Many guitarists don’t want to learn music theory if they can avoid it. I can totally understand that. After all, no one picks up the guitar in order to spend all day analyzing lines, dots, and the letters A-G. We play guitar because we love music so much that we want to make it ourselves.

Besides, aren’t there a good amount of world-class guitar players who don’t even read music? One famous example is the legendary fingerstyle guitarist Tommy Emmanuel. Although he started playing guitar (and performing full-time) at a very young age, he never got around to studying theory formally. And yet, as you can see right here, he’s an unbelievable guitarist.

I won’t argue that you can’t become an excellent player without theory. However, I still believe that you should learn theory, especially if you’re a beginner-intermediate guitarist looking to improve.

Bear in mind that although there are definitely some Tommy Emmanuels out there who never learned theory, most professional musicians can read music and have a deep understanding of its structure. Great guitarists with no theoretical knowledge are the exception, rather than the rule.

By the end of this post, I hope you’ll agree with me that theory will be an asset to you instead of a liability. Learning the language of music isn’t easy, but it’s 100% worth the effort. If you’re already motivated to learn some theory, check out this post I wrote.

Here are 7 reasons every guitarist should learn music theory!

I spend a lot of time on this blog, so I’m online for hours a day. This fact, combined with my search history on all things guitar-related, means I see a lot of the ads that are targeting guitarists.

I’ve noticed a common theme in many of these ads: they shun music theory. Usually, they advise you to skip theory and learn some other, better thing (but you have to click to their spammy site first!).

Sometimes these ads go so far as to say you’re wasting your time with theory, or that learning theory is the #1 mistake most guitarists make, or some other nonsense.
 

Theory Is Your Friend

Throughout this post, I’m going to argue that music theory is highly useful for you to know. But before I get to that, I want to counter the idea that theory is boring, overly esoteric, worthless, limiting, and so forth. On the contrary, theory is as fascinating as it is useful!

Haven’t you ever wondered why music sounds the way it does? Why some notes sound good together, while others sound terrible? What’s so “perfect” about a perfect fourth or fifth? Why it makes sense to call two notes “E” even though one is pitched much higher than the other? How the physics of sound corresponds to our musical system of lines and dots?

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg! If you learn theory, you’ll be able to answer all of these questions and more. You’ll know why you’re playing what you’re playing, rather than just knowing how to play it.

I guarantee that if you give theory an honest shot, you’ll actually enjoy it. We’re humans; that means we’re big-brained creatures who like to learn. There’s no reason to be a theory-phobe. In fact, you might be surprised at how fun and satisfying it is to know all the ins and outs of music!

If you’re like many guitar players in the beginner-intermediate stage, you spend a lot of time in first position (index finger positioned at the first fret) and almost no time in fifth, seventh, or tenth position. The higher register of the fretboard is probably uncharted territory for you.

Fortunately, a little bit of theory can give you the map to explore this territory. Once you understand intervals, scales, and triads, you’ll be able to find notes and chords all over the fretboard, no problem.

You’ll be able to play any scale in virtually any position, which will give you a ton of options for composing and improvising. Instead of memorizing chord charts, you’ll be able to build your own chords from scratch, even inventing a few that no one else has played before.

Plus, even if you do choose to memorize, theory will help the logic of each fretboard pattern ring true for you. You’ll memorize much faster than before, and remember better!

Above all else, music theory will demystify the neck of your guitar. Instead of thinking in terms of string and fret numbers, you’ll be thinking in terms of music.

Sure, you might already know that your open 5th string plays an A (in standard tuning). But with theory, you’ll know which A is being played, and exactly how it relates to every other A on the fretboard.

There’s really no better shortcut to conquer the guitar grid than to crack a book of music theory! If you’re ready to hit the books right now, here’s where I’d have you get started.

Have you ever met a good pianist who doesn’t know music theory? Probably not, since virtually all pianists learn to read music right from the start. Basically any piece they might learn is written in standard notation, so they wouldn’t gain much from “skipping” theory, and they’d be unable to learn the standard repertoire.

Guitarists are almost unique among musicians in their aversion to learning the language of music.

I’m guilty of this too! Personally, I avoided theory for as long as possible. I started out on guitar with simple chord progressions, then moved on to exclusively using tabs. Only when I embraced classical guitar did I begin reading standard notation and learning theory.

You might say, “Hey, I don’t care about classical music and I’ve been getting by fine on tabs and chords. Why start over?”

First off, you’re not starting over. Rather, I would think of standard notation as filling in certain gaps in your knowledge. For instance, you probably can already make a G chord (and appreciate its sound), but with theory, you’ll understand why those notes work together in harmony, which will only further develop you as a guitarist.

Importantly, theory can also help you work better with other musicians. If you’re in a band, you’ll quickly realize that it really helps to know the logic behind chord progressions. You’ll also want to know what key you’re playing in and how to harmonize a melody. Even one member of a band with a good background in theory can go a long way!

None of this is to say you shouldn’t play by ear or by instinct. Just think of music theory as another useful tool for your guitar playing. It should be a welcome addition to your musicianship, not a replacement for any other skill.

Regardless of the genre of music you’re playing on guitar, some theory knowledge will allow you to learn new pieces much faster than before, and with less effort.

Suppose you want to strum along with a song you just heard on the radio. You grab your guitar and look up the chords online. Without any exposure to theory, you’re likely to see each chord individually, but miss the underlying pattern.

You’ll see that the song starts on C, then eventually goes to F, then G, and then back to C. However, you won’t recognize this as a I-IV-V pattern.

Someone with theory knowledge would recognize this pattern right away without needing to keep looking back at it. Knowing the song follows I-IV-V would enable the theory-enlightened guitarist to play it in any key that suits them, rather than just as written.
 

Theory Will Help Your Sight-Reading

If you’re a guitarist who works on sight-reading, theory will also be a big help. (Sight-reading is the art of playing a new piece of music the first time you’re seeing it. You can read more about it here.)

Just as we saw in the chord progression example above, music theory exposes you to the most important patterns across all of music.

The difference between theory ignorance and theory mastery is basically the difference between someone learning to read who has to spell out each letter and someone who can read an entire word or phrase at once. Theory takes your musical competency to a whole new level!

Every piece you’re trying to learn has a structure that has a sound theoretical basis. Knowing even basic theory will give you a huge head start in working through new music.

For instance, if you understand how keys work, and you know what key the song you’re learning is in, then you already know what notes to expect, plus where the song should start and end. In other words, you’ll be ahead of the game.

Ever dream of writing your own songs? How about making amazing covers of songs you already love? You should learn music theory ASAP!

The more theory you know, the easier it’ll be for you to write your own music. As you might imagine, all the great composers you’ve ever heard of were well-versed in theory. Even today, most musicians who write their own music have a good command of its technical side.

Of course, I know that some musicians primarily compose by ear and don’t know theory, but again, they’re the exception rather than the rule. Even if composing by ear works well for them, it certainly wouldn’t hurt them to learn some theory.

In fact, a bit of theory knowledge would make it easier for them to write their songs down on paper in music’s universal language.

I should address a common misconception: the notion that true artists should avoid theory in order to protect their authenticity. For me, that’s a lot like arguing that writers should avoid reading, or that personal trainers shouldn’t bother with kinesiology, or that medical school would lead aspiring surgeons astray.

The truth of the matter is that the better you learn music theory, the more effectively you can break its rules and explore new musical terrain. Ignorance may be bliss, but only knowledge will give you freedom.