much, I play a lot but I just practice blues scales, and riff around with cowboy cords, and power chords.

There was some really good advice in this thread, so I decided to get serious today, I'm terrible at memorizing, so I went out and got notebooks, I know some good sites, I'm going to make up practice charts for the major scales, the pentatonics, and the chords and label every note and chord.

Then I'm going to make up a practice routine where I say everything in my head as I play it. I figure that will get everything memorized, and go a long way towards training my ear too. I'll start learning whole songs with tab too

 

[Kamen_Kaiju]

if it helps, I learned E, F#, G, A, B, C, D, E on the low E string (open, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 10, 12 frets)

and on the A string I learned A, B, C, D, E, F#, G, A (open, 2, 3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 12 frets)

..after that it all started falling together,...you notice that A, B, C on the fifth string (open, 2, 3) is A, B, C on the 6th string, (5, 7, 8)

...and you start seeing the repeats and the patterns forming.

A, B, C, D, E, F#, G,....once you know where all those notes are on the low strings,...it's easy to carry them over to the other strings,...you see patterns form,...C will always follow B by one half step. F will always follow E by one half step. ..everything else jumps up a whole step.

I know in the beginning it feels like you have to memorize 132 different notes (that's how many notes are on the guitar),....but in reality,...you have to memorize 7,...and that will be the base you build off of.

If you know G is 3rd fret E string,...you know bumping it up a half step makes it G#,...you don't really have to memorize G#,...you just know that G is 3, A is 5,...and in between them would be either G# or Ab,...depending on how you look at it.

I try and get my students to memorize the A minor and E minor scales very early on, because it's easy to build off them.

And on top of that the guitar itself seems to use a lot of the same root chords for songs,..because they're easier to play.

You'll see tons of songs rooted in E, A, D,...because they're open strings,...you don't see many songs rooted in C#. (you do,..but rarely.)

What are the roots most often used in songs in most genres (not counting jazz because the horn section ... well,..trust me,..jazz is it's own thing) but Rock, Metal, Blues, Country, Classical, Flamenco,...all use root chords of? ...guess....

A, B, C, D, E, F#, G

..almost every song you play in your time on guitar will be rooted on one of those notes. Might be Bm instead of B,...but it's still rooted on a B,....for example.

Now I'm saying root chords instead of keys because I don't want to confuse anyone at the moment.

But take a song like sweet home alabama? Rooted on that G,..it's 'homebase' for that song. (funny story about that song,..for 20 years one of the guitarists in the group thought the root was D,..because it's the first chord played. It was during a guitar interview that the interviewer corrected him,..pretty funny. ..there's a lesson there.)

Simple Man? rooted in Am

85% of Metallica songs? rooted in Em,..(10% in Am, and 5% in Dm) .. just kidding,...sorta.....they have 2 or 3 rooted in F#m.

So you learn those root notes, and you can build off of them.

and before you know it,..you really never think about it again,..it becomes automatic.

You glance at the 8th fret on your E string and your brain just automatically knows it's C.

....It's a lot like speaking a language. You don't think about the alphabet when you speak,...you just speak,..you know how to talk and you know what words to use to express yourself.

Guitar is exactly the same,..some things become automatic, you just know what words and phrases to play to express yourself. You don't think about the notes (alphabet) as much as you think about the phrase (sentence) or song (story)

The beauty of the guitar is it's one of the things in life that rewards you with exactly what you put into it.

I've never once seen someone seriously apply themselves to studying and learning guitar,..and not become a decent guitar player. It just takes time,..and patience,..and a bit of dedication.

 

[alstev]

I can relate to what you're saying about the patterns and saying something, I'm noticing patterns that work all over the place, and I notice when I'm playing now I hit points where part of my brain is saying "do it right now", I know it needs something but I don't know what to do.

Stumbling and fumbling my way to new discoveries is a slow and methodical way to learn the rules I'm seeing that now, like you said elsewhere in the thread I've built great muscle memory, and rhythm but it's like I'm trying to gain ground running on a treadmill. You've gave some great advice in this thread thanks, I see I need a better foundation and it's all gonna go a lot smoother, and quicker

 

[Apocalyptic]

Ive spent a bit of (very limited) time on the fretboard and running through the info on the link i posted earlier in the thread, a similar topic also echoed by mals above post. Whats its done already is put a name to things i already knew which is great and educated me on some new stuff. Literally all ive done so far is memorise all the notes on the low E and A and already thats opened a massive portion of knowledge that i knew, but didnt know if that makes sense. Before i knew certain barre chords, power chords etc by name just because id picked them up from tab and video as a chord in a song. From learning just those simple two strings note by note i can now put a name to all of those chords instantly. That im really happy with, its very basic and probably something i should have already known but that little bit of work has already paid off.
Feels like ive rubbed the steam off my goggles

I found the little nugget of 2 strings up 2 frets up or 2up/3up to locate octaves extremely simple/helpful.

 

[Kamen_Kaiju]

" Literally all ive done so far is memorise all the notes on the low E and A and already thats opened a massive portion of knowledge that i knew, but didnt know if that makes sense."



...you gotta have a foundation to build something on.