Practical Theory for Guitar: A Player's Guide to Essential Music Theory in Words, Music, Tablature, and Sound, Book & CD [With CD] [Paperback]

Don Latarski (Author), Aaron Stang (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 4, 1993

A guitar player's guide to music theory. This book is a complete theory course with recorded examples that put everything in an applicable, musical context. The recording includes all the musical examples and play-along tracks.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

A guitar player's guide to music theory. This book is a complete theory course with recorded examples that put everything in an applicable, musical context. The recording includes all the musical examples and play-along tracks.

Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Alfred Publishing Co., Inc. (October 4, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0898986923
• ISBN-13: 978-0898986921
• Product Dimensions: 11.9 x 8.8 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #820,972 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don Latarski Has Out Done Himself, August 24, 2002

By 

Bill Dux (Honolulu, Hawai'i) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Practical Theory for Guitar: A Player's Guide to Essential Music Theory in Words, Music, Tablature, and Sound, Book & CD [With CD] (Paperback)

The best and easiest to comprehend book that I have ever seen on the subject of Musc Theory, Scales, Modes, and Composition. The accompaning CD is wonderful as well, and gives so many great examples, that the reader will find him or herself wanting to spend hours learning, and playing along with them. This is something that is not often seen of books on this subject matter.

Barvo!!!!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars THE Best Theory Book For The Guitarist!, February 16, 2009

By 

Josh - See all my reviews

This review is from: Practical Theory for Guitar: A Player's Guide to Essential Music Theory in Words, Music, Tablature, and Sound, Book & CD [With CD] (Paperback)

I've been playing guitar over 15 years, teaching it full-time nearly 10 and let me tell you, this is THE best theory book for the guitar I have ever seen. I've been using it exclusively for theory in my lessons and I recommend it to everyone I know who plays. I find it to be by far the easiest to comprehend and the best for putting together the "big picture" of music theory. Keep in mind though, you will still have to re-read many, many parts of this book, even as many as 3+ times. You will still have to put forth and enormous amount of effort to take this material and make it a functional part of your playing. This is not a method book or an exercise book. It is an explanation of theory and a reference tool. If you are having a hard time understanding this book, you may not be ready for a full-blown theory book or you may be expecting easy results.

There are a few things that could be a hair better, but it's really nit-picking. The main one is that the examples to improvise over are way too short. Go pick up a copy of one of Peter Vogl's "Let's Jam" Cds. Problem solved. I also wouldn't mind having a simple fingering for ALL the intervals on one page. Again, kinda nit-picking. I personally use some slightly different fingerings for some of the scales, but if you're really practicing these as much as you need to, you'll have no problem figuring out which of the many ways to finger these scales you like the best. After all, you'll actually know how to spell them and put them together, so you'll be able to re-finger just about anything you want!

Long story short, this book is the way to go. You'd have to buy several others to even come close. Anyone who can't understand it is simply not spending enough time with it.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book... but not for beginners, April 2, 2009

By 

Marco Forcone (USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Practical Theory for Guitar: A Player's Guide to Essential Music Theory in Words, Music, Tablature, and Sound, Book & CD [With CD] (Paperback)

This is an excellent book, but be forewarned it is not for beginners. You should have a firm grasp on basic scale theory, keys, and chords before tackling this book. Also, this is not a book that teaches you exercises on learning the scales. If you don't already have the major scale down in multiple positions and all keys, this is not the book for you. A better choice might be Tom Kolb's book on music theory. Also, as someone mentioned, this is not a how-to book with exercises.

If you at least have the major scale down in all positions and keys, this is a great reference to get you going on all the modes, plus a bunch of other scales... and more!

I found it to be primarily a solid intermediate text/reference book on scales, chords, and music theory. Each of the 7 modes of the major scale (plus a bunch of other scales) is explained ... not just a fingering pattern (yes, those are there too)... but the intervals are explained as well as which chord's fit the scale. I found the writing is concise and clear.

Towards the end, there is a good section on chords and harmonizing in various scales. I found this book to be a perfect fit with my current guitar instructor and use it as a reference with my weekly lessons.

If you are 'self teaching', you will need to be disciplined to take the material and come up with the proper exercises to learn it. Again, that is not shown in the book.