anyone use this book?

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Theory

I really have been trying to make sense of what I read on the forum....but I think I need a book to get the ball rolling

anyone ever use this book?
or have a beginners book for theory?

thanks

Originally Posted by: ItsmesillyThe Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Theory

I really have been trying to make sense of what I read on the forum....but I think I need a book to get the ball rolling

anyone ever use this book?
or have a beginners book for theory?

I am not familiar with that book. There are tons of fine music theory books. The real question is: exactly what are you trying to learn or do? Are you trying to learn to compose music? Rearrange existing tunes? Analyze songs or pieces? Or just know why a certain shape on the guitar makes a certain chord?

For example:

"I want to learn music theory."

This implies a HUGE project. In fact so large and involved there are entire college degrees devoted to the subject.

"I want to learn a little music theory so I can understand what I am doing while I learn to play the guitar."

I am going to assume you are in the latter category. Please correct me if not. :)

Look at all the lessons in this tutorial:

http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=495

That is the most concise summary and formulation of "Music Theory" I have ever done. After that, please tell me if you have done all the work in Guitar Fundamentals 2 Chapter 1 "Intro to Music Theory" and Chapter 3 "Reading Music"

http://www.guitartricks.com/course.php?input=2

If you want a really good web source for understanding things I suggest these:

http://www.musictheory.net/
http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/theory/theory.htm

For the more serious student:
http://www.tonalityguide.com/

Finally a word of advice.

We've had many discussions of the supposed value or lack of value in studying music theory. To summarize my position:

There really is no way to "not use theory" when playing music. You can certainly not know the theory behind what you are doing. But the bottom line is that if you are playing music - notes, scales, chords, songs, etc. - you are in fact already using theory.

The only issue is: do you understand what you are doing when you play the guitar or are you just thinking of it vaguely as "stuff you do"? In fact as soon as you mentally identify "that shape" you do as a "D major chord", you have started doing or using music theory. The next step is to understand why that shape is a D major chord, as opposed to all the other shapes you can make. Then, how does that shape fit together with all the other things you can play on a guitar. And so on.

An analogy would be how as children we generally learn to speak before we know how to spell or be able to explain the rules of grammatical structure and the syntax of language. But ultimately if you want to improve at using language you must learn to understand the conceptual knowledge (literally, the "theory") that is the foundation for the application (literally, the "practice") of the words you are speaking.

An enormous amount of musical theory is contained in concepts such as "the major scale" or "a major chord". It is absolutely in any players interest to learn the theory behind the music they play. It will only improve your ability to think about and play music.

I encourage students to maintain a close balance between music theory and practice. This means that you should understand the theory behind what you can do and be trying to learn the theory behind what you are currently learning. There is no need for a beginner guitarist to understand advanced Baroque counterpoint cadential voice leading. :)

For example, you just need to know what a scale is and why those notes in that pattern make that sound. Makes sense?

Let us know your specific goals and we can try to help!

I copied part of this from another thread for more comments on this book you can check it out. The best thing I thought about it was how it complimented the fundamental 2 lessons and really helped me to understand what was going on as a beginner comming into music theory.

http://go.guitartricks.com/forum/showthread.php?t=28449&highlight=guitar+handbook

This is really a great book! While reading it I noticed that it really compliments the Fundamental lessons. The lessons really helped me to understand the more complicated book and vice versa. It is easy to read and understand however after learning the fundamentals it made the book make much more sense.

Also it has pages about hardware, sound equipment, special effects, and recording. It goes into guitar maintenance, repair and customizing. It is really a great book I enjoyed reading it and learned a lot from it. Like fundamentals 2 I am sure I will go back to the book often for reference.

Ed

Music Principles for the
Skeptical Guitarist:

This series parted the theoretical sea for me. Google it.

I had picked up bits and pieces of guitar theory over the years, but these books brought it all together for me.

Originally Posted by: ItsmesillyThe Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Theory

I really have been trying to make sense of what I read on the forum....but I think I need a book to get the ball rolling

anyone ever use this book?
or have a beginners book for theory?

thanks

Yes I have read it cover to cover, twice and I still don't understand music
theory. Just kidding. To get the music theory thing down takes a long time.
What you have to do is hang in there and reread, over and over the things you dont understand, and every once in a while the light will go off that's the best you can hope for.