Theory Primer The purpouse of this theory primer is to take you through the basic intervals, triads ( 3 note

chords and basic scales. Intervals Primer An interval is the musical distance between one musical note and another. There are 5 main categories of interval; Major, Minor, Perfect, Augmented and Diminished. So Why Do I Need Intervals? Intervals are the building blocks for chords, arpeggios and scales. In the same way that a bricklayer needs bricks and mortar or a carpenter needs, wood, nails, glue, etc, a guitarist ( indeed any musician ) needs to know intervals. If you were asked to play an A minor chord instead of an A Major chord or wanted to learn the Lydian scale, a basic understanding of intervals, not to mention some time spent finding it on the guitar, will help you no end.

Interval Chart For this chart I will start from the root and go through every interval up to an octave. Yes, there are more intervals, but as this is a primer I want to keep it as simple as possible. I will be using the key of C for this and have produced a tab example so you can listen to each of the intervals for yourself. There is also an MP3 file, containing all the intervals tabbed and shown here. In case it is not entirely clear, a lower case m ( m ) is used to denote a minor interval and an uppercase m ( M ) is used to denote a Major interval. Throughout my other lessons I shall be using m and M to show major and minor tonalities. Interval Unison ( Root ) Minor 2nd Major 2nd Minor 3rd Major 3rd Perfect 4th Perfect 5th Minor 6th Major 6th Minor 7th Major 7th Perfect Octave Abbreviation Unis ( Root ) m2 M2 m3 M3 P4 P5 m6 M6 m7 M7 P8 Note C-C C - Db C-D C - Eb C-E C-F C-G C - Ab C-A C - Bb C-B C-C

Example 1 shows the tab for these intervals.

Major Scale Construction

As you will probably remember from the Intervals lesson, the distance between one note and another is known as a musical interval. In the major scale, the intervals between each note are either Major ( M ) or Perfect ( P ). The major scale is probably one of the most important scales in Western music. It can be used to help create chords, make modes and find pentatonic scales. That part will come later but first we need to construct a major scale. There are 7 notes in the major scale, which are, surprisingly, numbered from 1 to 7. 1 refers to the tonic, or root note. This will be the note the scale starts on and also tells you which key you are playing in. You will also come across the number 8, which is the same note as 1, only an octave higher. The intervals in a major scale are as follows...... Root ( 1 ), Major 2nd ( 2 ), Major 3rd ( 3 ), Perfect 4th ( 4 ), Perfect 5th ( 5 ), Major 6th ( 6 ), Major 7th ( 7 ), Perfect Octave ( 8 ). This can be abbreviated to.... R1, M2, M3, P4, P5, M6, M7, P8 The second way of writing it is just shorthand and a little tidier.

Basic Chord Primer A basic chord contains 3 notes, which is also known as a triad. On a guitar though the notes of the chord are sometimes doubled up. For now I will deal with the main 3 notes needed. There are 5 main chord families......Major, Minor, Dominant, Augmented and Diminished. For now I will deal with the Major and Minor families, as they lend themselves quite well to triads as well as big chords. The Major Family A Major chord ( or triad ) contains 3 notes; the Root, or Tonic, which tells you which key the chord is in, the Major Third and the Perfect Fifth. There are 2 ways of finding these notes; one is to refer to the Interval Chart in the Interval Primer lesson, the other is to use what I like to call the 'leapfrog' method. For both examples I am going to use the note C as the Root. Using The Interval Chart To start with you need the Root note, which in this case is C. The next note you need is the Major 3rd ( a major chord always contains a Major 3rd ). Look down the chart and you will find how many steps away from the root the Major Third is. Next you need the Perfect Fifth. Again look down the interval chart and you will find out how many steps away from the Root note the Perfect Fifth is. The Leapfrog Method For this method you will need to write out the notes of the key that you will be playing the chord in. As the key is C major the notes will be..... CDEFGAB You already know that the Root note is C, so to find the other 2 notes ( Third and Fifth ) simply miss a note then use the next note like this.... CDEFGAB The notes in bold ( C, E and G ) form the basic triad for the C Major chord.

The Minor Family A Minor Chord ( or triad ) contains 3 notes; the Root, or Tonic, which tells you what key you are in, the Minor Third and the Perfect Fifth. You will notice one important difference between a Major and Minor chord; Major contains a Major third, Minor contains a minor third.