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Thoughts on the best way to learn all the notes on the fretboard?
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11-13-2011 04:20 PM
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A good way is to learn 7th chord arpeggios with roots on the 6th, 5th, 4th, and 3rd strings.
Learn the arpeggios, learn the roots, learn the fretboard.
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play scales and arpeggios on a single string.
play intervals on sets of 2 strings.
play open and closed position triads, all over the fretboard.
hopefully after you do all this you can fully understand, immediately, the notes you play of 4 note-chords, and you can go from there....
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Memorize the dots of the E and A string, from there it's easy to find the notes in between from there if you know the musical alphabet. For the D and G strings use the octave technique of down two back two e.g. 7th fret on D string, down two strings and back two frets is E string 5th fret, which you know is an A since you know the E and A strings. For the B string do the octave technique 3 strings down, two frets up. And the high E is the same as the low E so you already have it. Worked for me when I was learning guitar, eventually it just becomes natural and you'll know all of them.
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Find every E
Find every F
Find every F#/Gb
Find every G
Find every G#/Ab
Find every A
Find every A#/Bb
Find every B
Find every C
Find every C#/Db
Find every D
Find every D#/Eb
repeat
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It's too bad there is not one way to learn the notes on a guitar fingerboard. I mean just the notes, not even the notation on the treble staff. I think about how keyboardists, string players, horn players, etc don't have to deal with 5 or 8 or 100 ways to learn the notes on their instrument. I bet every guitarist has a different way to learn the fingerboard and thinks that is the best and only way. Guitar pedagogy is anarchy and it is why guitarists are so far behind all other instrumentalists.
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I used flashcards -- actually, the ones advertised here Guitar Fretboard Flashcards - Revised 3rd Edition Guitar Fretboard Flashcards - Revised 2nd Edition - $24.95 : 12 Tone Music Publishing LLC, Home of the tone note method
I found it to be an effective method, especially since it allowed me to be productive away from the instrument. It only took a few weeks or so until I had the entire fretboard down. I think I started with one string at a time but then went to sections of the fretboard across all the strings. (I think the price has doubled since I bought them but I still would say they're worth it.)
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The simplest, and best way:
1. Acquire sheet music
2. Attempt to play said sheet music
3. ????
4. Profit!
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Learning sight reading is a good thing to do: it doesn't only help with prima vista (which is important for a working musician) but also helps to memorize the fretboard. At least check out William Leavitt's Reading Studies For Guitar... Helped me a lot...
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Here's a technique I have found useful in teaching the notes
on the neck. ......
The "random notefinder" exercise.
-That's what the author in a Bassplayer magazine called
it anyway. [this would have been 10-15 years ago]
OK.....Here's what you do.
1 Start with the lowest available note on your instrument.
...For the majority of us this would be "E" 6th string.
2 Play all the E's on that string [lowest available to highest available]
3 Go to the next highest string [5th string] again, play all E's low to high.
4 Repeat on 4th string
5 Repeat on 3rd string
6 Repeat on 2nd string
7 Repeat on 1st string.
8 Now descend on each string, high to low.
eg 1st string 12th fret..open 1st.
2nd string 17th fret ...5th fret
Continue until you arrive safely [we hope] to Low E 6th string.
Now, go to the next highest note...F on the 6th string...You know what to do next.....Yeah up and back again.
Now, those pesky #/b notes......I get the best results by having the student call them sharp in ascent and their enharmonic flat name in descent.
BTW...I insist that they say the name of each note out loud...
Partly so I know what their mental process is .
And, to burn into the left brain the naming process.
There are quite a few variants and add-ons that I use according to
each situation.
For instance,..not much time for practice? Just do one or two notes .
Getting up to speed....use a metronome.........I often use 2 clicks per
note for the students...first click, say the next note by name and move
your eyes in preparation to playing it on the 2nd click.....
Works well for me, along with a bunch of other cunning strategies I've
picked up over the years.
I just never give up on any road blocks the student shows up with.
I don't take no for an answer.....unless....they don't care enough...
....At which point I generally suggest they go forth and sabotage their
"learning" elseware.
Oops...straying into teacher burnout syndrome here...sorry....normal transmission will now resume.
SO....try the random notefinder...it works...and you know when you've completed the task...because you have an ordered , finite assignment.
OK......Cool!
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Here's a very related thread:
Learning the fretboard
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Does it help/hinder the process to use the cycle of fifths?
Originally Posted by Moonray
Ed S.
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I think the way to get the best out of the random notefinder ex.
is to go through it the way I described..
The main thing to consider is that the purpose is purely to learn the names
of the notes and their location on the fingerboard.
-- I realize that the name is not the sound...neither is the name the part of this or that scale/arpeggio etc.....
However, in my experience if you are trying to address one issue...in this
case the location of all notes on the neck...It's good practice to do one
thing at a time ...
Howard Roberts for one, turned me on to this kind of thinking in his essay
on the subject of learning music applied to the guitar...[or really, learning in general.]
He had looked at the way we learn and was recommending small,
clear "snapshots" of each chunk of information....and avoiding overload at all costs.
This approach [to me] means to go into each aspect of our learning
mindful of what the objective is.
If you want to learn the location of each note say...you do JUST that; before
connecting it to say, cycle five, this arpeggio or whatever....
It's simply taking a "one clear snapshot at a time" approach...before adding further elements
to the task.
In this way your learning can take on a more considered, yet intense
approach...as you are not second-guessing whether "perhaps I should
[for example] be applying the exercise to the cycle" ...you simply [SIMPLY]
do this one thing...Then you proceed to another level,eg arpeggios and
observe to what extent you struggle to find, or identify, notes as a part of
a larger construct...and boom...you're connecting up pathways in your
brain and fingers.
Am I right?
Well....as our local fruiterer, of Chinese peasant stock,and
a lovely man used to say..."Try...see"
It's become something of a family maxim
for us.
Hope this helps......
Questions answered answers questioned.
MJP
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using only one string, play the major scale in every key while saying the note name out loud. then sight read all on one string. do this on all 6 strings. do this with other scales.
play every single A on the guitar lowest string to highest, then every A#, every B, etc.
play every single major scale in every key locked in first position, then do it from second, then third, etc. until you've gone up the whole neck. say the notes out loud if you need to.
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colduc - sight reading on one string, what a great idea! thanks.
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Arnie Berle and Howard Roberts have written sight reading
methods based on the single string approach.
I would recommend either of them.
..But have a preference for the HR one.Mainly because he was a bad MF.
...and....
I just caught sight of my HR fusion 111 looking at me
from across the room...[love that guitar]
But, at the risk of being a bore on the original question to this thread,
which, if I remember rightly is , "the best way to learn the notes"
....not, "how to sight read" [remember you gotta look at the music to SR]
or, "relationships between notes".....
You wanna learn the notes?
Learn the &#!*# notes!.....
One thing at a time guys.
Try thinking clearly.......
I promise I'll leave it there......[Don't be one of those guys that get the ignore response....whatever happened to........? LOL]
If it's sight reading you want to work on, the books I mentioned are
called "New techniques for sight reading" by Arnie Berle and "Howard Roberts guitar manual sight reading"
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