Any good books on music theory applied to the guitar?
I have been learning music theory in school for a while now and I have realized it does not always apply to the guitar. When switching chords on the guitar a lot of the rules are broken. The rules most broken are the P5 and P8 moving in similar motion. Also some doubling rules are broken like the common C chord on the guitar has a doubled third. I need a book that teaches harmony applied on guitar. If possible one that teaches in multiple styles not just classical. Thanks.
It DOES always apply to the guitar! You’re just learning theory for music that’s 300 years old. There are no "rules" to music, just conventions, which are all relative to the time period. If you look at guitar music from the period your classes are teaching you about, you’ll see that it follows all those "rules". Back then, parallel 5ths, direct octaves, doubled thirds, etc were all considered very unpleasant to the ear, so people avoided them. Over time, people began to like those sounds, and started using them to create new styles of music.
You don’t need a special guitar book, you need a contemporary theory book. The Berklee music theory books are great for this. If you want a good theory book written for guitarists, check out Fretboard Logic and Bill Leavitt’s Modern Method for Guitar.
It DOES always apply to the guitar! You’re just learning theory for music that’s 300 years old. There are no "rules" to music, just conventions, which are all relative to the time period. If you look at guitar music from the period your classes are teaching you about, you’ll see that it follows all those "rules". Back then, parallel 5ths, direct octaves, doubled thirds, etc were all considered very unpleasant to the ear, so people avoided them. Over time, people began to like those sounds, and started using them to create new styles of music.
You don’t need a special guitar book, you need a contemporary theory book. The Berklee music theory books are great for this. If you want a good theory book written for guitarists, check out Fretboard Logic and Bill Leavitt’s Modern Method for Guitar.
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Like many others, I studied conventional theory many years ago in Graduate school using the then standard Walter Piston book: "Harmony" and later its many revisions. It is a thorough study of the subject, though not as simple in delivery as some of our students required. I could not in good faith recommend this tome to my Classic Guitar students, so I have been writing my own theory book entitled "GUITAR: BASIC HARMONY" and have been using it with my students to good effect.
In the preface to my book is an explanation of its merits:
"Introduction
While pursuing Classic/Acoustic Guitar performance studies, it is not unusual for the serious student to consider the advantages of exploring the Theory of Music and harmonic constructions. But, awkwardly, nearly all of the theory books in print use piano keyboard illustrations. Certainly this is not very helpful to the guitar enthusiast.
Essentially, the layout of the piano/organ keyboard is diatonic in construction (the white keys) with the sharps and flats (black keys) wedged in between almost as an afterthought. The guitar fretboard layout, on the other hand, is uniquely suited to this formal study due to its natural chromatic construction and tuning and its remarkable automatically-correct Voice Leading progressions.
Because of the guitar’s historic tuning in fourths (similar to early Lutes and Viols), rather than the fifths of the violin family, even the novice guitar student in his early chord progressions is unwittingly practicing well-established voice-leading principles. (More on this topic will be discussed in the chapter on Voice leading).
Therefore, exploiting the advantages of chromatic tuning, this book will guide the guitar student through the basic principles of harmonic structures and their interplay using well-known classical and folk music compositions as models of good practice. All of the illustrations are written in standard music notation form, with secondary Tablature notation offered as additional support."
Well, there is more, of course, but that is the basic premise of the book, and in my opinion, such a book is sorely needed.
The special needs of the guitar student are not being met in the standard theory fare being offered today. The guitar fretboard (with its special geometry) and the abundant classic guitar literature need to be used as theory examples, not keyboard illustrations. The guitar (and its cousin lutes and viols) predates the piano by centuries. Even the Tempered scale is more ancient on the fretboard and certainly more easily explained on the guitar as well as overtone demonstrations. The piano is seriously deficient in these and many other areas of study.
Cliff E. (classic guitarist)
PS..The doubled third is allowed because the chord is arpeggiated as Bach did in his well-known Prelude no. 1 of the "Well Tempored Clavier". This is not peculiar to guitar, and is not a violation of any rule.
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