Guitar Theory Lessons And How Not To Get Dizzy With The Cycle Of 5thsGuitar theory lessons will help you make the connection between understanding basic music theory and making real music on your guitar. And that way you'll be able to use it to improve your guitar playing and perhaps even compose your own music. This could be considered an intermediate guitar lesson…but in my humble opinion beginners are more than welcome! To get the most from this guitar instruction I highly recommend having a solid grasp of the following fundamentals:
If any of the above doesn't make sense to you, don't worry! Click here for a great introductory lesson to help get you started. This guitar theory lesson is divided into 3 sections for ease of understanding. Enjoy :-) And please feel free to contact me with any questions or feedback. I'd love to hear from you! Lesson One: Secondary Chords and The Major/Minor System If you already know that the 3 Primary Chords are built in 3rds from the 1st, 4th and 5th degrees of the major scale, great. What a lot of people don't realize is that there are also 3 Secondary Chords in a Major Key…and that they happen to be minor chords. These secondary chords are built from the 2nd, 3rd and 6th degrees of the major scale and we use lower case Roman Numerals -- ii, iii. and vi. We'll leave Minor Keys alone for now as it can get a little tricky. So for the rest of this guitar theory lesson when I say "key" -- I mean Major. The major keys still have minor chords in them. Important! We're only talking about "traditional" or classical harmony in this guitar theory lesson. Blues, jazz and rock have lots in common with traditional harmony, but are a slightly different language. For example, even though the chords change in a blues or rock tune, many times you can just play ideas from the blues scale and sound great. But if you try this over a standard pop song or singer/songwriter type of song you won't always sound too good. Lots of people don't realize this and it creates a lot of confusion! I like to refer to traditional harmony as the Major/Minor system of Music. This is to make sure that students realize there are different systems of organizing music. These days, as a guitar player, you often need to play different styles of music from song to song! For now, you can ask yourself if it's blues based or major/minor? Or a combination of the 2 depending on which section of the song? When the chords come from the major scale and belong to one key they are called Diatonic Chords. All songs will have a home key, but many "modulate" through different keys temporarily…before returning to the home key. This is an important subject but beyond the scope of this guitar theory lesson. Diatonic Chords From The Key Of C Major C major, D minor, E minor, F major, G major or G7, A minor. For now, we'll simply treat the B diminished on scale degree 7 as the upper 3 notes in a G7 chord. Lesson Two: Cycle Of 5ths This guitar theory lesson also deals with the Cycle of 5ths. When music moves in 5ths, such as G to C, it's one of the strongest movements. This is probably because any 2 notes a 5th apart are in the closest relationship to one another…except for an Octave, which is essentially the same note. What do you mean? Isn't it a semitone? The note 1 fret away? No. That is a big mistake lots of guitar and piano students make. In terms of the physical distance on your guitar or piano, yes. But in reality, the sounds in music aren't a certain distance apart! They are in a certain RELATIONSHIP to one another. As an example, in a perfectly tuned octave, the "upper" tone is vibrating exactly 2 times as fast as the lower tone! Still aren't convinced? Try playing fret 6 on string 2 together with string 1 open. That is the relationship of a semitone. They don't sound too closely related, do they? As a matter of fact, that's the same sound composers often use in movie soundtracks when they want to create tension and fear! 
Just to remind you, every sound has it's use. It's an ugly sound "out of context" …but it can still be beautiful. For example as an E7b9 chord in the key of A minor. But that's another lesson… How Does That Help For Guitar?…when you memorize the cycle of 5ths, you not only have a better overview of what keys are close to one another, you'll also know the key signature for any key! In other words, which notes are sharp or flat in a given key? You'll know that the IV Chord in the key of Bb is Eb. Father Charles Goes Down And Ends Battle Memorize that little saying for now. It's in 5ths. It also tells you which notes are sharp and how many notes are sharp in a key. Important Tip: Going up a 5th is the same as going down a 4th! Try it for yourself. Start on any letter of the musical alphabet. Count up 5 and then do the same thing counting backwards for 4. You should end up on the same letter name. For example: Start on G. Count up 5 and you get G A B C D. Again start on G. Count down 4 and you get G F E D. In both cases you end up on D! If you have a keyboard or piano this is very easy to see. Try it! You can take the same Father Charles saying and put it backwards. Battle Ends And Down Goes Charles' Father! This will tell you which notes are flat and how many notes are flat in a key. Click here for a free printable guitar lesson. It's a mini worksheet to help you practice some of the ideas in this guitar lesson. Guitar Theory Lessons And How To Organize Yourself... This is one way you could approach organizing all this information…
That's a lot to learn! Don't worry... you don't need to do it all in one day. Take your time and savour learning the guitar. But if you learn even half of what I suggested you'll be further ahead musically than most. Oh! And click here if you don't know what "guitar friendly" keys are yet!
I hope this guitar theory lesson was helpful to you on your quest to become a better musician and guitar player. Once again, please feel free to contact me with any questions or feedback regarding this lesson. I'd love to hear from you! Thanks for tuning in and tuning up, Dave Return from Guitar Theory Lessons to Theory Return from Guitar Theory Lessons to Homepage
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