Rock Guitar Lessons
When student first starts with rock guitar lessons their guitar teacher will teach them the basics and fundamentals of playing the guitar. The guitar student will learn how to play chords, chord progressions (the order in which the chords are played for a given song), and how to read the three main types of guitar music (chords, tabs, and staff notation). After learning the basic fundamentals of playing the guitar the student will start working on some of their favorite songs and songs that the teacher introduces to them.
Once a student has taken lessons for a while and feels comfortable with what they have learned they want to start jamming with their friends and form a band. This is a great way for a student to use what they have learned from their private guitar lessons and put it to use in a fun way.
How To Write A Rock Guitar Song
Many great rock songs are surprisingly simple using only 3-4 chords throughout the entire song. To start writing a rock song the musician needs to come up with what chords they would like to use. Once they have a set chord progressions the next step is to come up with a rhythm and time signature. After that words or lyrics are added and the song really comes to life. Once the basic idea of a song is created its up to the members of the rock band to add in their own style on their instruments to the song. My best piece of advice on writing a great rock song is to keep it as simple as possible. Once a basic idea or outline of a song in created its all about filling in the spaces to make the song unique to the band.
Typical Chord Progressions
Chord progressions are the order in which chords are used during a song. There are three most commonly used chords and they are the I, IV, and V7 chords. These are chords that are relative to the key signature of the song being written. Our musical alphabet is based off of 7 letters. A B C D E F G. To find the relation of these chords starting on any letter of the musical alphabet start with one letter as the I chord and then proceed to the right to find the IV chord and the V7 chord.
For example if the song is in the key of C the chords used will be C(I), F (IV), and G7 (V7). If the key signature for the song being written in starting on the A chord then the chords being used will be A (I), D (IV), and E7 (V7).
Three very standard and easy chord progressions are
I-V7-I
I-IV-V7-I
I-V7-IV-I
Twelve bar blues and 16 bar blues progressions
These two chord progressions are a great start to writing a rock song. Most rock songs will use one of these two forms for its chord progressions.
12 bar blue
[: I-I-I-I-IV-IV-I-I-V7-IV-I-V7 :]
16 bar blues
[:I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-IV-IV-I-I-V7-V7-I-I:]
Time To Solo
One of the best parts about playing the guitar in a rock band is taking the solo. The solo to a song is a great way for a guitarist to express themselves musically. Guitar solos can either be written or improved. A great start to writing solos is using the blues scale. It is a scale using only 5 notes that will work best with a given key signature. Use of any of these notes will sound good with a chord progression.
—————————————————5—–8———
——————————————5——-8—————–
——————————–5—-7—————————–
————————5—–7————————————
————–5—–7———————————————-
–5——7———————————————————
Musical Form
Music form is the order in which parts of the song happen. Parts of the song are referred to as Verse, Chorus, and Solo. A Verse is when the melody stays the same but the lyrics change each time the song comes back to the verse. Chorus is when a melody and lyrics stay the same each time it is used. Solo is when the music continues but instead of singing lyrics an instrument plays a melody.
Here are a couple of typical musical forms for a rock guitar song.
Verse, Chorus, Solo, Verse, Chorus
Verse, Verse, Chorus, Solo, Verse, Verse, Chorus
Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus, Solo, Verse, Chorus, Chorus
The real key to writing a rock guitar song is to keep it simple.
Are you ready to get started?
