GuitarLayers 4+

As a guitarist, spending lots of time lost in a sea of theory and not really knowing where to begin is a real struggle sometimes, especially given the relatively complex structure of the fretboard. Having all the basic scale shapes organised in one app makes navigating all this a lot easier, and really streamlines my practice planning.

My only real gripe, and the reason for the loss of a star, is the UI - it's a little unrefined, and next to the standard Mac apps it doesn't look amazing; it's still very functional however, and hopefully down the line it'll be polished up in an update - I'll certainly be upgrading my rating to 5 stars if so!

I was waiting for this kind of app for years, after spending hours with drawing my own diagrams on paper and recently using some software, trying to find the best solution to learn and practice harmony and theory in a deeper way. With it, I can combine, visually and practically all the music concepts about learning guitar technique and applied theory that I’ve learned from the greatest guitarist/educators as Mick Goodrick and Tim Miller.

Because of its great potential, GuitarLayers can take both students and advanced guitarists into a very deep understanding of the guitar harmonic mechanisms and theory, all of these ready to be viewed and applied to our fretboard with just a simple click. And that’s only the starting point! The easy-to-use and serious looking platform, its endless adaptability and the multi-fretboard layers make this app a powerful tool. I’m sure that a constant use of it can also increase our vision and imagination to create our own new shapes/sounds, and that’s so exciting.
GuitarLayer, or... Guitar-Mind Layer is the perfect tool for the Contemporary Creative Musician!

I have discovered that GuitarLayers is not just another computerised chord/scale chart, it is a progressive learning method that provides intuitive visualisation of many concepts that are not easy to cross reference in printed/single dimension form. The sample projects are a good introduction for those starting out, whilst providing a basis for the more experienced to explore interactively.

After using it for a few days, much of the fragmented theory that I had picked up over time suddenly started to become more meaningful. Learning retention was aided by the screen presentation, which can be configured to show multiple overlaid chord/scale structures in various ways, most of which can be individually switched on/off. The control area of the screen can also show combinations of chord/note tables.

The overall impression is that GuitarLayers is a well thought out app for those learning guitar. It can be used at various levels from practice/study to a fairly comprehensive lookup reference, whilst also catering for tutors who wish to set structured development plans for their students. Moreover, the idea behind their website “Forum” seems to be that projects can be shared, which has the potential to provide online tutorials and discussion.

Well done MOREORLESS Software!