4 ms·

> Guitarists learning scales? I mean like the names of the notes rather than the shapes they make on the neck? I'm probably not supposed to say this sort of th

• jimnotgym 9y ago
  I think I may have got the tone wrong here, but it was more self deprecating than trolling. I am a competent guitarist, but know little musical theory. The same was true of many of my friends. The guitar is easy to start out on and impress some non-players with. You can get a very long way with a few chords and tab. However I would never claim to be a musician. I don't read music, I don't think in scales. I used to hang round with music students who marvelled at my solo improvisations, but I couldn't compete with them when it came to music theory. I learned the blues scale shape and added the interesting notes which my friends had proper names for..but it didn't stop me playing songs. Those who do learn music theory have my utmost respect, they could do harmonic things I can only marvel at, but I knew 20x more guitarists that just learned songs from the magazines (before the internet), song books and each other until they had enough building blocks to do their own thing