LorenFL
Well-known member
I'm not quite ready to REALLY start learning the fretboard, though I know I should, and I do want to.
I poke around Here from time to time and experiment with different scales. Really, more playing with different sounds than paying attention to what notes I'm playing or in what key. Trying to get some of the more common scales (particularly blues and pentatonics, but I find that the Egyptian and Chinese/Japanese scales are simple and fun to play with) into my head for improvisational purposes, and just to amuse myself.
I picked up the basic "box" patterns of pentatonic and blues scales pretty early on (9 years ago), now I'm trying to expand on them to extend my "runs" into the correct notes.
Now, what I just noticed is that there's some obvious simple MATH on the fretboard. I've done a lot of reading and watched a lot of tutorial videos, and nobody's EVER mentioned this. I feel a little annoyed at MYSELF for not seeing it before, but perhaps even more annoyed that nobody's teaching this.
What the heck am I talking about? Well, for instance, the one that just jumped out at me is that the "shapes" of the notes in a particular key/scale repeat on the fretboard. And not only that, but that repeated shape includes EXACTLY the same notes (perhaps octave-shifted). Mathematically, related to that idea... Any note on two bottom strings (any scale, any key) you can move left 3 frets and down two strings and find the same note! Simple math! Good to know!
So, any shape on the E and A strings that you move to the other two strings and down the neck by 3 frets is exactly the same set of notes.
Yeah, I know, it's all basic musical math. But, SHORTCUTS... they can really amplify the learning curve. Heck, if I can learn HALF the fretboard and get the other half by simple relative math... I've done something.
Alright, that being said... what other simple mathematical shortcuts am I missing? Simple obvious connections that make it easier to learn to play beyond the first 4 frets.
I poke around Here from time to time and experiment with different scales. Really, more playing with different sounds than paying attention to what notes I'm playing or in what key. Trying to get some of the more common scales (particularly blues and pentatonics, but I find that the Egyptian and Chinese/Japanese scales are simple and fun to play with) into my head for improvisational purposes, and just to amuse myself.
I picked up the basic "box" patterns of pentatonic and blues scales pretty early on (9 years ago), now I'm trying to expand on them to extend my "runs" into the correct notes.
Now, what I just noticed is that there's some obvious simple MATH on the fretboard. I've done a lot of reading and watched a lot of tutorial videos, and nobody's EVER mentioned this. I feel a little annoyed at MYSELF for not seeing it before, but perhaps even more annoyed that nobody's teaching this.
What the heck am I talking about? Well, for instance, the one that just jumped out at me is that the "shapes" of the notes in a particular key/scale repeat on the fretboard. And not only that, but that repeated shape includes EXACTLY the same notes (perhaps octave-shifted). Mathematically, related to that idea... Any note on two bottom strings (any scale, any key) you can move left 3 frets and down two strings and find the same note! Simple math! Good to know!
So, any shape on the E and A strings that you move to the other two strings and down the neck by 3 frets is exactly the same set of notes.
Yeah, I know, it's all basic musical math. But, SHORTCUTS... they can really amplify the learning curve. Heck, if I can learn HALF the fretboard and get the other half by simple relative math... I've done something.
Alright, that being said... what other simple mathematical shortcuts am I missing? Simple obvious connections that make it easier to learn to play beyond the first 4 frets.