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Guitar theory will allow you to learn chords, scales, and other abilities on the guitar such as sight reading, that will allow you to quickly improve on your instrument.

Lets take a look a 4 ways to get a grip on your guitar theory so that you can learn beginner guitar.

1. Know your guitar notes: You will have a much easier time learning theory on your six string by learning your notes on the fretboard of your guitar. The bare minimum for this is to learn the first 4 frets on the first 6 strings of your guitar. The more you know where your notes are on the fretboard the easier you will be able to figure out note placement for chords and scales on your instrument.

2. Learn functional keyboard: All modern theory is based on the piano. Although you don’t have to learn piano to learn guitar theory, it sure helps speed up the process. When learning theory on your instrument, it’s important to know a little bit of what is called functional keyboard. Functional keyboard is not knowing how to play the piano. Functional keyboarding is where you take general music theory which comes from the piano, and applying it to your guitar. Thankfully, You do not know how to play the piano, just know the notes of the piano. Learning notes on the piano is actually quite easy compared to learning all of the notes on your six string.

3. Learn and apply basic music theory: Basic theory basically consists of learning how to read music, intervals, scales, chords, and rhythm. Similar to learning beginner guitar, there are some very practical steps that fit one after another when learning music theory. One key, however, to learning music theory for the guitar is to learn how to apply what you are theoretically learning immediately.

4. Find a guitar instructor who knows guitar theory: Putting the concepts of music theory can be dramatically increased by finding a music theory instructor. Better yet, find a guitar instructor who understands basic music theory and how to apply it to the guitar.