Basic Chord Theory - Stupid Question

It's going to take me months to even come close to digesting all of this. I'm certain that there are many others who are at a similar place in their learning curve who will benefit from this thread, as well.

Thanks for all of the great input!
 
In reference to the Ukulele Fretboard Roadmaps and its shortcomings, may I recommend Brad Bordessa's Ukulele Chord Shapes. It has been a while since I looked at it, but in my remembrance of it, I seem to recall that he provided a root shape for every string for every chord.

Yeah, I recocmmended Brad's book in another thread. It's a great reference, but thought in this case the UFR might be a better lesson book. Either one is a great book to own.
 
It's going to take me months to even come close to digesting all of this. I'm certain that there are many others who are at a similar place in their learning curve who will benefit from this thread, as well.

Thanks for all of the great input!

Loren, you're going to get burnt out and frustrated with all this info. I think you should take it one concept at a time. If I were you, I would learn about whatever was holding me back musically. Over time, you will make great strides in your knowledge. Otherwise, if you try to learn about theory in a systematic and broad approach, it isn't going to be applicable to you, it won't stick, and you won't be able to process it all.
 
Oh, I totally get what you're saying. I'm not even trying to digest all of this right now. I'm just going to remember that this thread is here and refer back to it from time to time.

What I'm trying to do right now is:
1. Keep playing songs. I've literally got about 8 tabs open on my browser right now with songs that I play fairly regularly. I don't want to search for them or wait for them to load, and I don't want a bunch of paper around. So, I just leave the tabs up. When I've got time and feel like playing a song... I'll bounce through a few of them.
2. Keep noodling with chords and scales. I enjoy doing that. And as I learn more, I can also do it more "intelligently". (playing chords that are actually in the same key... mess with some 12-bar blues improv)
3. Try to learn "theory" as I go. Little bits and pieces here and there. I'm sure this isn't the best learning method... but, if I spend too much time trying to read about music theory, my eyes glaze over. I'm taking it in bite-sized pieces. Little "revelations" here and there.
5. Try to learn the fretboard, the common chord shapes, and get to where I can play the chords that I want in more than one position. I'm a touch-typist. I can type any letter you want... but, I can't necessarily tell you where a particular key is on the keyboard without really thinking about it. I need to get that level of familiarity with the fretboard... to just "know" where each note is, and by extrapolation, where each chord is, and so on.
6. Try to start learning more and different strumming patterns. I've been practicing with a quiet thumb strum for 9 years. I need to get comfortable with getting "louder" and doing different stuff.

That's about it. I'm trying to chisel away at a lot of different things a little at a time, but still have fun doing it.

I've been playing uke for 9 years, but I've REALLY been slacking. Only recently have I started taking it more seriously. And it's fun! I'll watch some stupid YouTube tutorial, and if it's not over my head... I'll learn something, and I'll be like "hey, I didn't know I could do that"... and as I play with it, I realize that I've added more to my musical vocabulary.

Like, just within the past few days, I've learned to do chord runs from a G up to an alternate position G7, and a standard G7 run up to yet another alternate G7 position. Pretty darned cool, and simple due to the minimal fingering changes.

I made some huge strides in my understanding of playing 12-bar blues last night, too. I've been playing "Little Queen of Spades" for literally 9 years, and never really made the connection that it is absolutely and unquestionably a simple 12-bar blues pattern with a few substitutions thrown in for flavor. It's learning that kind of thing that will inspire me to get more familiar with the circle of 5ths and which chords are the I-IV-V in various keys and such.

So, yeah... I'm not going to let myself get burned out. I'm having fun along the way. PLAYING and enjoying a groove comes first. Getting bogged down in the details comes second.
 
12 Bar Blues — I love them St Louis Blues
From straight - Johnny B Good
To Quick turn around - Momma don’t dance and daddy don’t rock and roll
To less obvious - In the Mood and Dueling Banjos
Off to look at Queen of Spades


And generally learning chord shapes, learning it’s not a Grab Bag, but rather
An A7 becomes an A#7 by ‘moving the nut’ though the use of your finger to make a barre chord/ bar chord.

I’m not an expert, but it is amazing what can be done with this simple instrument.
 
It seems like you folks are getting into analysis-paralysis. I'm not a music teacher or anything like that, but let me tell you how I treat the triads. You can either reject it, or embrace it, or modify it.

I agree that it's easy to over-think the whole music theory thing, which is basically nothing more than understanding the intervals between notes.

I have to keep things simple, so prefer to stick to the basics which I call "musical knowledge", because there's nothing theoretical about it. It's how music works.

I've gotten a lot of mileage just from learning:

The intervals of a Major scale are Whole, Whole, Half, Whole, Whole, Whole, Half (whole steps & half steps, that is).

Chords are made up of every other note of a scale (1, 3, 5, 7, etc.)

Intervals are simply the number of half-steps from one note to another. (A Major second is two half-steps while a minor second is only one half-step, for example.)

That's the extent of my musical knowledge, but I've gained quite a bit of understanding just based on that.
 
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