Music Theory through Pearl Jam

desandrews

Hey Guys. I've been playing for a few years now, but I know very little, if any, theory. I know the bar chords and open chords, I know a few scales, but I don't really get how it ties together. I'm strictly a tab kind of guy, I learned as a child how to read music, but don't remember and haven't even tried. I was hoping maybe you guys could shed some light on this for me, through the example of a Pearl Jam song.

For example, I know how to play Wishlist, including the solo. Is there anyone here with enough time or patience to explain to me how the rhythm and solo are linked? Like, what key is it in? What scale is the solo based on? Why does the solo sound good with the rhythm? It seems so simple, but how did they come up with it?

I'm getting to the point where I can come up with some of my own riffs, but I have no idea how to start building anything on top of that. I guess that's the basis for my question. How do I know what lead type notes will sound good with a riff that I come up with?

I apologize for the scattered thoughts, but if anyone wants to take a shot or just pontificate some knowledge my way, I'd greatly appreciate it. Thanks.

MissYouAllDay

K I am not the greatest but I can give you a rough idea.

I personally do not know how to tell what key a song is in. I would say the first chord played, or if not, the most predominant chord played. I have a feeling that is wrong, but someone will correct me.

So once you figure out the key of rythm or riff, you can solo on it. What you have to do is play the notes involved in that scale of the key, or around it. Say your soloing in D, play on the notes that make up the D scale . Now you don't just have to stick to these notes. All that is important is that you land on one of these notes after every "run". Every time you play a series of notes and are gonna end (or pause) on one note sustained, then that note needs to be a note from the scale (preferably the root note, D) or it's gonna sound ugly.

My knowledge is weak but hopefully that will give you a very rough idea of what sounds good with what.

BinFrog

Here is some basic theory stuff I wrote for a buddy of mine who just started playing guitar a few months ago...maybe it will help.

---

Everything you will learn, aside from fingering and basic dexterity issues, has to do with the "major scale".

The first thing you want to know. Standard tuning on a guitar goes like this (starting from the bass string, or 'low' string'): E A D G B E. Memorize this.

Also memorize this:

A to B is a whole step (2 frets)

B to C is a half step (1 fret)

C to D is a whole step (2 frets)

D to E is a whole step (2 frets)

E to F is a half step (1 fret)

F to G is a whole step (2 frets)

G to A is a whole step (2 frets)

Notice that to go from B to C or from E to F means you only move up 1 fret. Every other step from a non sharp/flat note to the next non sharp-flat note is a whole step. I'll explain sharps (#) and flats (b) below.

The major scale is simple. Western instruments are based on the notes from A - G.

The major scale is the progression of an octave (so from A - A). An octave is just every note between a note and the next highest version of that same note. On a guitar, octaves starting from the 0 fret (open string) end where you see the double dots on the 12th fret. The major scale through an octave though does not play every note. A major scale, no matter what note you start on, has this progression:

W W H W W W H

W means "whole step" (or 2 frets)

H means "half step" (or 1 fret)

Let's start with the C major scale. The C major scale is great for beginners because every note in it is neither a sharp nor a flat. It goes like this:

C D E F G A B C

Or

W W H W W W H

If you relate that to the info above, you'll see that where the half steps occur on the C major scale happens to coincide with the B-C and E-F note occurrences. That's why C is perfect for a beginner to look at. No sharps or flats. For instance, the E major scale looks like this:

E F# G# A B C# D# E

See how the whole step from E brings you to F# instead of F? That's because it only takes a half step to get to F from E, but the major scale says you need to go a whole step.

Almost everything you learn will be based on the major scale. You will often hear people talk about "1-3-5" chords. This is really very simple. All that means is that a basic major chord (not a minor, or diminished, or a 7th, etc etc) has the 1, 3, and 5 notes from the major scale. A C major chord, if you look at the major scale above, will have C, E and G in it. All chords have at least 3 notes in them. They usually have more.

A c chords looks like: 032010

If you follow this, starting on the left the string are (like I said above) E A D G B E.

Thus the notes in this very basic, good to know “C major” chord are:


E C E G C E

This one is easy. Like I said, C major has C E and G in it. There you go. Your first introduction as to how basic major chords are constructed. When you hear people talk about chords like the ones I described above (minors, diminished, add9, 7ths, etc) all they mean is there is a variation on the major chords. Some have more than 3 notes in them. An easy one to remember: A minor chord (Cm for instance) has a flattened (half step down) 3rd note of the major scale. So Cm has C, Eb and G.

I’ll leave it at that for now.



Just remember:

EADGBE

WWHWWWH

1, 3, 5

Octave = Note to higher Note

B-C and E-F are half steps, the rest are whole.

---

justam

Learn scales.
Learn the chords that go with them.
Learn arpeggiated chords.

These will give you the materials you need to build with.

rickp

There is a whole bunch of information about this stuff on giventowail...

StuffnJunk

look up a thing called the "circle of fifths", it shows how how to match chords and what key to solo in with the combinations

it is really the simplest way of explaining this complex shit

Pearl Jam and toast

learn the pneumonic (spelling?) scale and expand... play behind the main scale.. in front of it... up and down the neck.. etc..

dont over think it. its not complicated and you dont need lessons to understand it... you need practice...

i have a friend blowing 20 dollars a week on theory (and buying books to boot) and not progressing anywhere because 1) he doesnt try at all, and 2) he never practices.

StuffnJunk

ok i decided to elaborate a little more for example : YELLOW LEDBETTER

the chords used are E, A, and B.....the most common grouping of chords is what is known as I, IV, V....this is derived from the blues, as all blues songs follow the I, IV, V pattern......

basically you take a chord (I) and pair it with the chords that are 4 steps and 5 steps above it

in this case, E is the I chord, the chord 4 steps above is A and the chord 5 steps up is B

so yellow led follows the most basic blues rock pattern....since E is the I chord it is in the key of E

now, when you solo over this you do NOT use the E blues scale, you use what is called the relative minor....why? i have no idea.......in this case the relative minor to the key of E is C# minor.....the basic pattern of which is on the 9th fret.....as you can see, the Yellow Led solo is mostly around the 9th fret.......

so look up the Circle of fifths on google.....as you see you take a chord, and the chords to the left and right of it on the circle are its IV and V, and the minor on the inside of the circle is the minor blues scale you will use to solo.......

hope that makes sense

Pearl Jam and toast

StuffnJunk wrote:

ok i decided to elaborate a little more for example : YELLOW LEDBETTER

the chords used are E, A, and B.....the most common grouping of chords is what is known as I, IV, V....this is derived from the blues, as all blues songs follow the I, IV, V pattern......

basically you take a chord (I) and pair it with the chords that are 4 steps and 5 steps above it

in this case, E is the I chord, the chord 4 steps above is A and the chord 5 steps up is B

so yellow led follows the most basic blues rock pattern....since E is the I chord it is in the key of E

now, when you solo over this you do NOT use the E blues scale, you use what is called the relative minor....why? i have no idea.......in this case the relative minor to the key of E is C# minor.....the basic pattern of which is on the 9th fret.....as you can see, the Yellow Led solo is mostly around the 9th fret.......

so look up the Circle of fifths on google.....as you see you take a chord, and the chords to the left and right of it on the circle are its IV and V, and the minor on the inside of the circle is the minor blues scale you will use to solo.......

hope that makes sense

you make perfect sense to someone who knows what to listen for

a simple way to think about scale names is like this:

C#minor scale is the key of E. look at these chords:

C#minor
e- 7
b- 7
g- 7
d- 9
a- 9
e- 7

e5 (i think e5.... tis an E anyway)

e- x
b- 9
g- 9
d- 9
a- 7
e- x

they have the same scale with 2 names.

Emin / a5
Amin / D5

etc..

StuffnJunk

that "C# minor" you wrote out was a B minor.........

desandrews

StuffnJunk wrote:

ok i decided to elaborate a little more for example : YELLOW LEDBETTER

the chords used are E, A, and B.....the most common grouping of chords is what is known as I, IV, V....this is derived from the blues, as all blues songs follow the I, IV, V pattern......

basically you take a chord (I) and pair it with the chords that are 4 steps and 5 steps above it

in this case, E is the I chord, the chord 4 steps above is A and the chord 5 steps up is B

so yellow led follows the most basic blues rock pattern....since E is the I chord it is in the key of E

now, when you solo over this you do NOT use the E blues scale, you use what is called the relative minor....why? i have no idea.......in this case the relative minor to the key of E is C# minor.....the basic pattern of which is on the 9th fret.....as you can see, the Yellow Led solo is mostly around the 9th fret.......

so look up the Circle of fifths on google.....as you see you take a chord, and the chords to the left and right of it on the circle are its IV and V, and the minor on the inside of the circle is the minor blues scale you will use to solo.......

hope that makes sense

This is good stuff here. Exactly the type of info I was looking for. Thanks. Thanks to everyone actually. You've all given me some meat to chew on. Now I need the weekend to roll around so I can blow 8 straight hours on this... 2 days in a row.

moemoe6434

StuffnJunk wrote:

that "C# minor" you wrote out was a B minor.........

Isn't it a Bmajor?

StuffnJunk

B major would be

e 7
B 7
G 8
D 9
A 9
E 7

moemoe6434

Hmm, i thought it was the other way around.... hmm oops.

BlindMelonade

Another way to find out the key of a song that works MOST of the time is to find out if there is a seventh chord in the song...

The seventh chord is USUALLY the fifth in the song...

Wow, I just read that and noticed that it would confuse someone who doesn't know theory...I'll try again.

Say there is a chord like B7. (x,2,4,2,4,2). When I say 'seventh', I mean that it's a triad but with an added seventh note, this doesn't mean it's an actual seventh chord in the scale (seventh in the scale of E would be D).

In composition, there are things called cadences. A perfect authentic cadence is V7 -> I and both have to be in root position. It is very rare that you would come across, say, a ii7, or any other 7th chord that isn't a V. So when figuring out the key of the song, you could either look at the cadence, or find any 7th chord in the song and hope that it's the V chord...Then just count backwards from the letter name... (B,A,G,F,E) and the song would most likely be in the key of E....

This goes for simple songs with no modulation or complicated chords....

I hope that can make sense to at least some people ( I just woke up and am only on cup 2 of coffee)

puremagic

Stuff mentioned the circle of fifth and here are the links.

[This link contains the charts]
http://www.torvund.net/guitar/Theory/23-Circle_of_fifth.asp

http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/lessons/the_basics/the_circle_of_fifths_music_theory_for_dummies.html
[This link takes you through the whole circle]

Don't take it personally because it says for dummies, these two links are really good when you feel like your in a writing slump or everything you've been playing starts to sound the same. They let you get creative a little faster. Guitar is not my first choice of instruments, so the circle charts work serve as great reference points.

desandrews

StuffnJunk wrote:

ok i decided to elaborate a little more for example : YELLOW LEDBETTER

the chords used are E, A, and B.....the most common grouping of chords is what is known as I, IV, V....this is derived from the blues, as all blues songs follow the I, IV, V pattern......

basically you take a chord (I) and pair it with the chords that are 4 steps and 5 steps above it

in this case, E is the I chord, the chord 4 steps above is A and the chord 5 steps up is B

so yellow led follows the most basic blues rock pattern....since E is the I chord it is in the key of E

now, when you solo over this you do NOT use the E blues scale, you use what is called the relative minor....why? i have no idea.......in this case the relative minor to the key of E is C# minor.....the basic pattern of which is on the 9th fret.....as you can see, the Yellow Led solo is mostly around the 9th fret.......

so look up the Circle of fifths on google.....as you see you take a chord, and the chords to the left and right of it on the circle are its IV and V, and the minor on the inside of the circle is the minor blues scale you will use to solo.......

hope that makes sense

So, when I'm using the minor scale to solo, that, in terms of steps is WHWWHWW?

lovin kind

creating great music and songs needs a bit of luck involved with it
and from the beginning good percussion

StuffnJunk

i don't know what it is in terms of steps, that the kind of thing you don't even need to know......just learn the pentatonic patterns........i have a very backward understanding of music theory......as long as you know the circle of fifths and know which chords go together, and know your scale patterns to use to solo, you can do everything most rock guitar players (mccready) do.....that simple.......since we mentioned the C# minor for yellow led, the basic pattern is:

e 9,12
B 9, 12
G 9, 11
D 9, 11
A 9, 11
E 9, 12

please keep the thread going with any other questions you have.......

DieasGrey

Lots of good info on here so far.

Id have to say the circle of fifths is the most important thing to learn when starting out in music theory.

So here is a lil crash course.

FIRST: KEY AND SCALE ARE NOT THE SAME THING
KEY= is bascially an indicator of how many sharps or flats are in the scale the song is based of off.
SCALE= an arrangement of pitches (the step patterns) like wwhwwwh

Where they relate is that every Key is based on a major scale (or minor ...but for the sake of simplicitywell stick to the major for now)

So well start with the key of Cmaj.
Using the major scale step pattern of wwhwwwh we get the notes
C D E F G A B C...c major scale
So the Key of C contains no sharps or flats.
So any scale you play that has no sharps or flats in it is in the key of C.

So lets do the Key of G maj .
Again the same pattern of wwhwwwh but start at G.
G A B C D E F# G...G major scale
So the Key of G has 1#. So any scale you play that only has an F# is in the key of G. No matter what the step pattern is if it has a F# as its only sharp its in the key of Gmaj.

So the Circle of Fifths Clock wise from noon goes
C, G, D, A, E, B, F#,C#
(count a fifth up from c you get g..count a fifth up from g you get d..and so on...thats why its the circle of fifths)

Every new key adds one sharp to it
C=0 G=1# D= 2# A=3# E=4# B=5# F#=6# C#=7#

and every new note sharped is the 7th note of that key
and the sharped notes carry over to the next key.

start with Key of G
G A B C D E F#G f is sharpened
D E F#G A B C#D f is still sharp and the 7th(c) is now sharped to give 2
A B C#D E F#G#A F,C are still sharp.the 7th G is now sharped
E F#G#B C#D#E F,C,G are carried over and the 7th D is now sharp
and you get the picture.It goes all the way up to the key of C# with has all 7 notes sharpened.

another way to remember the order of the sharps that are added is that they also go up in fifths. F,C,G,D,A,E,B,

So if you see a key that has 4 sharps in it :
A. you should know that it is the key of E because of how many sharps .
B. what notes are sharp. In any key with a sharp its going to have an F#.
so you start with F then go up a fifth to c then go up a fifth to g and so on till you have all 4 sharps that are in that key.


i could go on much longer but this should get you started i hope in learning the circle of ffiths.

and you arent restricted by the key of the song to only play those 7 notes.
In theory you can play any notes you want in a song. but thats a whole different lesson hahaha.

sound_scape

scales all tie in with key modes, and scales are played depending on the mode, there are 7 modes in all 7 keys, and 3 major and the 3 minor notes/chords in each key, so study music modes and then you'll know where and how to play your scales and the 'caged' and triad studies will help you build your chords, soloing is a tricky thing to do on diff. modes and isen't something you can just dive into, like its been said in reply's to this before you can't get into modes without learning your ircle of fifths and so on, you need to know how many sharps or flats are in each key and you need to know how to easy say the key of G has 1 sharp F, and the key of F has 6 sharps, F C G D A E, so the key would be F sharp and you should know how to write your keys starting with ur 6th note 'minor' making it a minor key, all a minor key is, is a major key starting with the 6th chord

StuffnJunk

i personally don't know any of that stuff about which keys have sharps or what not, it is not really needed to know how to solo, i solo just fine.....and i guarantee mccready, stevie ray vaughnn, even hendrix didn't know anything about that stuff either

DieasGrey

StuffnJunk wrote:

i personally don't know any of that stuff about which keys have sharps or what not, it is not really needed to know how to solo, i solo just fine.....and i guarantee mccready, stevie ray vaughnn, even hendrix didn't know anything about that stuff either

its basic theory to know the circle of fifths and what keys have what sharps.
A must know if you want to even comprehend playing to sheet music.

knowing patterns is one thing...knowing why the patterns are there is 10x more benificial.

even knowing why the guitar is tuned the way it is helps know where to go while soloing or learning scales .

and i gurantee that all those guitar greats you mentioned know what keys have what notes sharpened or flatened.

Anon

DieasGrey wrote:

Lots of good info on here so far.

Id have to say the circle of fifths is the most important thing to learn when starting out in music theory.

So here is a lil crash course.

FIRST: KEY AND SCALE ARE NOT THE SAME THING
KEY= is bascially an indicator of how many sharps or flats are in the scale the song is based of off.
SCALE= an arrangement of pitches (the step patterns) like wwhwwwh

Where they relate is that every Key is based on a major scale (or minor ...but for the sake of simplicitywell stick to the major for now)

So well start with the key of Cmaj.
Using the major scale step pattern of wwhwwwh we get the notes
C D E F G A B C...c major scale
So the Key of C contains no sharps or flats.
So any scale you play that has no sharps or flats in it is in the key of C.

So lets do the Key of G maj .
Again the same pattern of wwhwwwh but start at G.
G A B C D E F# G...G major scale
So the Key of G has 1#. So any scale you play that only has an F# is in the key of G. No matter what the step pattern is if it has a F# as its only sharp its in the key of Gmaj.

So the Circle of Fifths Clock wise from noon goes
C, G, D, A, E, B, F#,C#
(count a fifth up from c you get g..count a fifth up from g you get d..and so on...thats why its the circle of fifths)

Every new key adds one sharp to it
C=0 G=1# D= 2# A=3# E=4# B=5# F#=6# C#=7#

and every new note sharped is the 7th note of that key
and the sharped notes carry over to the next key.

start with Key of G
G A B C D E F#G f is sharpened
D E F#G A B C#D f is still sharp and the 7th(c) is now sharped to give 2
A B C#D E F#G#A F,C are still sharp.the 7th G is now sharped
E F#G#B C#D#E F,C,G are carried over and the 7th D is now sharp
and you get the picture.It goes all the way up to the key of C# with has all 7 notes sharpened.

another way to remember the order of the sharps that are added is that they also go up in fifths. F,C,G,D,A,E,B,

So if you see a key that has 4 sharps in it :
A. you should know that it is the key of E because of how many sharps .
B. what notes are sharp. In any key with a sharp its going to have an F#.
so you start with F then go up a fifth to c then go up a fifth to g and so on till you have all 4 sharps that are in that key.


i could go on much longer but this should get you started i hope in learning the circle of ffiths.

and you arent restricted by the key of the song to only play those 7 notes.
In theory you can play any notes you want in a song. but thats a whole different lesson hahaha.

a mate of mine is currently doing theory lessons with a music teacher, and sitting the proper exams etc. as well...... he has been passing this info onto me, and what you have above is about what i've learnt so far..... how to find the key a song is in, counting sharps/flats of a scale to get the key etc..... and it does actually start to make sense after a while....