lost on scales

[chrisC]

i have been playing the piano for a few years and am familiar with music theory, but i have recently taken up the guitar and am having a hard time understanding how to relate sheet music to this new instrument.
( scales are particularly diffucult to understand , how do you know if you are in the correct position on the fret board , which C do you start on for a C Major scale.

I would appreciate any help!

[StoneDragon]

Hey chrisC,

Welcome to Jam Session.

First of all, you will need to know how the notes lay out across the fingerboard. Check out my Know Your Notes (http://www.zentao.com/guitar/theory/notes.html) lesson.

Then it's a matter of determining if the music is written specifically for guitar of if it is written for piano. Sheet music specifically written for guitar will usually include TAB underneath the standard staff, while music written for piano will usually only have guitar chord diagrams placed above the staff.

Guitar is a transposed instrument, so music written specifically for guitar is written one octave higher than it sounds.

Check out Guitar Lesson Five (http://www.zentao.com/guitar/lesson5/theory-1.html) for an explanation and fingerboard chart of how to approach this.