Symmetrical chords have a unique place in music theory, which results in a unique application to the guitar (and fretted instruments in general). This article is the first in a series, that is will take a look at symmetrical chords, where they come from and how we can apply them to guitar. To start with, …
It’s been said that you can’t be a great lead player, without first being a great rhythm player. And if you are writing your own material, part of being a great rhythm player involves having great riffs. Today, we’ll look at how we can write riffs using the harmonic minor scale. Let’s look at a …
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A key skill for making your scales and arpeggios sound musical, rather than sound like playing a scale and an arpeggio, is to learn how to integrate scales and arpeggios on guitar. When I first started learning modes and scales, I had this idea that I had to know everything, in all positions, all over …
Key changes. When I was learning guitar, no one really explained how these work to me. There are some basic approaches I figured out, such as modulating between keys with shared chords… or just abruptly changing key. But I always liked knowing why something worked, or having a set of rules I could follow. I …
First, give the piece a listen. It’s barely 2 minutes long: How does this piece work? The first bar gives us the main theme for the prelude, and each following bar gives us variations on that theme. It’s quite beautiful. Chopin shows us different uses of a few different music theory concepts for: Using V7add6 …
