Take a look at this:

http://www.musictheory.net/

And here is a downloadable version:

http://classic.musictheory.net/

It even has a scheme for writing chord progressions. And it's free.

I got a few of Mel's books when I was starting out. But I don't blame him .


Really good actually - learned a lot. Are the books still around?
Highly recommended.



I posted elsewhere on KVR but just visit http://jguitar.com/ - you can learn about chords you made up and what name/key they are. You can tune your guitar/bass including alternative tunings. You can find scales that go with certain chords. You can look up a name of a chord and find alternative inversions.

It really is a one stop shop for the beginner guitarist. I wish I had had it when starting out. Then again...

That Mel Bay chord encyclopedia sold alot back in the day. I never heard of it until my girlfriend in high school bought it for me - back when I only had one thing on my mind.

Bullshit. This is geared for avoidance of musical thought, for people that for some perverse reason are in a hurry or allergic to the work involved of approaching music with their own thought. Anyway as per the OP that is asking about a primer, this will be a crutch before the first steps are taken.

If one needs a program to guess their chord changes, perhaps they aren't well suited temperamentally to the task of writing music.
I said "work" above, but the real interest in how music works would prefigure that this kind of thing is a lot of fun and rewarding per se. If it isn't, I can only guess 'in a hurry' hence a drive to find a way out of doing it yourself.

There is surely a market for this kind of thing today though.

Hmmm, makes me want to check it out! I look at things now (as I get older) in a way that I can't do everything; I write my own songs but not with any real music theory other than what I learned from HS band; I play what sounds good to me. I look at it like this...I can't be an expert at everything or even study / become very proficient at everything I want to do in life; learn music theory, guitar, bass, DAW, effects, synth programming, tennis, homebrewing, motorcycle riding, studying the bible, making wine etc. etc. I only have so much time to do all these things!

What if you found out that your favorite song ever was written by a songwriter that didn't know much about music theory...would you not like it anymore? I think the final result (if it's legal) is what's important.YMMV.

But I think this is the point. If you play what sounds good to you, then why would you need a program to tell you what to play?

Well it would be an easy way for me to add color (variations of chords) that I might not use normally. Kind of like collaborating with a virtual songwriting partner/piano player. I wish I could become better at all the things in my list above, but I don't want to give up even one of them so I have to spread my time around to have some semblance of a balanced life. I still spend most of my time on my songs but I can't finish things from fear of judgement (I really have to get over that!) or not enough time before the next big idea comes along!

Your post really explains a few things I never understood and ties some other things I did together. THANK YOU!

Nicely summarized.