Reading Music

On Reading Music

When I first did lessons, reading music was the only way to access any material, songs, exercises or method books.  No CD,s, no DVD's, no YouTube or TAB.  You could learn from your mates; put your fingers here and play this.  Once you'd cracked some basics you could listen to records and busk something similar.  I didn't play "Born to Wild" correctly for twenty years!  If you went to a teacher you'd have to start reading straight away.  I still have my original 'McNeil's Modern Guitar Method' book from 1958 - students nowadays think it looks horrendously difficult, with it's tiny notation and chords from day one written as music with tiny chord diagrams less than a 10mm square.

If you wanted to study the guitar at a high level at a Music College, it would have had to be classical guitar and totally based on music reading.  Studying the classical instrument is still like that.

Things have changed in the last twenty years and it's now quite possible to get right through to Grade 8 in Electric Guitar, Bass, and Acoustic Guitar without reading a note of standard notation.  Now that's fine if you're playing with your mates in a local band (which, granted could become big) when you can sort out between yourselves how to learn and store your songs without writing or reading music.  But if you plan to play with players you don't know, to teach, or do sessions and generally pursue playing to a higher level, not understanding how to read and write music is a big blocking factor.  If fact if your not able to read music and you are trying to earn a living playing and teaching,  it can be as difficult as not reading or writing your own language - not impossible to survive - but much more challenging.

Fortunately as young or adult players there is a wealth of material published to help you attain this skill and the process can be broken down to a few fundamental elements to make the whole journey of learning and practicing successful.  Once you start you'll find it easy.

Reading can be broken down into three main parts - understanding what pitch a note is to be played - understanding how long a note should sound - and the rhythm of the notes.  Learning each of these separately at first make the initial stages easy to handle and far less intimidating.

Below is a list of books and material to help you learn.  Against each book is my explanation of the reason to studying them and what you should understand by the time you finish.

(This book appraisal work will be published here in the next week or two  2/12/2010)