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So a guitarist of many, many years but never bothered to study much. I've been in cover bands but played mainly original bands in the 90's and early 00's. I'm self taught and can play most simple things from ear or tab but as i've got older (now in my early 40's) I feel compelled to study more and learn the basics properly. I now have time (and possibly the money) and want to structure it in the best possible way. I'm guessing the best thing I could do is take on some proper lessons. In order to progress i'm open to anything even piano lessons if this would progress my understanding of music more. My aims are clear - 1)to learn to site read 2)to learn the keys and scales 3)Advance my guitar technique (ie chicken picking/hybrid picking etc) 4)to generally become more accomplished.
So what you guys reckon?
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It is the most efficient way.
Why sight reading?
Understand that there is a difference between reading music and being able to sight read fluently.
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I have a midi keyboard so have that covered. Would love to be able to play properly -Not much of a player though!
Also its easy to produce the sound, and to make chords. Imagine if you were trying to learn music theory and all you had was a trombone, chords would be a bugger! And knowing which note was which, would be difficult for a beginner too.
You will learn a lot of things that may seem irrelevant to you (the staff system, the different note values, the Italian and German words), and it will probably not all go at the right speed for you (some bits you'll already know, others you won't), but the majority of it you'll immediately be able to apply to your playing and listening. And it's the tried and tested approach for millions of classical musicians (you have to have passed grade 5 theory to qualify to take grade 6-8 instrument exams) - it will give you a proper, thorough foundation and you may even love it. Plus, doing it as a mature musician will probably be easier than as a child.
You can get the teaching guides and workbooks and past papers for £3 on ebay.
And yes, use the keyboard as you learn. The way a keyboard is arranged actually models music theory. It's an amazing invention - it's like a pivot table of the circle of fifths. I don't know how anyone really knows how music theory works without an image of a keyboard, even subconsciously.
Supportact said: [my style is] probably more an accumulation of limitations and bad habits than a 'style'.
Supportact said: [my style is] probably more an accumulation of limitations and bad habits than a 'style'.
Just curious. Are the ABRSM grades for classical guitar, which wouldn't suit me?
The reason I ask is I'm toying with the idea of going for the Rockschool Grade 8 exam next year after I retire. I purchased all the books when I was teaching my youngest daughter, until she decided she wanted to be a bass player.
Supportact said: [my style is] probably more an accumulation of limitations and bad habits than a 'style'.
I'm honestly not sure how popular (or otherwise) formal grades on the likes of electric guitar or bass are. I know for "classical" musical instruments such as piano, woodwinds, brass etc that teaching, learning etc is much more formalised and exams are very popular. I think this is partly down to the fact that guitar lends itself to self-learning a bit more than others though - for example you'd really struggle on eg clarinet without a teacher, while people on guitar can self-learn quite successfully.
For example, there is the "Sparky the music theory dog" set of graphics/PDFs: http://tobyrush.com/theorypages/
And more formal stuff: http://www.dolmetsch.com/musictheory1.htm
I went up to Grade 6 theory - it was one better and I really liked theory. Quite a bit of it is about notation and understanding; it's not necessarily about writing music, particularly at lower grades.
Based on how much I've learned in the last 9 months I'd strongly recommend finding a teacher you get on with and who can spot where you need to pay attention. You still need to put in the effort yourself, but a good teacher will ensure that that effort is correctly directed.
It's interesting that harmonisation of scales and the interrelationship between chords and scales, plus what scales to use against certain chords (or groups of chords) doesn't tend to get listen under 'music theory', but I would regard that as one of the most useful things for most players.
I'm not sure if there's a specific qualification for a music teacher though. Obviously, there's MusB etc
I'll just leave this here...
http://thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/7506/full-in-depth-music-theory-see-post-3/p1
Learning theory is important but incredibly boring to just learn on your own by reading about it, especially when you get past the basics and hit the heavy going stuff. Have a look at the higher grade theory work books or test papers and you will see what I mean. Without a teacher to push you, and without putting it into practise by playing classical pieces I think it will be very difficult to motivate yourself to get to any decent level past the first couple of grades.