[mickyboy100]

hi kirk hi guys & girls of course i dont know if this is the right place to ask this question been playing just over 6 months i'm totaly learning myself i know all my major,minor 7ths, and a few suss cords can play loads of songs finger picking and strumming some good some not so good but get comfused when you guys start talking about modes and 12 bar ,modules, scales,improvisng,do i need to go back to the beginning i watched kirks video on red strat blues (i was hooked)i have only ever played my acaustic guitar i only started so i could play camp fire songs now it is becoming an obsession,dont read music dont understand it even i just seem to have an happy nack of looking at chord tabs and playing the song i would love to learn how to do it right
ps dont mind paying for the tools as long as i know what tools to buy i dont think i'm stupid just ignorant any help would be fantastic

[Kirk Lorange]

Hi mickyboy100.

Six months is not a long time, and as you point out, there's a whole lot to learn about music and how it applies to the guitar fretboard. My advice is just keep doing what you're doing, use you ear as much as you can right now since it sounds like you have a good one. I think if you use the blue links above and start from 'What is music?' you'll get a fairly good idea of how music works (in plain English outline form) so at least you can see what you're up against. Having said that, as dense and complex as music seems at first, a whole lot of it is detail ... the fundamentals aren't that hard to grasp ... major, minor, 7th ... those are the main chord flavors to come to terms with. Chords are very important in my books ... you mention The Red Strat Blues ... I played all of that because I really know the underlying chords, and all the melodic runs I play and double stops (two notes played at once) are based off them.

12 bar means 12 measures of music before it all repeats, a standard blues format.

Modes are just scales ... I never worry about them, never have. I know what they are, but they never enter my mind while I'm playing, the chords take care of that aspect.

I've never hear of modules in music!

Improvising is simply inventing your part as you go, whether it's a chordal thing or melodic. You need to know some underlying rules, of course, and 'inventing' really means assembling your part from things you already know.

Stick at it, it will all fall into place soon enough ...

[newlite]

i have only ever played my acaustic guitar i only started so i could play camp fire songs now it is becoming an obsession

lol, thats the same as me. im a camp counsuler. now i want to be better so i can play in the camps chaple band, but also just cuz guitar is totally awsome