Music theory has a fearsome reputation among guitarists — a dense thicket of notation, Italian terms, and academic rules that seems designed to suck the joy out of playing. A lot of players proudly avoid it, and a lot of others feel vaguely guilty for not knowing it. Both groups … Read more
There’s a particular sound that makes people stop and listen — the gentle, interwoven, harp-like quality of a guitar being fingerpicked. It’s the sound of so much of the music people fall in love with: folk, classical, fingerstyle blues, countless quiet acoustic moments in songs of every genre. And it … Read more
If you learn one scale on guitar, learn this one. The pentatonic scale is the single most useful scale a guitarist can know — the foundation of rock and blues lead playing, the source of countless famous solos and riffs, and, conveniently, one of the easiest scales to play and … Read more
Scales have an image problem. To a lot of beginners, they sound like the homework of guitar — dry, technical, the boring vegetables you’re supposed to eat before the fun of playing actual songs. That reputation is unearned, and it costs students dearly, because scales are quietly the thing that … Read more