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Basic MusicTheory - Beginning Thoughts
If you've ever strummed a D7 chord followed by a G and thought it sounded good, then you know some basic music theory already. You know D7 likes to turn into G. That you may not know "we have a dominant returning to a tonic through resolution of a tritone to a major 3rd" does not negate in any sort of way the fact that you do know something very important about those two chords. Just pointing that out because for some reason (amongst guitar players more than any other musicians it seems) there is some sort of odd and adolescent tendency to brag about their supposed ignorance almost to the point of competition. To say something along the lines of "Hendrix didn't know any theory man, ..." is just not accurate. The man did not randomly move his fingers about the fretboard. The notion would be silly. He knew exactly what he was doing, he just didn't know the name of anything he did. The same would be true for many many players in every style. One other point. "Don't get so smart that you get stupid" certainly applies here. One should not educate themselves for the purpose of pointing out to everyone else how darn (such language, again!) educated they are. There is unfortunately some tendency as people learn more and more complicated musical ideas to want to "rank" different musical forms, artists, and entire groups of people for that matter, into some sort of ugly and arbitrary hierarchy(sp?). I have neighbors who only know a handful of chords. They sit around and sing and make wonderful music. Happy as can be and don't give a rat's rear end about learning any more than they know. That's perfectly legitimate, isn't it? Seems so to me. Losing your appreciation of simplicity does not square with the spirit of music. Now, if you do want to learn more... I intend on just putting the basics of how one goes about constructing chords here. Understand the fundamentals of something, the sky's the limit. Miss something fundamental and you're gonna crash sooner or later. My experience with students coming to me from other instructors is that for some reason people trying to learn to play the guitar never begin their study of any guitaristic topic from the beginning. Let's look more closely at those words..... begin beginning I thought so! They are startlingly similar. Hmmmmm....let's make it a little more complicated..... begin beginning beginner Yup. Very similar. Note that none of those words look similar to childish or babyish. It always strikes me as funny that so many guitar players who avoid learning to read music and gaining some basic vocabulary of music theory end up needing years and years of spoon-feeding.....Mercy! [This message has been edited by mapletrees (edited 02-11-2001).] [This message has been edited by mapletrees (edited 02-11-2001).] |
#2
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kenilu...
in reference to the question in the other post... my thoughts on the simple... I need to get back to that other post with useful ideas... an itsy-bitsy nibble of theory followed by a big majubba wubba truckload of application... another nibble, another truckload... like that word nibble.....
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Indeed, there is something in the current DC/NY culture that equates a lack of unthinking boosterism with a lack of patriotism. As if not being drunk on the latest Dow gains is somehow un-American. - Arianna Huffington May 11, 2009 |
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Bwana MTrees,
Been awhile since i scoped this area (playing and technique) and here you are. I looked at your word progression and thought: begin beginner beginning .....that looked more I IV V to me, but then i could also go with: beginner begin beginning This is my bizarre way of saying welcome back....I dug a tunnel or two in the sandbox since you last corresponded....
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Tom More than deserved, less than desired |
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Quote:
Anyways, bring on the good stuff, these little nibbles are making me hungry! Ken |
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Hunh? are there more than three chords?
beginner buy a taylor begin buy another taylor just the beginning JW
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