If you cannot afford a teacher - find a friendly guitarist who can give  you a few lessons in the basics, as Harry says - starting with a good technique will pay dividends.

 

Hughes, you're a tricky feller. These things are extremely misleading. If you have a good understanding of modes and counterpoint, polyphony, it means you've had a significant amount of formal training on some instrument (Piano????) or at minimum many hours of self-study from formal materials. No beginner is going to be able to learn complex music completely "by ear." Readily available video has made self-study better than ever because you get closeups of good teachers hands and you can rewind and really study it. Some of them are better than the many lessons I had in terms of basic technique. (There's this complete redneck who actually has some very good free youtube videos that involve how you hold the pick and economy of motion)

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXNABMV-hu4&feature=related - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXNABMV-hu4&feature=related

 

It's hard because there are terrible teachers out there, terrible videos out there, and really good example of both. I suggest learning from every possible place you can.

 

Here's my favorite story about guitarists. Randy Rhoads used to find a local guitar store at every town they entered to get a lesson. Rhoads was not only obviously better than half of the teachers in technique, but he was also a good teacher (his mom ran a music store herself). Half the time Randy would end up giving the lesson, but almost every time he'd end up adding a little something to his store of knowledge. That's been my example.

 

From there you could go in many directions, but personally I feel that Victor Wooten was on to something when he used speech as an example when it came to learing music: we learn to speak by being around other people who speak fluently, then we slowly start to mimic, and ultimately we pick it up. Yet, even when we are in our thirties or fourties we still are constantly learning new things about our language.

 

Basically what he was saying is that you should jump into music right away and just start messing around with your instrument, then after you've become used to the feel of things, you will gradually and naturally hone your skills.

 

Don't sweat it: there is no wrong way to play guitar. People who tell you that are just pompous. Certainly, there are certain ways to go about it that will benefit you, but after you reacha  certain level of learning, you begin to take control and customize your own approach at the instrument.

 

Many many rock guitarists do it this way. Some examples of completely self-taught (or informally taught) guitarists:

 

Dave Mustaine

Alexi Laiho

Adam Jones

Steve Wilson

Paul McCartney

George Harrison

Stevie Ray Vaughan
Jimmi Hendrix
Esteban Echeverría
BB King
Carlos Santana

Steve Howe

Dave Gilmour

 

Just off the top of my head.

 

Personally I think music theory is unnecessary when it comes to creative songwriting and playing ability. Some of the greatest musicians alive didn't know squat about formal music theory, yet the wrote very complex and unusual music that became quite memorable. I would say that their lack of proper training was in fact what helped them break all of the new ground they did; since they didn't know what the 'proper' way to write a song was, they simply wrote what sounded good to them.

 

 

Now THAT is bloody brilliant!

 

I know of a guy who took classes for 2 years, knew how to shred, but would only repeat the patterns he got from Yngwie videos, the ones his teacher taught him. Then he changed to the same as I did, and said he learnt twice as much in 6 months than he had. So in the end it's not all just techinque. I use the http://www.free-scores.org - www.free-scores.org to pick up songs. There you have a pretty good distinction between difficult and easy songs, from bossa nova to baroque. No heavy rock though.

 

Also, I'd like to add, that in case you'd wish to find Guitar Pro tabs, which can be pretty good at times, most often actually, but you DON'T want to steal the program, you might want to try http://www.tuxguitar.com.ar/ - www.tuxguitar.com.ar/ It's pretty nifty, though lacks soundfonts, which is what people like about GP5. Anyway, Tuxguitar is an open source program, so it's modifyable, and it opens both GuitarPro and PowerTab files. And it's free. So, if you were like me, you'd get that instead of Guitar Pro.

 

Also, I'm not selling myself here, but it's nice to share info and opnions, so if there's any questions, just pm me or ask here and start an argument with old-school guitarists and shredders

And though the solo spot on SS is the most impressive, the composed solo for Mr. Crowley is probably the most instructive. Probably Randy's greatest piece. If you watch video of subsequent guitarist playing with Ozzy, they almost always futz with his solos except for that piece which, most like prog, is considered a composed part of the music. BTW, guitarists, the organ part for Mr. Crowley is butt easy and fun to play (on piano / organ.) "Dee" is also a nice introduction to playing classical. That tab book was an education on its own for me and I've taken alot of lessons.

 

I also highly recommend the tab book for "Surfing with the Alien" when you get to the next level.

 

I'd actually be happy to help out with some ideas if you have some specifics about where you're at and what your tastes are.

Whether you learn music theory on your own or from a teacher will depend on how you (as an individual) learn best.  Some of us need a kick in the pants, or the pressure of an upcoming lesson to keep our noses to the grindstone, others are more self-motivated.  But keep in mind that the minute you learn how to play a G chord you've learned a piece of music theory.  When you figure out that G, C, & D go together really well, you've learned more theory.  When you figure out why the drummer clicks his sticks 4 times before you all start playing you've got a bit more.  The notion that you can "mess around and let your feelings guide you" is just a pile of crap.  What you actually do as you mess around is learn theory, whether you decide to call it that or not.

I feel some obligation to insert here a proper description of what music theory really is, before someone goes off on "composing according to rules" etc.  Music theory has never been (apart from some serilaists of the 1950s and 1960s) a set of rules for what you can and can't do.  What music theory is, is a description of what composers have already done, and what was generally accepted to have "sounded good" to that particular generation of composers.  That's why it keeps changing.

As an example (as well as an interesting story), during the Baroque Era (1600-1750) it was generally accepted that you should not write diminished fifths in music.  It's a very dissonant interval (the opening notes of "Black Sabbath" if I remember an example) and folks thought is sounded so bad they nick-named it "the devil in music".  Now Antonio Vivaldi, as a Baroque composer knew this and like other composers of his time avoided that interval, but in the original handwritten manuscript of the Gloria of his Mass in D major there happens to be one.  Did he really mean for it to be there, or was it a mistake?  Most editors who print the score for sale "correct" this note because it is the only diminished fifth in all of Vivaldi's 600+ concertos and 40 operas AND its in a mass where you wouldn't, as a priest, stick "the devil in music".  They look at the practice of the time and understand howe unlikely it is that Vivaldi would not have done that on purpose.

No composer I have ever met thinks specifically about theory when writing music. It's not even discussed in formal composition lessons unless the student brings it up.   We use what we have learned in a subconscious way, or as Nero Wolfe puts it with "experience guided by intelligence".  If you want to learn to play the guitar, do it any way that works for you.  There are plenty of truly remarkable guitarists with horrible technique and little or no formal training.  But, if you want to learn about MUSIC, go to the local community college and take a couple of semesters of theory.  Under no circumstances should you trust a guitar teacher to teach you theory!!!!  They are, as a rule of thumb, the worst theorists in the known world.  It would be the equivalent of trying to get training as a gourmet chef from a McDonalds fry cook.   

Learning music theory will change the way you play, change the way you write, and even change the way you listen to music, and that will help you get where you want to go.  Music will open up like a flower in front of your eyes.

A flower?!....

 

I use very little theory when writing music, but I use it all the time when learning other people's music, especially when trying to figure it out by ear.

 

BTW, I've learned plenty of theory from guitar teachers, and since the basics are well basic, that part was fine. Harder stuff, yeah, you need to go to other sources. My best teacher was a piano professor who was a friend of mine who gave me lessons for part of a semester as a non-piano major. For the first time I really got the intimate relationship of melody and harmony, and yes one of the many music flowers opened for me.

 

 

I suppose that is what I am doing, then? I've only once willingly looked up a lesson on music theory; otherwise I've just slowly discovered stuff on my own. Right now, during my songwriting process, I have been slowly beginning to grasp time signatures. They always confused me before when I was told by someone else what the number on top meant in relation to the one underneath it, but now that I can just experience it for myself as I write, it's becoming very clear; even I can't describe it exactly in words.

 

Gabriel referance?

It is physically possible, I suppose, but bending shouldn't really break strings.  If can happen if the strings are really old and have deteriorated from lots of sweat and finger crud.  There are corrosives in your sweat that will make the strings more susceptible to breakage, but your ears will tell you its time for a nice, bright-sounding new set of strings long before you get to breakage territory.

I do remember back in High School ('75 ish) I had an old  single P-90,  double cutaway, red LP Jr. that broke strings at the bridge constantly (didn't know how to fix it at the time) and I used to leave the ends nice and long at the peghead so that when they broke I could save the ball end and tie the rest of the string back through.  I could re-tie strings three or four times before I needed to buy another.  It was then I discovered that you could buy strings one at a time at the music store counter if you knew enough to ask.    Cheap b*****d.

 

Great site, thanks!

 

I found this one useful:

 

http://www.6-string-videos.com/ - http://www.6-string-videos.com/

And you will suceed .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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/admin edit: de-spammed.

 

Maybe I should join a twelve-step program . . .

 

Damn you! *spits on ground and spins*