Q. I want to learn more about chord structure works, how scales work, how most songs are written/ song composition and things like that because I want to have a better ability to make and write music. I'm a novice when it comes to guitar as I have only been playing for a year. Any other suggestions on things I should learn or what order or something I should learn things in would be much appreciated as well!
A. Hey there, my name's Garrett. I'm glad you're looking into ways to educate yourself in the technicalities of music theory in approaching writing songs! Many people take off without learning some basic fundamentals and hit walls because they are not able to completely understand what they are playing.
Probably the best way to understand music composition is obviously professional instruction. But because many people do not have the time, means, or financial capability to do that, I'll run through some other alternatives.
Honestly, some of the best free sources of music theory come from people uploading things on YouTube. Just run a search for "beginning music theory guitar" or something like that.
If you have a few dollars to spend, go into any guitar center or bookstore and look for orchestration or composition books. Even though these books may be geared towards different instruments, that is ok. Music theory is music theory. The first few chapters will always be about how music is arranged and how chord structure works. It doesn't change instrument to instrument, and it will still give you a solid foundation for applying anything to the guitar.
Personally I would recommend learning theory first by looking at the piano instead of the guitar. This may seem foreign and weird at first, but let me explain. Piano is unique in that there is a visual for every note that is played (in other words, there is a single key for a single note). And these notes are lined up lowest to highest, from left to right. Guitar doesn't offer that. You can play a note on the low E string that is higher than the open D string, and you can play the same note in a multitude of different places on the guitar. Piano is not like this. Piano is very straightforward. You literally are able to see the intervals.
Here's a crash course to solidify what I am saying. I will get to how this applies to writing songs on guitar, promise!
A major scale is composed of these intervals - whole, whole, half, whole, whole, whole, half.
Whole meaning a whole step. This means that you move two keys on the piano (including black keys) for every note you move up. A half step means you only move up one key.
A C major scale is the simplest, so I'll use this one as an example. Start on C, then whole step (skipping the black key) to D, then another whole step to E, then half to F, and so on, following the whole-half structure I indicated above.
If you do this right, you notice that you didn't hit any black keys and the scale sounds happy and familiar. This is why C is the easiest. There are no sharps and no flats. If you start on the note D and play a D major scale, following the whole-half structure, you'll notice that you will hit F# and C#. This is where sharps and flats come from.
Now lets see how this applies to creating a song, and chord structure. Lets start at C again. Play a C chord, then an F chord, then a G cord, and an A minor chord. These all sound good together, right? That is because all of these chords are in the same key; the key of C. The C chord is the I chord, the F chord is the IV chord, the G chord is the V chord and the A minor is the VI minor chord. If we go back to our scale, you'll notice C is the first note you hit in the whole-half pattern, F is the 4th, G is the 5th, and A is the 6th. You can mix these chords up any way you want and they will sound good. Thousands and thousands of songs have been written based on these chords alone. For now it is not important to understand why the first three chords are major and the 6 chord is minor, but you will get to that if you decide to pursue your musical training.
If you want to play in a key other than C, you look at the same pattern, just with different notes. For example, the I chord in the key of D is D. The IV chord is G, the V is A, and the VI is B minor. These are the same intervals as the chords in the key of C, just played in the key of D.
Of course you are not only limited to the I, IV, V, and VI chords in making a song. You don't even have to play chords. The great thing about music is that it is always up to the artist's choice. Chords are just a good place to start. As you learn more, you will learn the other chords that can be played in a specific key to sound good and how to add "accidental" notes and move in and out of keys, use passing chords, etc etc.
But start with knowing chord structure and what chords will sound good together and why. Then you can find intervals and grooves you like, put some lead guitar on top of the chords, or incorporate whatever you feel is best.
I know I practically just wrote a novel, and I'm sorry for that. But I really love this stuff and I like showing it to people too. I hope some of that made sense. Read up and you'll understand this stuff in no time!
How long does it take to learn bass guitar?
Q. I'm a grade 2 on piano already.
How long would you need to play to be able to cover the bass of a rock band?
And how hard is it compared to piano?
A. Having not played a string instrument before, it will take you a bit of time to build up your fingers and dexterity for playing bass guitar. Your piano knowledge will help some, but honestly, most rock bassists don't read the bass line from music or anything like you would a piano score. They typically know and understand their scales and chord theory and improvise the bass line around the chord structure of the song.
Compared to piano though, I think you'll find bass pretty easy. You have 4 strings (E A D G from thickest to thinnest). Each fret is a half step, so the first fret on the E string would be F, 2nd fret is F#, 3rd is G, etc). The easiest way to get going on bass is to look at a chord chart of the song (has the chord names above the lyrics) and just play the root note of each chord on the bass, so if you see a C chord you play a C on the bass, if you see a G chord you play a G on the bass. If there is an alternate bass note (ie. D/F#) you'd play the note to the right of the / (the F# in this case). The tricky part is getting your rhythm down. Typically you'd play whole notes, 1/4 notes, or 1/8 notes depending on the dynamics of the song. Really not that difficult to do a passable job on bass, but there's way more you can do with it with enough practice and musical knowledge.
How are scales actually used when playing music?
Q. VERY beginner question here. I'm trying to learn some music theory online. I already know how to find scales, I'm just very confused as to exactly what they do and how they are applied when playing music or piano.
Is a scale just a sequence of notes that are played one by one in their particular order in the scale?
Are they just a selection of notes that can be played in any arrangement? Can you play two notes of a scale at the same time?
If someone can clarify with a detailed response I'd greatly appreciate it. Thank you!
A. Scales are the fundamental part of modern western music. Chords are based on scales. There are a great many chords and scales, but the basic premise is the same. Using the scale of C major as an example - CDEFGAB and C. By convention, the notes of a scale are numbered - 1234567 and 8. Number one is often called the "root", and the others are usually ordinal numbers - "fifth", "seventh". The C major chord is C,E,G, which is the root, the third and the fifth. In fact, all major chords are the root, the third and the fifth. The other chords - minor, harmonic minor - go by the same rule. A major chord is 1,3,5 no matter what key it is in - D major is 1,3,5 as is A major. That is based on what is called an "interval" - from C to D is a whole step. From C to C sharp is a half step. Look up intervals, it will help and it's too complicated for here.
So. It has been found that playing the C major scale in a song that is in the key of C produces pleasing, harmonic music. There are also other scales that can be used in C major, but playing a scale of B flat over a C chord is discordant to most people's ears. It's important to know which scales go well with which chords. Learning these things makes it automatic - instead of playing around to get a feel for what sounds good, you can just say, "Hey, I'm in the key of C, I think I'll use the harmonic minor scale for this" and it will sound good. Then there is the other side of intervals - actually playing them. Instead of playing 1,2,3,4,5,6,5,4,3,2,1 play 1,8,2,3,4, 6,6,6 You can play any of the notes in the scale any time, in any order, because it's all harmonic. In the same way, you can play any chord structure with 2, 3, 4 or even five notes. C major is 1,3,5 but you can also play 1,3,5,7, though that's not called C major any more. But it will sound good. Just about anything you do within this basic framework will sound harmonic and pleasing. That doesn't mean it will be good music necessarily, but it won't be discordant. I've tried to off some depth, but it goes way beyond what I can write, and I know a fair amount of theory but not so, so much.
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