Description

I wrote this book for everyone who dreams of understanding music and being able to enjoy creating it for themselves. I want you to know that there is nothing "wrong" with you if you haven't yet found your path in music. All human beings are capable of imagining and creating beautiful music, and there is nothing stopping you from enjoying the thrill of creating your own music almost immediately. All you need is a little help visualizing the materials of your art so that you can begin to enjoy working with them.

You do not need to know anything at all about music theory to get started. All you need is an open mind and any instrument that produces musical notes (guitar, bass, piano, trumpet, saxophone, violin, etc.). You will begin improvising on the very first day, and you will use improvisation itself as your own personal vehicle to move around and explore our musical system. You will learn how to connect with and play from your musical imagination, where you will discover that you have an endless supply of beautiful, creative ideas. And you will learn to use a simple but powerful musical map to gradually build your own personal understanding of harmony.

This method is completely open-ended. How far you go is up to you. Even if you never go beyond the first two exercises, this alone will enable you to improvise with confidence in any musical situation for the rest of your life. But if you go further you will see things with more clarity. You will begin to recognize and understand the sounds in the music all around you. You will be able to play any song you hear, in any key. And you will compose your own pieces just as easily as you might draw a picture.

But none of that is really very important. What I really hope to give you is a chance to discover and connect with a part of yourself that you didn't know existed. And I hope to show you a vision of harmony not as a set of rules about "right notes" and "wrong notes" but rather as an infinite beautiful landscape that you can discover at your own pace. Most of all I hope you enjoy the journey. Life is too short to waste time imitating others. Be yourself and discover your own music!