Beginning theory

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Tremontinator

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I am beginning music theory.
My last guitar teacher (who holds I think a BA in music education and I think an MA in music composition) decided to start me off with the circle of fifths.

Lesson 1 was:
I-ii-iii-IV-V-vi

Lesson 2 was:
i-II-III-iv-v-VI

Lesson 3???

Please speak slowly and clearly. I've always struggled with theory and, therefore, I have avoided/shunned/shied away from theory.

I understand Major and minor chords are named because the third degree of the major scale is either a minor third or Major third above the tonic.

I'm not looking to get a doctorate in musical science here. I don't care about sharps, flats, or key signatures. I use tabs and YouTube. Not sheets.

I want to gain a basic understanding of what is going on in Blues, Rock, and a little bit of Metal.
I don't like classical, jazz, punk, funk, fusion, reggae, pop, new wave, prog, ska, or whatever.
Just Blues, Rock, and some Metal.

Is there anybody here who can keep it extremely simple and basic?


Verify my knowledge?

Looking at my circle of fifths wall chart, I have D-A-E, and Bm-F#m-C#m.

So, AM, DM, and EM are the I-IV-V

Does that mean Bm-F#m-C#m would be ii-vi-iii?

I am assuming A-B-C#-D-E-F# are scale degrees 1-2-3-4-5-6.


Anybody see my confusion? The I chord is in the center. The IV chord is one to the left (CCW), and the V chord is one to the right (CW).

I don't see any kind of logic to find the ii-iii-vi chords without having to stop and count up the alphabet every time (ABC...).

When looking at my wall chart, I am mentally drawing lines through it (ABC...), and I'm not seeing anything logical to quickly and easily find the scale degrees.

Finding I-IV-V is logical. It makes sense. I heard it one time years ago, and it just clunked into place inside my extremely tiny and porous musical brain. And believe me, it's tiny and porous.


So, fair warning:
My last theory lesson (i-II-III-iv-iv-VI) was a little over a year ago.

NOTHING I have found or asked anybody about has made any sense at all. None whatsoever.



The outside ring is Major.

The inside ring is minor.

The minor chord directly underneath the Major chord is the relative minor (CM-Am).

Picking groups of 6 chords, and knowing which to play as Major and minor is easy.

All of these things are concrete in my mind. I may or may not have a complete understanding but, I know that these 4 items are true. And I can write out the formulas I-ii-iii-IV-V-vi and i-II-III-iv-v-VI for Major and minor respectively.


Beyond that, you might as well be speaking Mandarin.


Is there anybody here who can teach me in simple, plain American? Use small words? Make it easy to understand?

I've got A.D.D. and scatter brains with a bad memory so, yeah.


Cheers to all! Sorry for the long post. Drink water. :-)
 
OP. What the heck are you talking about? What’s with all the Roman Numerals? You lost me at I ii iii... I thought you were counting off a song. No clue.
 
DreamTheaterRules said:
OP. What the heck are you talking about? What’s with all the Roman Numerals? You lost me at I ii iii... I thought you were counting off a song. No clue.
Click to expand...

Scale degrees. Root is one, etc.

So in C...

C D E F G A B

I II III IV V VI VII

Capital Roman numeral is a major chord, lower case is minor. So I = C maj, iii = Em.
 
Yeah I've spent many years avoiding theory because Rock N Roll breaks all the rules, anyways.

But, it's a topic that keeps popping up. And I keep having theory related questions about whatever I'm working on or thinking about, musically.


IDK. I'm gonna take it kinda slow in the beginning and see what happens.


Somebody once defined music theory as follows:
Replacing magic with understanding.


Well, David Fvcking Copperfield wouldn't make any money if everybody knew his tricks.


To me, music is magic. Every time I learn these tiny little scraps of theoretical knowledge, it has ruined the magic. Which is why I refuse to learn songs by my favorite band: The Beach Boys.


Lemme try an analogy

I can prepare a deck of cards, and show you 4 aces fanned out in my hand.
I put the aces on top of the deck.
I grab the first Ace, and put it on the bottom.

I take the next 3 aces, and put them anywhere in the middle of the deck.

I tell you to cut the deck.

I wrap it with my knuckles, and when I flip all the cards over, the aces magically appear together, and they're in the same order (heart, diamond, club, spade) that they were in my hand.

That's magic.


And then, I teach you how I did the trick. You didn't see me prepping the deck. I took 3 random cards, and carefully arranged them in my hand:

A-4-9-10-A-A-A

When I fanned out the aces in my hand, I carefully hid my 3 random cards, held them at the right angle and distance, and made you concentrate on what order they were in. Heart, diamond, club, spade.

Now, the trick isn't magic anymore. It's just stupid now.


That's what music theory does for me. It reveals the 3 random cards hidden in the magician's hand.


But, I seem to have reached a point in my musical journey where I just have to learn the card tricks in order to progress my learning of everything else.

I've tried to avoid it. I held off as long as I could. But now, it seems that my lack of theory is holding me back.
 
veinbuster said:
Theory is just one path to help you figure out which things will sound good after the last thing you played. You could also just try a lot of stuff and remember what works.
Click to expand...


That's when ADD kicks in lol

Also, I want to be able to change keys at will in order to make my listener go what the fvck? That was awesome!
 
DreamTheaterRules said:
I just learned more theory in 15 seconds than I have all my life. Not joking. I've NEVER bothered to learn any of that.
Click to expand...

Well, it mostly exhausts what theory I know. I've tried a couple times to learn, but I get to a point where it just baffles me. I'll read an article or watch a lesson and the guy will say, "You can play Phrygian mode over this..." and when I do, it sounds like crap. Not only that, but I find myself thinking more than playing with feeling.

I think some music education is very important, especially if you're going to play with others. I think you should be able to do some basic reading, or at least know enough to be able to tell someone else what you want them to play. It's one thing to tell another guitar player to play this shape at the 7th fret. It's another thing to try to tell a keyboard player to play that. So that level is important. I'll never have the musical understanding that guys like Zappa, Satch, Keneally or Vai have. But I can be better and learn more. And that's where I'm trying to go.
 
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