I’ve recently been reading through some lessons and articles (devised over a long period of time), editing and updating them for publishing to my website. One of these articles is about (and titled) “Three Aspects of Performance Musicianship”. It currently appears on the Audio Design Workshop myspace page:

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=147226874&blogID=374018957

I’ve been considering the content of this article a lot recently, since I engaged in a discussion about some aspects of theory (on the music radar forum http://www.musicradar.com/forum) not too long ago. I’ve become concerned that this article may be misunderstood as the “guitar perspective” on music, and I would wish to avoid using this point of view as a basis for establishing a balanced and overall outlook on playing. A reply to something I had posted made reference to “guitar theory” being different from “common practice”. I disagreed with this distinction at the time, although later in the discussion, it became clear what was actually meant by this. What was meant, was that that people who learn music in different ways (though learning to play different instruments) usually develop different perspectives on theory, unfortunately sometimes to the point where their knowledge can offer someone what they consider to be a “comprehensive outlook” on theory. In actual fact, they really just have a basic grasp of a small part of theory (from the point of view of studying an instrument on which certain things are easier to grasp than others). I occurred to me that where the old adage “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing”, didn’t quite apply, a modified and similar “little knowledge based on the study of one particular instrument, will lead you to have a totally different little knowledge of theory from someone who has studied a different instrument” probably did (to a certain extent). My contribution to the discussion was as follows:

“Theory is theory. How that is practically applied to any instrument (melodic/harmonic) is immaterial. Chords, keys, scales, modes, modulation, harmonic suspension and resolution, are all the same no matter what instrument you play. There are recognisable differences in the manner in which theory is sometimes expressed within different styles/ genres of music which is perfectly acceptable for practical reasons, but ultimately within the western system of equally tempered instruments (which modern classical and jazz theory relates to), theory is universal.”

From the practical viewpoint of studying “guitar playing” in general, these considerations raise some interesting questions regarding where and when one actually begins to learn theory, and where and when one perhaps should begin? Also, should we just accept, or reconsider the entire “natural approach” to learning theory as a guitarist, where an emphasis on the theory which makes most sense to guitar players (borne of the nature of the instrument) is learned first? Is this the best approach in the interest of developing a thorough and comprehensive understanding of theory? When it comes to learning, should we continue as we have done for a long time, or change? Perhaps learning theory as we learn to play the guitar (as and when theoretical questions arise regarding theoretical expressions and explanations of what is actually being played on the guitar) cannot be improved upon? Do we consider the practical aspects of guitar playing and the theoretical aspects to be separate subjects and study them independent of each other? I believe that the large space in between the extremes of theory being on one side of the table, with “practice” on the other, is where most guitarists will find their own experience of learning. Taking that into consideration, I would like to put the question to “accomplished” guitarists: Was this the “best” way you could have learned all this stuff? And if it wasn’t the “best” way, how could it be improved?