Music Theory For Guitar
Lets have a look at some music theory for guitar to get you started. In this scenario lets say you are a male singer and you want to sing a song and it is normally sung by a female. Its most likely this key would be to high for a male to sing well. We would most likely need to have the song in a lower key so you could sing it. In lowering the key the chords would change but again this is really simple to do. If you are the listening then the song would not sound any different to you. You would not notice the key change but as the singer you would make it more comfortable to sing.
Lets look at the simplest music theory for guitar with Key’s in music and how they are constructed. The easiest key in music is the of course “C” which contains no faults or sharps. We will use the key of C mostly in our examples so we remain consistent and you can grasp the concepts better. If you have a keyboard then all the white keys are in the key of “C”. To change to another key then you start substituting a white key for a black one. It seems simple and it is really.
I will show you later how to find the notes in any key and again it is pretty simple to do. Honestly if you take it step by step you will have the understanding and the practical guitaring skills in no time at all.
Whats a Key?
In the basics for music theory for guitar a key consists of seven notes, of which some are happy sounding, these are known as Major sounding notes/chords and then there are some sad notes/Chords, and these are as Minor.
All chords are made up of 3 notes played together to get a particular sound. A guitar has 6 strings the three notes are repeated twice in most occasions. There are some occasions where you can only play 5 notes and normally the big E string on a guitar is not played. This gives chords a nice full sound when played. I will show you what they are and how to play them very soon.
The major and minor notes also refer to the chords in a scale. There are Major, Minor and Diminished chords on a guitar but don’t worry about the diminished for now. Honestly hardly anyone uses them. We will keep it simple and stay with just the major and minor chords for now. Chords have quite a few variations and for different types of music you will find Major and Minor 7th chords and more but lets keep it basic for now.
The Key of “C” is below and we also number the chords. This gives us a reference to which chord we are talking about regardless of the key. Ill explain this more in a minute.
Numbering: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Chords: C – Dm – Em – F – G – Am – Bdim
You may have heard someone say lets play 1 – 4 – 5 progression. In the key of “C” it would be the chords of C – F – G. You can see the numbers above the chords in the list above and that’s where you get the name. If someone said lets play a 1 – 5 – 6 – 4 progression which turns out to be extremely popular then it would be:
C – G – Am – F
If you play with this progression you will find many many songs using this progression. Once you can play the chords I am sure you will strum and go … Oh yeah that sounds like $%$#@ song. Its just the rhythm that changes.
I have included Jack Blacks band called Axis of Awesome and they show you exactly how it is done. They are fantastic.
In the video by Jack Black and the comedy band AXIS of EVIL they show us a huge list of songs that use the same chord progression (1-5-6-4) but they are using another key thus different chords in the example.
The songs are played in the key of “E” so the chords change, but you can play the chord order in any key. Again the order is 1-5-6-4.
In the Key of E:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
E – F#m – G#m – A – B – C#m – D#dim
The Chord you need to play are of course:
The Chords = E – B – C#m – A
1 . Journey – “Don’t Stop Believin’”
2. James Blunt – “You’re Beautiful”
3. Black Eyed Peas – “Where Is the Love”
4. Alphaville – “Forever Young”
5. Jason Mraz – “I’m Yours”
6. Train – “Hey, Soul Sister”
7. The Calling – “Wherever You Will Go”
8. Elton John – “Can You Feel The Love Tonight” (from The Lion King)
9. Akon – “Don’t Matter”
10. John Denver – “Take Me Home, Country Roads”
11. Lady Gaga – “Paparazzi”
12. U2 – “With Or Without You”
13. The Last Goodnight – “Pictures of You”
14. Maroon Five – “She Will Be Loved”
15. The Beatles – “Let It Be”
16. Bob Marley – “No Woman No Cry”
17. Marcy Playground – “Sex and Candy”
18. Men At Work – “Down Under”
19. Jill Colucci – “The Funny Things You Do” (Theme from America’s Funniest Home Videos)
20. Jack Johnson – “Taylor”
21. Spice Girls – “2 Become 1”
22. a-ha – “Take On Me”
23. Green Day – “When I Come Around”
24. Eagle Eye Cherry – “Save Tonight”
25. Toto – “Africa”
26. Beyoncé – “If I Were A Boy”
27. Kelly Clarkson – “Behind These Hazel Eyes”
28. Jason DeRulo – “In My Head”
29. The Smashing Pumpkins – “Bullet With Butterfly Wings”
30. Joan Osborne – ” One of Us”
31. Avril Lavigne – “Complicated”
32. The Offspring – “Self Esteem”
33. The Offspring – “You’re Gonna Go Far, Kid”
34. Akon – “Beautiful”
35. Timbaland featuring OneRepublic – “Apologize”
36. Eminem featuring Rihanna – “Love the Way You Lie”
37. Bon Jovi – “It’s My Life”
38. Lady Gaga – “Poker Face”
39. Aqua – “Barbie Girl”
40. Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Otherside”
41. The Gregory Brothers – “Double Rainbow Song”
42. MGMT – “Kids”
43. Andrea Bocelli – “Time To Say Goodbye”
44. Robert Burns – “Auld Lang Syne”
45. Five for Fighting – “Superman”
46. The Axis of Awesome – “Birdplane”
47. Missy Higgins – “Scar”
48. Alex Lloyd – “Amazing”
49. Richard Marx – “Right Here Waiting”
50. Adele – “Someone Like You”
53. Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Under the Bridge”
54. Daryl Braithwaite – “The Horses”
55. Pink – “U + Ur Hand”
56. The Fray – “You Found Me”
57. 3OH!3 – “Don’t Trust Me”
58. Tim Minchin – “Canvas Bags”
59. Blink-182 – “Dammit”
60. Kasey Chambers – “Not Pretty Enough”
61. Alicia Keys – “No One”
62. Amiel – “Lovesong”
63. Bush – “Glycerine”
64. Thirsty Merc – “20 Good Reasons”
65. Lighthouse Family – “High”
66. Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Soul to Squeeze”
67. Banjo Patterson – “Waltzing Matilda”
68. Bic Runga – “Sway”
69. Ben Lee – “Cigarettes Will Kill You”
70. Michael Jackson – “Man in the Mirror”
71. Mika – “Happy Ending”
72. The Cranberries – ” Zombie”
73. Natalie Imbruglia – “Torn”
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