Learn Guitar Blog

Here’s a stupid question but I figured I better ask…

The C major scale is the simplest scale in western music. It has no sharps and flats and can be easily played on piano by starting on middle C and playing the 7 white keys that follow it. We will use it as an example of how to form the other major scales.

Most people who take up playing the guitar will start off by learning major chords, and then move on to minor, 7th and minor 7th chord shapes, all of these chord shapes are very similar, so learning them is fairly simple.

I was a cocky know-it-all, but I ended up looking so stupid…

I’ll let you in on a very personal story…

I had been playing guitar for about a year and a half - And I thought I was really good too…

I could play chords, strum, play lots of songs - and I’d seen guitar scales…

But, you know how it is - at the time learning guitar scales didn’t seem to do me any good, so I ignored them…

Boy was I wrong…

The major and minor guitar scales are very important.

Most songs are based on one or the other.

Between the two scales a whole variety of moods can be invoked in the listener…

Major and minor scales used to drive me crazy, but I finally figured them out…

See, for years I just ignored them - but guess what?

My ignorance caught up with me in the end…

It’s so embarrassing for me to say this….

I used to be tone deaf…

To be brutally honest, I was so musically inept that I made those cringe worthy American idol contestants look incredibly talented…

You finally get your first guitar and it seems everyone has an opinion about how to learn quickly – and the more you hear the more confusing it all seems…

It’s like a mine field of bad advice and the only way you’ll navigate to safety is taking it one step at a time…

Imagine you’re taking a long haul flight from Europe to Australia, with a stopover in Bangkok - Diminished chords are kinda like that stopover - not absolutely necessary but they make the journey that little bit more interesting…