A couple of months ago I started looking at composing some music for a game I’m working on. I started fiddling around with DAWs with just mouse and keyboard and a few weeks later I picked up a little 2 octave MIDI-keyboard to make it a little easier. That lead to diving into music theory, which made me want to pick up a bass.
A few weeks later and a couple of cheapo guitars, and I feel like I’ve found an essential part of myself. I could literally sit here playing bass until my arms go numb. I don’t even have my audio interface or an amp yet, I’m literally just playing it dry, and I’m absolutely in love. I can’t wait for my interface to get here so I can start putting down just like, some bass lines and some simple power chords with some distortion.
It’s incredible how cheap it is to pick up a couple of instruments now and just dive right into music. With all the stuff on various instruments and music theory out there, why not? Nobody’s going to gasp in awe at the quality of my pair of Glarrys, but it’s plenty to get my fingers moving and let the music find its way out.
Anyway, that’s really all. I’m in love with bass and with how accessible music is. I kind of want to try violin. Or like, maybe a shamisen. I feel like instruments used to be so prohibitively expensive, even on the beginner end, and that seems to be much less the case now. Like, it also certainly seems like you could easily spend as much money as you might feel like spending on music stuff, but I actually feel like I can pick some different stuff up and try things without like selling my organs.
While we’re here, any recommendations for resources on getting further into music theory or composition? There’s so much out there, I’m sure there’s some great stuff I haven’t even brushed up against yet!
Get a banjo! Play some folk 🪕🎶 I wish I was as musically inclined as you, guitar always looked so fun
I recommend “Music theory for computer musicians”. Amazon link
I don’t really have any tips regarding theory, i never picked it up mostly due to laziness. Admittedly, i never felt the need as my lack of knowledge didn’t keep me from cutting records and touring. But your post cheered me up, and it made me want to point out the incredible satisfaction of sharing a musical moment with other people. Doesn’t have to be a band or a committed project. Just having another instinct leading the music in unexpected direction is a great way to learn new stuff. It’s not something you need to do to grow, music is its own person in some senses: even when you play alone it’s you AND music. But if you get the chance to play with someone: take it!
Best of luck in your endeavour!
I was looking for a Sitar, it was really expensive.
Anyway, if you’re looking into beginner music theory, musictheory.net is a good place to start.
The moment I understand how to do all the diatonic seventh chords of a key, how to construct scales & chords, and how it ties to modes, it makes a lot of thing easier to process. E.g. knowing what notes / chords to play when you’re in certain key.
It’s even easier when applied to guitar, since I can learn D minor 7 in one shape, and I can use the same shape for all other minor 7 chords (in the same inversion).
I have a hard time finding free piano sheet music, so I mostly use MusicNotes, which is not free, and the viewer is really not good. For guitar, maybe spend some money on Guitar Pro, and go to ultimate-guitar.com to find tabs to download.
To delve more about piano chords, I use Chordie App, but if you’re just venturing out, I don’t think you should get it yet.