Experiences with Lessons

[charvelguy]

Its great to have someone you respect or admire actually show you up close their approach, chops, technique and basis for phrasing and where they built and learned from. Some guys are intensive in their background.
A good teacher is much like a hired consultant. IMO, a teacher balances constructively... criticism, direction etc. If you are in more advanced.. then it can incorporate more performance oriented things.
Some teachers will give a little extra time if you are at a scheduled time which it allows and you end up jamming.

[Brick]

So Jeff Loomis of Nevermore is also not a musician since he doesn't really "know" theory or music? Yeah, okay. Good day, sir.

If u learn nevermore songs you would realize that he does have some knowledge of scales and theory, many of his licks are diantonic ie they're in scale. The solo in the riverdragon is based on a diminished 7th arpegio and alot of his stuff is in harmonic minnor, and if u read his column in guitar world u can tell he knows what hes talking about.

[khabibissell]

If u learn nevermore songs you would realize that he does have some knowledge of scales and theory, many of his licks are diantonic ie they're in scale. The solo in the riverdragon is based on a diminished 7th arpegio and alot of his stuff is in harmonic minnor, and if u read his column in guitar world u can tell he knows what hes talking about.

Yeah, there's no way Jeff doesn't know any theory. Maybe those guys play it off in interviews 'cause it's not cool to be well versed?

I've never really had any formal training other than learning a few pentatonic scales and stuff way back when, but I've learned a couple of new (to me) things lately such as: using the Circle of Fifths (mentioned above), relative major/minor scales and arpeggios over chords, and diminished scales and arpeggios. I'm only just barely scratching the surface I know, but the amount of options those things give you along with using diatonic/pentatonic scales in the key you are soloing in is mind blowing. These theories also give you songwriting ideas as well. It is well worth the effort.

[charvelguy]

If u learn nevermore songs you would realize that he does have some knowledge of scales and theory, many of his licks are diantonic ie they're in scale. The solo in the riverdragon is based on a diminished 7th arpegio and alot of his stuff is in harmonic minnor, and if u read his column in guitar world u can tell he knows what hes talking about.

He's influenced by Yngwie...I seen a clip of him doing Far Beyond the Sun many years ago, .. he's learned theory if he's gone into learning that note for note.

[Endrik]

Bill said that Jeff didn't know any theory until GW asked him to do columns last year and he learend it to explain his stuff to the readers... that's what Bill said and he knows Jeff pretty well.

[kmanick]

I took my first formal lesson in 21 years on Monday night.
It was a web cam lesson with this guy I know that has been transcribing Greg Howe stuff for me for a while.
There's nothing like actually being able to see how someone better than you plays something that gives you trouble.
This guys is very well versed in theory, as well as being someone that totally rips.
It was really cool, went over a bunch of Bebop phrases and concentrated
on playing over dominant chord changes ala Greg Howe/Guthrie Govan/Charlie Parker type of stuff.
Being able to see someone play it correctly VS. playing along with a
Powertab was like night and day.
He also showed me some wide interval tapping licks that were ridiculous.
Playing a minor pentatonic shape with my left hand and tapping the same minor pentatonic shape up a 5th with my right hand. 4 notes per string (2 left hand /2 right hand) that's gonna take a while to get good at :ROTF:

That one hour lesson gave me a ton of really cool ideas

[Spivonious]

Inner ear, pitch and vision are actually the only things you need to create music. You can live without the other stuff but nothing can replace these things.

Totally agree E, with pretty much everything you've said. But, if your ear and pitch aren't that great, then theory can be a great aid.

[Endrik]

yeah it is a great aid, I'd learn theory myself...maybe.... but as I said before I have a very hard time remembering that stuff... luckly I have a good ear and pitch... I know what's going on, I can jam with crazy jazz musicians who throw insane chords at me...

Theory is a great tool if you are a session musician and do soundtracks for TV shows and whatnot. If you don't want to use your songs wich are important to you, you can build tunes strictly based on theory.... using different modes and chord progressions to create certain mood wich the specific moment requiers.

My advice would be learn theory as much as you want but do not forget to LISTEN. Theory is worthless if you really don't feel what's going on... in yoyr ears. Training your ear is essential, if you learn intervals, scales, chords and whatnot, sing 'em along. Play a chord with a guitar and sing the scale over it. Or sing chord progressions and improvise over it with the guitar. There's so many things you can do.
Knowing terms and rules is useless if you don't know how they sound.

[Deneb]

I don't know about you, but i met a guy, who was in jail for a few years. Nicest guy in the world, and I was asking him one day, how he learned so much music theory. He said, in jail, all I could do was lift weights, and play guitar. He said that he jammed with jazz piano players that played for a living, people that blew chances at music college and everything.

Everything he showed me, was in a well thought out, well planned "lesson" plan. Like, I wasn't taking lessons, he was just showing me different things than I do now, and some theory things I didn't get.

I'm so suprised to hear this guy was locked up too, he's like the best friend anyone could ever have. That's another story though.

[demeyes]

You know I figure all these things out pretty qucikly. I know music in and out. I know how everything works, I've mapped out everything in my head. I just don't care about the terms and the rules. I will never learn theory not because I think it's ghey or I'm just an arrogant asshole, it's because it's like math, all these numbers and weird names. I will never remember that shit.

That pretty much means you know theory, you just don't know the names for the stuff you know. Most players who make music well and claim to not know any theory really have learned it along the way, they just picked up the stuff and never learned its name.
I think that anyone who takes guitar seriously will run into theory eventually. Even basic chord construction and the pentatonic scale are tools of theory that every guitar player worth his salt is aware of.