Saturday, June 30, 2018
Guitar tutorial 1 what am I working on
Guitar tutorial 1 what am I working on
v0.91 - edited nov 24 2011, fixed some typos+extra info.
A guitar lesson. There are many lessons and tutorials out there, but lets pick a different approach. Its OK if youre an absolute beginner, but this may help more experienced players as well.
When learning an instrument, or music, or anything for that matter, one of the hardest parts really is to learn to understand what youre working on. Lets say youre about to learn the guitar and your goal is to become an excellent player. Sure, first you learn some basics about music and the guitar. Then youll learn some chords and then some songs. Dull isnt it?
One of the basic and most important things youre working on is patterns. Repeating patterns. Symmetry. Youll learn to pick any chord on any given position on the guitar neck in any inversion. Eventually that is, if its really your goal to become a good player.
Youll learn to recognize how all these different patterns sound on different positions and how they relate. Sounds complex, doesnt it? Actually it really isnt. And that is the essence of this blog post.
The better you know what you are working on the better youre focused and the more room you have to work on other skills like techniques, rhythm, consistency, muscle control, sound control, riffs and so on. The better you know what youre doing the faster and deeper you learn.
Mysteries...
For people who have never touched a guitar the instrument looks like a mystery. It has about ten strings and about one hundred metal rods. If not more. A guitar player then makes very complex gestures with his hands and voila: music.
When people see a guitar for the first time they may see something like this:
Step 1
As people start to learn guitar theyll start with basic chords like G (3-2-0-0-0-3) and C (X-3-2-0-1-0). After some practice people may see something like this:
Quite some people actually stay there. They learn the chords and stick with them. Its all right if you feel fine with just some very basic understanding of the guitar. People may recognize the songs you play although it may sound nothing like how it is on record.
Step 2
Then there are more advanced players who pick the basic chords and move those over the neck. This is what they see, sort of:
In this example the typical C-chord grip moved over the neck, other strings omitted. Blue would be D, green E, purple F, and so on. And theyll do this with other basic chord grips as well. Move the A chord up two frets to get a B, one fret further to get a C and so on.
Step 3b
Now Ill skip about one step and show you what a truly experienced guitar player sees. Note that this is a most abstract depiction. For any chord with any root in any inversion an experienced player sees the neck like this:
Yes, wtf? It means: no mystery. Its quite clear what every note does in whatever is being played. It doesnt mean that everything picked will sound fine and nice, but everything will sound logical. Everything sounds as expected. And youll know that if you pick something that sounds different than expected its some more ear training you need.
Patterns, spots
This is an abstract depiction of how an experienced guitar player sees a particular chord:
Here is chord you-name-it. All over the neck there are patches and spots that belong to that chord. Either notes as hand/finger positions.
What about other chords? Quite obvious, its the same thing:
And:
These illustrations are abstract depictions. In reality its much simpler than that.
Basic patterns
There are only a few basic patterns and those patterns are connected all over the neck in a particular way. When youre learning the basic chords and typical scales youre actually learning those patterns and how they relate. Youll learn them all over the neck. Then you start to break up patterns to smaller patches that you can use to combine. Thats depicted with these colored areas. Eventually you see the relationship with every single note, that green dot diagram.
An experienced guitar player sees a song as basically an empty neck with just some patches in some colors. These make the song. He may also see routes around the neck that fit in the song, i.e. for solos and improvisations.
Tips
Whenever you have a chord, try to figure out alternate picks. Play with octaves, i.e. pick a certain note one octave higher. Omit notes to get other inversions. By practicing and playing you get used to how things sound and youll hear what is being played on a record. Learning to make music is learning to listen to what you really hear.
A small example to conclude this little tutorial with:
Dm (D minor) is x-x-0-2-3-1 according to the books. Now listen to x-x-3-2-3-x. Youll probably hear something completely different, but actually its still is a Dm chord. Just another inversion!
Be aware that there is nothing like an X chord. Any chord is several chords at once, depending on the root note you chose. When you hear good, melodic music you actually hear several chord schemes at once. Beatles music is a good example of this. In quite some songs only parts of chords are being played with full chords at key positions. Your mind hears much more than your ears. It fills in gaps. If there is a lot of room and consistency in a song there are many ways to hear it. This makes good music feel fresh and something to listen to over and over.
Ok. Can you figure out what chord x-3-x-x-4-3 may be? C-Eb-G, Cm is one possibility. But it may be G-B#-Eb, G aug, as well. Lets say we pick Cm in our songs music logic. Note that it is in about the same spot as Dm from-the-books, just a little bit higher on the neck. The grip is not really that different. Powerful, isnt it? As you learn the guitar youll find gems like this everywhere and you will play basically any chord at every position on the neck.
PS, did that chord sound familiar? Try x-3-x-0-4-3, then 3-x-5-3-3-3 (Gm), then 3-x-5-4-3-3 (G), then 3-x-5-4-5-3. Welcome to Hotel California. Sort of, very basic. To get you started.
x-3-x-9-4-3
3-x-5-3-3-3
3-x-5-4-3-3
3-x-5-4-5-3
6-x-3-3-6-x / 6-x-8-7-6-6
1-x-5-4-3-3
4-6-x-5-4-4
x-6-8-8-8-x
1-x-3-1-1-1
3-x-5-4-3-3
4-x-6-5-4-4
x-6-8-8-8-x
