Note finder: which note is in which fret?

Louis0815 · Dec 10, 2015

There's a lot of fretboard maps out there already, but they usually never link the note names on the fretboard to the notes in musical notation.

Should anyone be interested try one of these fretboard helpers:

GCEA re-entrant (aka high-g): tenor, concert, soprano, (sopranino)
GCEA linear (low-g): tenor, concert
ADF#B re-entrant: "canadian" or "european" tuning for concert, soprano
ADF#B linear
FBbDG re-entrant (one note below standard GCEA)
DGBE linear: baritone
first line sounds a full octave lower than noted, but this would have been a visual desaster with all the ledger lines
DGBE re-entrant: baritone
EADG: bass (for alternate version with additional treble clef notation see post #11)

This is what it looks like:

pls notify me of any bugs you find - and feel free to ask for other tunings

update 2015-12-12:
- added the rare notes E# and B# (I've hardly ever seen Fb or Cb, so I left these out)
- added low a version
- added version date to all updated files
- added note names to all updated files

update 2016-06-10
- added re-entrant DGBE and FBbDG as requested in post #18

Peace Train · Dec 10, 2015

Nice, thanks for posting. (Not sure if the red links are supposed to be working, but they're not, fyi.)

Stagehand · Dec 10, 2015

If you go to his website, you can find them there.
Nice work by the way. Thank you Louis

Louis0815 · Dec 11, 2015

Peace Train said:
Nice, thanks for posting. (Not sure if the red links are supposed to be working, but they're not, fyi.)

They are indeed supposed to work, thx for the heads up.

Apparently links like http://http://go.4str.in/low-g do not really work

- fixed them now.

Croaky Keith · Dec 11, 2015

Thanks for posting these.

actadh · Dec 11, 2015

Thank you. Can also affix a Snark and follow along with the sheet music for sensory impact of hearing it, seeing the note on the tuner, and reading from the sheet music. I am a visual/kinesthetic learner and that helps me.

wayfarer75 · Dec 11, 2015

Thanks! I like this; it helps decipher tab for those of us who can read music.

Kayak Jim · Dec 11, 2015

Never seen the multiple positions for each note represented before, thanks.

Still Water Weapons · Dec 11, 2015

Very cool, thanks for posting!

Katz-in-Boots · Dec 12, 2015

Great idea, thanks for posting.

Question about the Bass version, am I right in thinking the last bits are in tenor clef? Personally I'd rather see it in treble clef myself. I used to play cello, so had to get my head around tenor clef (also used to play viola so had to learn alto clef, just to

me more).

Louis0815 · Dec 12, 2015

Katz-in-Boots said:
tenor clef

Well, now you get me confused

Tenor clef is usually a C clef where C4 is on the 4th line - I used an F clef with F on the 4th line (F2 in the first part, F3 in the last part)

In any case you are correct that the first parts of the bass helper are noted an octave higher (= sounding an octave lower) to avoid a visual desaster with all the ledger lines below the stave.

Would this file help you sorting out treble and bass clef?

Katz-in-Boots · Dec 13, 2015

Louis0815 said:
Well, now you get me confused
Tenor clef is usually a C clef where C4 is on the 4th line - I used an F clef with F on the 4th line (F2 in the first part, F3 in the last part)

In any case you are correct that the first parts of the bass helper are noted an octave higher (= sounding an octave lower) to avoid a visual desaster with all the ledger lines below the stave.

Would this file help you sorting out treble and bass clef?

D'Oh ! I hadn't realised that the first part was written an octave higher, so when I saw the clef in the last 3 bars I thought you had gone to tenor clef to prevent having to go way above the line in bass clef.

Apologies for confusing things, now I understand and I think it is a very useful chart.

photoshooter · Dec 13, 2015

Thanks for posting this, it's very helpful.

It's kind of like a secret decoder ring.
Well, except that it's not a ring. And... I guess it's not a secret...

Joyful Uke · Dec 14, 2015

Looks like a great tool, but I'm not able to view the files correctly. If I try to save them and open them as a pdf, I get the message that the file is corrupted. Looks like I'm the only one with the problem?

Louis0815 · Dec 16, 2015

Which one(s) have you tried?
(Left-)Clicking on any of the links brings up the PDFs for me, right-click and "save as" seems to work as well - at least for me.
Seems I need some more details to find the root cause...

cdkrugjr · Dec 17, 2015

I cannot recommend highly enough that you write out your own fretboard charts, every day, varying which string you do first.

Brian1 · Dec 17, 2015

This is very interesting I can put this to use!

Thanks.

Mivo · Jun 8, 2016

Only just seen this now, very useful!

Thank you.

Would it be an awful lot of work to add one for re-entrant Bb? (fBbDG) And for re-entrant dGBE? Which software did you use for making these?

Louis0815 · Jun 8, 2016

Mivo said:
Which software did you use for making these?

All these were made with Musescore.

Adding other tunings is not rocket science, I just need to find some time - or I can provide the source files and you can adjust it yourself.

Bill1 said:
Can I suggest that you also add a picture of the fretboard on the same page like below for gcea (imagine a picture of a uke neck around the outside)

There are already plenty of these fretboard maps out there on the web; actually I left it out on purpose because it always lacks the octaves. And I was too lazy to draw a different one for every tuning.....

Rllink · Jun 9, 2016

actadh said:
Thank you. Can also affix a Snark and follow along with the sheet music for sensory impact of hearing it, seeing the note on the tuner, and reading from the sheet music. I am a visual/kinesthetic learner and that helps me.

I do that too. A lot of times I just go up and down the fret board, plucking the notes with my tuner set on chromatic. I read the notes on my tuner, sing the notes along with it, and visualize the notes on the staff. It has been a very good practice and is a great warmup.

In addition, when I am learning a new song, or sometimes even with songs that I already know, I will play the chord progression off the sheet and sing out loud along with the chords in the pattern that I'm strumming instead of the words, and just read along with the words in my mind. Maybe something like "bu bump bu bump bu bump bu bump". Of course, changing the pitch with the chords as they change. By doing this, you will start to hear the chords and the changes as they come. After a while, when you listen to music, you will not only start hearing familiar progressions, but you will actually recognize the chords and as time goes on, you get better and better at it. This is not something that happens over night, but over time it works.

Soprano	Concert	Tenor	Bass
Makala MK-S Kala SSTU-FMCP Makala Waterman Firefly Walnut Flight TUS50	Flea M-42 Koa Pili Koko Acacia (Aquila CGDA) Big Island KTO-CT Blackbird Clara Risa Solid	Pono MTDX8 KoAloha KTM-25	Kala Ubass EM-FS

Note finder: which note is in which fret?

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