Books to Start with for the Amateur Musician

Q: I came across your books via Amazon and it lead me to your website. I am a amateur musician, I can play guitar (a bit), bass (better at the bass), and can make some decent sounds on piano. I have no formal musical training, strictly self-taught.

One thing I am very bad at is hearing notes, at least being accurate about it. It makes me a horrible singer. I can play a note and sort of work my way to the note vocally. I believe it is simply because I lack any training and my ears have not been properly exercised.

My goals are to improve my ear in the hopes that it will make me a better vocalist and improve my guitar playing. I also have a desire to better understand music theory overall as a means of being a better guitar player.

I am writing then to ask for recommendations on where to start with your publications. What (if any) books would help me?

A: Nice to hear from you. There are a few books that I would start with.

Music Theory Workbook for Guitar Volume One Video Course: This will give you some exercises to do to improve your basic knowledge of music theory and then we can build out from there. I’ve given you the link to the digital download of this book. It will require you to print out some pages so hopefully you have a printer. Let me know if you don’t.
Ear Training One Note Complete: will be for listening to improve your recognition of what others are playing.
Contextual Ear Training: will help you with your singing ability.
1st Steps for a Beginning Guitarist: is a book that hopefully we can go through fairly quickly. I want to make sure you have all the basics together before we move on to more difficult things. We can also use it for a few simple bass patterns before we move into more difficult exercises.

Once you get the books let me know and we can work at setting up a practice schedule and I’ll help you with any difficulties you have getting started.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Best Regards,

Bruce

It is also recommended that you read Bruce Arnold’s Blog at his artist site. It contains more discussion of the musical topics found in these FAQs as well as other subjects of interest. You will also find the “Music Education Genealogy Chart” located here which shows you the historic significance of the music education products found on the Muse Eek Publishing Company Website.

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