Guitar Theory

[nweekes]

I have played guitar faithfully for 30 years. I primarily play fingerstyle from artists such as Leo Kottke, Adrian Legg, Pete Huttlinger, etc. I am a good player. The problem is that I can only read tablature. I have tried really hard for two decades to read music notation, and increase my guitar knowledge but I really struggle. Does any one have advice?

Thank you.

[Silly Moustache]

Hi, I stumbled through learning guitar totally the wrong way, but picked up what I needed over the years.
Net result, I don't use teb or notation, and yet I find myself teaching guitar now, largely by feel - and maybe just "feeling" the music.

I see both forms of writing music seems to me to only make you kinda "follow instructions" from someone else, rather than making songs your own.

Maybe I might help?

[phydaux]

Music Principles For The Skeptical Guitarist Vol I: The Big Picture

Music Principles For The Skeptical Guitarist Vol II: The Fretboard


by Bruce Emory, available on Amazon

[Fred_Garvin]

Work your way through this. Easy to understand, gets progressively more challenging. By the end you'll have a firm grasp and be able to move on, knowing where to go.

https://smile.amazon.com/Alfreds-Ess...srpt=ABIS_BOOK

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by nweekes

I have played guitar faithfully for 30 years. I primarily play fingerstyle from artists such as Leo Kottke, Adrian Legg, Pete Huttlinger, etc. I am a good player. The problem is that I can only read tablature. I have tried really hard for two decades to read music notation, and increase my guitar knowledge but I really struggle. Does any one have advice?

Thank you.

Where is there a problem? Want to learn tunes that's only available in a standard music score? Want to play better in some way?

[Mandobart]

I'm the opposite. I read notation, and never even tried to learn tab. I see this as just as large a knowledge deficit as you not reading notation. Well, except that I can use the same notation to play a song on guitar, mandolin, fiddle or ukulele, in standard or alternate tunings, and tab is written for one specific instrument tuned one specific way.

But really I learn mostly by ear. Knowing some very basic "theory" (turns out it's all fact) like the circle of fifths and basic western culture (Europe, North America, UK Commonwealth) song structure: for most all songs in the blues, rock, folk, bluegrass, C&W, Great American Songbook genres you're going to use the I, IV, V, ii, vi and sometimes II and VII cords. You may throw in some 7th variations like a V7 resolving into the I.

This helps a lot when picking out a chord progression by ear, because you'll already have a pretty good idea where the progression is heading.

[Llewlyn]

Originally Posted by nweekes

I have played guitar faithfully for 30 years. I primarily play fingerstyle from artists such as Leo Kottke, Adrian Legg, Pete Huttlinger, etc. I am a good player. The problem is that I can only read tablature. I have tried really hard for two decades to read music notation, and increase my guitar knowledge but I really struggle. Does any one have advice?

Thank you.

To start with, reading music notation and learning guitar theory are two different things. Which one are you interested in?

Ll.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by nweekes

I have played guitar faithfully for 30 years. I primarily play fingerstyle from artists such as Leo Kottke, Adrian Legg, Pete Huttlinger, etc. I am a good player. The problem is that I can only read tablature. I have tried really hard for two decades to read music notation, and increase my guitar knowledge but I really struggle. Does any one have advice?

I'm surprised you've struggled for so long. I've always found it easy (but then I did learn as a teenager, and everything is easier then... )

Have you tried this site?
https://www.guitarlessonworld.com/le...ion-tablature/
If that's the sort of thing you've looked at countless times, what is it you find hard to understand?

It's true that it's slow at first. If you're trying to learn a tune from notation alone, you have to go note by note, and (if there is no other information), decide on the best position to play each note, which is sometimes not obvious at all. It can years - decades - before you can actually "sight-read" (play from notation as easily as you could read out this sentence).

[mr. beaumont]

So, my guess is any of the stuff you want to learn is likely available in a tablature format...

So if the quest is simply to better your musical self, start simple, and start with music you actually like...get a fakebook of any genre of music you like, and start with single note melody lines.

Memorizing the lines/dots/spaces is something you can do with steady practice in a few weeks...I always find reading rhythms to be more challenging.

[nweekes]

I took piano at 7 and was not interested. I immediately jumped to the guitar. My teacher only taught tablature. I continued this way only playing songs. I have only been a song player, nothing more. I have never been able to jam with other musicians, or improvise, etc. I knew my potential but lacked where to begin. I went on a tour with Adrian Legg and began working with Pete Huttlinger and that is when I realized my playing and ability was extremely limited. Pete suggested the Berklee College of Music and I began learning notation in those books but I feel the problem I've had all this time is that I was trying to bite off more than I could chew. I was trying to improvise, read music, learn all chords, memorize the fingerboard, etc, etc. I need to take it one step at a time. I have researched the books suggested in this thread and started over with the Berklee College of Music book "A Modern Method for Guitar Vol 1". My biggest motivation is that I do not want to be just a song player. I want to join in with other musicians and have a firm foundation of this universal language. Thank you all for your advice. Happy Holidays!

[TBman]

Originally Posted by nweekes

I have played guitar faithfully for 30 years. I primarily play fingerstyle from artists such as Leo Kottke, Adrian Legg, Pete Huttlinger, etc. I am a good player. The problem is that I can only read tablature. I have tried really hard for two decades to read music notation, and increase my guitar knowledge but I really struggle. Does any one have advice?

Thank you.

What do you mean by "read" notation?

I guess you aren't talking about simple note identification and its position on the fretboard. That's easy. Do you mean that you can't read notation and hear the music in your head? That's a different story and I don't think anyone can teach you that, it just comes to you. (It hasn't come to me though in 50+ years )

[tbirdman]

Having been playing for 1.5 years, maybe I'm biting off more than I can chew, but I'm enjoying the learning process. I'm learning classical guitar so I'm learning how to read music. I'm just finishing taking a music theory class for the second time. I'm taking guitar lessons along with singing lessons. I'm also learning things such as bluegrass flatpicking among other things.

Sometimes I get frustrated, but then I have to look back a 1.5 years and see where I've come from.

However, there is no learning process that suits everyone. It's the journey that is important.

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by nweekes

I have played guitar faithfully for 30 years. I primarily play fingerstyle from artists such as Leo Kottke, Adrian Legg, Pete Huttlinger, etc. I am a good player. The problem is that I can only read tablature. I have tried really hard for two decades to read music notation, and increase my guitar knowledge but I really struggle. Does any one have advice?

Thank you.

hi nweekes

Learning to read notes should not be construed to be the bulk of theory.

First off, it's music theory, not guitar theory. Note names are one way of expressing the location of notes on a fingerboard, or on the keys of a piano, or neck or an orchestral instrument, flute, piccolo, etc. in relationship to the other notes you are playing or about to play.

It was the pocket recorder of musical music because notation was a uniform system which allows a composer to write out his thoughts and songs.

Some people around the world read notes using Solfege (Do-Re-Mi etc), other with Aribic numerals, of Figured Bass (classical training and very scripted). Others use Nashville numbering.

So I'm assuming you want Western Music Theory.

As a life long musician since age 11, the best things musicians who want to learn theory can do is take a year of piano lessons.

Community colleges often have day/night semester long courses where you learn how the names of notes relate to the keyboard, and understanding how to build chords makes tons more sense on keyboards than on guitars.

Guitars can play the same note (written the same way on a staff) in 5-7 positions up/down the fingerboard. And then we are prone to readjusting the notes on our guitars (something very difficult to do on a keyboard) and play in other tunings.

So my suggestion is if you want to learn basic note reading take a semester of piano. If you want to apply it to guitar, buy the most basic classical guitar teaching book and learn to play children's tunes on it.

[Gdjjr]

When I was a kid (10 or so) I took piano lessons and song leading in church.
I don't do either now- play piano or church- I kinda learned how to read music from those two exercises- now, I look up tabs like this, listen to the song on you tube and determine how I want to play it- tons easier.

[Mr. Jelly]

In a way I admire people like the OP. I'm the opposit. I have to understand how a song works to be able to do it. Which keeps me from playing some tunes. Not that it's a big deal. Often songs in tab or lessons on videos don't even mention the key they are in. When I see some fingerings I look to figue out what chord it was part of. At times It seems that at the end of the day it all comes back to just playing the song and the rest doesn't matter.