Playing guitar, at least for me, is all geometry. The fifth is the next string two frets up (like the knight in chess, I just realized) and so on. Each chord is a shape - so if your starting with a note, you kind of know where to go after a while.

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jawilson2 a day ago | parent [-]

I've played guitar for over 30 years now, and it is 100% geometry to me, or Tetris pieces. A D chord is a triangle, A chord is a line, a minor barre chord with a root on the 2nd string is stair steps, etc.

One of the things that is bittersweet about learning a song is that it can take the magic out of the song; instead of just hearing it, I am thinking in chord shapes, positions, lead lines, etc.

	▲	scarecrowbob a day ago \| parent [-]
		I've got multiple ways of listening. I can't even Phish because if I'm on drugs I fall into listening-like-I-need-to-play-the-next-chord. Whereas a lot of songwriter music I can listen-like-I'm-reading-underegrad-poetry I do feel that way about tetris, too. I think the reason I enjoy older jazz standards on bass is playing them is a little like solving a suduko- I can get a satisfying answer without much more than the melody. That doesn't work for modern rock where the riff is key. That kind of "well, it sounds okay but it doesn't line up with my idea of what makes sense" is my own anti-magical-feeling.