Looking for an easy introduction to music theory? I’ve struggled for years to find one that my students would like and get something out of. So far this seems to be the best one. Take a look if you want to tell your minors from your augmenteds.

When I was in college I had a number of amazing teachers. One of them was Dr. David Ward-Steinman, one of the world’s great composers as well as instructors. I remember one day sitting next to him as he sightread an entire orchestral score at the piano. That means he played on the spot about 20 parts of music at the same time on the piano. As if that wasn’t enough he was transposing for various instruments (e.g. clarinet, saxaphone, etc.) Even more amazing was that he would nod his head for the page to be turned while he was only half way through the page, meaning that he had memorized all the music that was still on the page before he played it!

In order to play a piece of music well, at sight (sight read) that is what you need to do, to look ahead. How does one learn to do this? Try this. Put a piece of music in front of you that you have never seen. Start playing. As you near halfway through the first measure have a friend cover it up the whole measure with a piece of paper. Did you have to stop? If so, try again and this time look ahead. As you go your friend keeps placing the paper over what you are playing leaving only what comes ahead visible. Fun!

One problem with sitting down and “practicing” is that we guitar plays tend to noodle. Now we may start with the best intentions but soon find ourselves off on a tangent. Here’s an ideas that will fix that but still allow you to have fun while practicing. Write down five things you want to accomplish. Not things that you want to accomplish over the next year, but over the next hour. Then when you sit down to practice start working on getting them done. When you have those five checked off, you’re done, play whatever you want. Do this for a week or two and you will make more progress than if you had practiced aimlessly for three hours a day. It’s all about quality not quantity.

Nothing annoys audiences more than an out of tune guitar (except maybe spandex). Let’s face it, most guitar players aren’t great at tuning. Part of the problem is that they still use the old play the fifth fret, tune the neck string, repeat. The problem with this is if you make a little mistake at the beginning it will show up on every string after that, and if you make several little mistakes it adds up to a big mistake in the end. Solution? Try this:

1) Tune Fifth String to a tuning fork (or piano, or tuner).
2) Play the 12th fret harmonic on the 5th string and tune the 4th string to it by playing the 7th fret on the 4th string.
3) Play the 12th fret harmonic on the 5th string (again) and tune the 3rd string to it by playing the 2nd fret on the 3rd string.
4) Play the 12th fret harmonic on the 4th string and tune the 2nd string to it by playing the 3rd fret on the 2nd string.
5)Play the 12th fret harmonic on the 3rd string and tune the 1st string to it by playing the 3rd fret on the 1st string.
6)Play the 7th fret harmonic on the 5th string and tune the 6th string to it by playing the 6th string 5th fret harmonic.

This will help for a number of reasons. It reduces the problem of compounded errors. For example the fifth string is used to tune the third which is used to tune the first, which means there are two steps involved. Compare this to tuning the fourth to the fifth, third to the fourth, second to the third, and finally first to the second. There is a lot greater chance for error there. Also, it involves tuning strings to unisons which always helps. Try it out!