Guitar-Lessons

The major scale is the most important scale in music theory, and today we will have a brief look at how to play it on guitar.

What Is The Major scale?

The major scale has seven notes, which we label 1 2 3 4 5 6 7.

The first note, note 1 is the root note. This is the note that we start from.

• From 1-2 is a whole step.
• From 2-3 is a whole step.
• From 3-4 is a half step.
• From 4-5 is a whole step.
• From 5-6 is a whole step.
• From 6-7 is a whole step.
• From 7-8 is a half step.
• 8 is the same note as 1, but an octave higher.

Root notes are sometimes referred to as the key.

Set Goals For Yourself and Guitar practice

The first step to getting more form your guitar practice time isn’t doing practice, but thinking about who you want to be as a guitarist.

Do you want to play rock guitar? Rhythm guitar? Lead guitar? Classical guitar?

Do you want to be able to compose or improvise? Read music? Or play songs from tab?

What genres do you want to play? 

Do you want to play in a band?

Sweep picking is a popular technique amongst shred guitar players, and cracking the technique is often seen as an important milestone for guitarists interested in that genre. 

But is sweep picking a technique that is only useful for those who want to shred, or is it worth learning for all lead guitar players?

That is what we are going to discuss.

But, before we do so, we should take a minute to think about what sweep picking is and is not.

Guitar Pro is the most popular guitar tab program in the world.

And it is easy to see why - it’s easy to use to write your own tabs and is packed with useful features for writing and learning songs.

I’m sure every guitar player that has discovered it remembers the moment they did!

For sure, Guitar Pro is great for learning songs, but… are you using it to its full potential?

Different people learn to play guitar for different reasons. 

Some people want to learn their favourite songs, some people want to play in bands and play guitar solos…

and some people want to be able to compose, record and perform their own songs. 

This article is going to look at the different topics that you need to study in order to be able to compose neoclassical instrumental guitar songs. 

So, if you’re into players like Yngwie Malmsteen, Tony McAlpine and Joe Satriani; and you want to write your own instrumental guitar songs, read on! 

Every guitar player knows that they should be using a metronome to practice… and chances are, they (by which I mean you!) are not using them enough.

Metronome’s are a vital tool to improving your playing, especially if you are wanting to play more technically advanced pieces of music. 

However, quite often, even if guitar players are practising with a metronome, they are not using them as effectively as they could be.

Modern life is better than any other time in existence, by almost every possible measure. Income, life expectancy, access to information, infant mortality, cost per calorie of food… and of course, access to guitar lessons. 

As long as you have an internet connection, or live in a town, you are going to have access to some form of guitar lessons.

But with so many choices available, how should you go about choosing how to learn guitar? 

Minor key chord progressions are any chord progressions that come from the minor scale.

In this article, we’ll look at some common minor chord progressions and also look at a lot of examples on how to play these chord progressions on guitar in the keys of A minor, C minor, D minor and E minor (these keys are quite common!).

Let’s quickly recap the chords in the natural minor key:

Scale Degree	1	2	b3	4	5	b6	b7
Chord	i	ii˚	bIII	iv	v	bVI	bVII

Common Minor Chord Progressions

Here are some chord progression, all in minor key, that are commonly seen in music:

Here’s the fast answer: A minor scale is any scale containing the b3 scale degree. If you’re looking into minor scales for the guitar, you are probably looking for the natural minor scale, sometimes called the Aeolian mode. The natural minor scale has the following intervals:

1 2 b3 4 5 b6 b7

And can be played on guitar using the following 3 note per string scale (example in E minor):

In this article, we’re going to look at how to write lead guitar harmonies, just like Iron Maiden play. Part of Iron Maiden’s iconic sound is the use of lead guitar harmonies, and we are going to completely unlock how they work, so that you can use them in your own music.

In this lesson we will cover:

1. How to understand the basic theory required to write lead guitar harmonies.
2. Examples for writing lead guitar harmonies.
3. Shortcuts you can use to write lead guitar harmonies really, really fast.
4. Two simple ideas for writing the rhythm guitar backing for a lead guitar harmony.

After working through this lesson, you will find yourself with a powerful new tool in your songwriting tool box and you will be able to easilly incorporate lead guitar harmonies into your songwriting.