I have looked over the other lessons in the Theory/Reference section and have not found any lessons that can be used as a starting place for beginners who aren't familiar with all areas of music theory. Therefore, in this lesson I will be attempting to explain the basics of music theory, mostly restricted to major scales and chords.

Please note that most everything said here is not an absolute, but a simplification of the details. The ideas here are true a large portion of the time, but there are exceptions to just about every part of this lesson.