Fretboard Note Locations

[Ravvij]

What happens when you're in an open tuning? Do you memorize the notes in every open tuning, too? That seems like a lot of work.

Yes I do. But it's worth it. I've seen the end-result of this kind of work and I'm looking forward to being able to play anything I want just by hearing it or thinking it. In any tuning.
It's not as if I'm trying to learn and deify a set pattern; although that would be accurate only in the case of A to G#/Ab.
As it's been said by many people through out the ages, "It's better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it."

 

[redstone]

Then I guess there was no cleaner fretboard charts available on google image, and violinists cannot play with other instruments because hey, they don't have any fretboard charts.

Sarcasm aside, I'll agree with TeeWX, you won't be a quick guitar thinker if you're looking for notes instead of intervals. For people without perfect pitch, it's like taking a longcut to avoid shortcuts.

 

[Ravvij]

You're walking on thin ice, homeslice. This board is one of the better ones on the internet for music theory. I am a member on several other boards that are solely dedicated to music theory, and while some of the contributors there are vastly knowledgable, the level of competency is much higher and more evenly distributed on this forum. Most of the people in this thread are regulars here, and they know their theory. The very first thing I was taught in music theory when I went into college was intervals, intervallic relationships took up the majority of my three semesters of harmony, intervals factored heavily into my six semesters of aural skills, and intervals provided the pitch basis of my composition, counterpoint, and analysis classes. I can pick up another instrument without any prior experience and reliably make a tune with it because it's all intervals. To learn intervals is to understand pitch space. If I memorized the fretboard by a chart like that, I would have to get a new chart for every tuning. Since my ear knows what to look for though, I can do the same work much faster and more intuitively. Intervals aren't the shortcut, they are "The Way".

Having gotten that out of the way, I have no problem with the content of your diagram, but it is completely unreadable. We'll be fine if we print it on bright paper, you say? Well, all I have is the printer that came free with my laptop. It only prints 8.5"x11", the quality of print isn't very sharp, I am on a student budget so I can't afford nice paper and copious ink, and your diagram would come out as a gray blob. For instructional material, you should ideally be able to print it on a beat up dot matrix printer from 1986 and still have magnificent results.

I agree with you. I didn't mean that learning those things were pointless, but, as someone who aspires to master guitar I believe that I should know every note by name and position even without hearing it. I envy your skill to be able to find notes just by their pitch which is why I memorize the notes (and their sounds) so that I can do just the same.

I don't understand why you're all having trouble reading the diagram. "It's too dark" only tells me that your monitor might not be bright enough. I intended to make this dark so that it wouldn't strain anyone's eyes with the typical White on Black set-up I see almost every where.
And, I guess I should split it into two parts; the flipped and normal sets.

 

[wespaul]

Yes I do. But it's worth it. I've seen the end-result of this kind of work and I'm looking forward to being able to play anything I want just by hearing it or thinking it. In any tuning.
It's not as if I'm trying to learn and deify a set pattern; although that would be accurate only in the case of A to G#/Ab.
As it's been said by many people through out the ages, "It's better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it."

Do you see how much more work and effort it takes to memorize something rather than understanding it? Why memorize note locations when you can understand interval relationships? I'm kind of repeating what others have said, but it's an amazing point. There are countless tunings you can play in, so are you going to memorize each and every one? Or will you put in the work to understand intervals so you can be able to name any note in any tuning?

And thanks to SW for the new quote.

 

[Mr. Big Noodles]

Exactly!
But you're right. I did forget exactly where I posted this.
I do apologize if I've offended those of you who actually know what you're talking about. I realize that I might have come across with a "Holier than though" attitude and for that I apologize again.

No problem. We're all friends here. We try to keep this place free from the attitudes and shoddy information that permeate places like Ultimate Guitar and other corners of the internet that I thankfully cannot remember the names of. We're helpful, but we don't tolerate BS. If everyone here is telling you something similar, it's a good idea to consider what they're saying.

 

[Ravvij]

No problem. We're all friends here. We try to keep this place free from the attitudes and shoddy information that permeate places like Ultimate Guitar and other corners of the internet that I thankfully cannot remember the names of. We're helpful, but we don't tolerate BS. If everyone here is telling you something similar, it's a good idea to consider what they're saying.

Heh, I guess it's a bit of Musician's pride talking.
I still don't think Intervals are THE Way, but they are A Way. I've found that there are many roads to reach the same goal, however, the roads others take don't really work well for me. Intervals are great and I love how easy they make playing, but I don't think they're the final say. Music is a lot like math, most of it is accurate, but not everything is known about it. So I'm not going to discount memorization just yet.

BTW: Without memorization practices your brain starts to shut down and can't reason properly. I've done a self study and found that people who're able to memorize things tend to remember more and more often. That's one of the reasons the Matching Card game is so popular for kids as they're learning in their first years of schooling.

 

[Ravvij]

UPDATED
I made the background lighter.

 

[JustMac]

UPDATED
I made the background lighter.

 

[redstone]

BTW: Without memorization practices your brain starts to shut down and can't reason properly. I've done a self study and found that people who're able to memorize things tend to remember more and more often. That's one of the reasons the Matching Card game is so popular for kids as they're learning in their first years of schooling.

With poor sensitivity to intervals, the brain only learns about music, not music itself. We're all more or less pitchdeaf and the only cure is focusing on interval recognition. No recognition, no comprehension... no imagination.

There's no use in reasoning when one cannot imagine, recognize, the right premises.

 

[Ravvij]

With poor sensitivity to intervals, the brain only learns about music, not music itself. We're all more or less pitchdeaf and the only cure is focusing on interval recognition. No recognition, no comprehension... no imagination.

There's no use in reasoning when one cannot imagine, recognize, the right premises.

You can't have one without the other. Reason and Imagination go hand in hand. If you were only imaginative you end up with a chaotic mash-up of sounds. If you were only reasonable you end up playing like a robot with no soul.

 

[Mr. Big Noodles]

 

[TeeWX]

First of all, I never said the "American" school system by itself. Memorization is a system of learning that has been practiced through-out the centuries. You wouldn't be able to read without it.
You need to get a better opinion of the people that come out of public school.
Secondly, I play in D Standard tuning (DGCFAD). I have to transpose notes all the time when I want to play something in E Standard and it's just as difficult when I use an Capo. [Floyd Rose Original Tremolo; IF you don't know what this means you should look up how difficult it is to tune a guitar with this bridge and why using a capo is the only quick solution to changing tunings for people who use this bridge.] The whole time I must remember that the original note positions are a whole step up.

I think when I say memorization and you say memorization we are talking about two different things, and that's fine. You aren't actually memorizing every word to be able to read. When you come across new words you're often combining different parts of the word and still figuring out exactly what it means without ever having memorized the word because you've never seen it before. Some things do have to be memorized, but they are often small. Make it easy on yourself, memorize the intervals and the few note finding tricks. On a 7 string guitar there are 84 note locations in the first half of the fretboard alone. It's a lot to handle.

If you're focusing on notes, and you're given a key, you're having to figure out each note of the key as you go. It's probably just going to confuse you and slow you down. In fact I really doubt anyone could use such a method in real time. If you can just figure out the root note and you understand the intervals that make up the chords you're using or the specific scale than you have a lot less things to remember to be able to play all over the fretboard. You'll want to learn scales by the intervals that make them up, not by the notes. The intervals never change, the notes always change. The same note location in one key could be B, and in another Cb, for example. It's really just too many calculations for your brain to handle, let alone when you're playing sixteenth notes at over 200bpm. Notes apply to ONE key/tuning, intervals apply to everything.

 

[Ravvij]

I think when I say memorization and you say memorization we are talking about two different things, and that's fine. You aren't actually memorizing every word to be able to read. When you come across new words you're often combining different parts of the word and still figuring out exactly what it means without ever having memorized the word because you've never seen it before. Some things do have to be memorized, but they are often small. Make it easy on yourself, memorize the intervals and the few note finding tricks. On a 7 string guitar there are 84 note locations in the first half of the fretboard alone. It's a lot to handle.

If you're focusing on notes, and you're given a key, you're having to figure out each note of the key as you go. It's probably just going to confuse you and slow you down. In fact I really doubt anyone could use such a method in real time. If you can just figure out the root note and you understand the intervals that make up the chords you're using or the specific scale than you have a lot less things to remember to be able to play all over the fretboard. You'll want to learn scales by the intervals that make them up, not by the notes. The intervals never change, the notes always change. The same note location in one key could be B, and in another Cb, for example. It's really just too many calculations for your brain to handle, let alone when you're playing sixteenth notes at over 200bpm. Notes apply to ONE key/tuning, intervals apply to everything.

Just a fun fact after you mentioned the number of notes, did you know that the Babylonians had a number system of Base 60? (We use Base 10) Now, Imagine having to learn and memorize 60 different symbols for 60 individual numbers. THAT's pointless and excessive.

 

[TeeWX]

Just a fun fact after you mentioned the number of notes, did you know that the Babylonians had a number system of Base 60? (We use Base 10) Now, Imagine having to learn and memorize 60 different symbols for 60 individual numbers. THAT's pointless and excessive.

I did not know that! Pretty ridiculous. I wonder why base 10 is so nice with 0-9. It's a smaller list to memorize. But thats not the only reason, drop down to base 2 with something like binary, and the sequences get a little too long for the kind of math we usually do. Finding the most effecient method for doing anything is always key

 

[JustMac]

Is it a bad idea to think a lot in scales, rather than intervals? I understand intervallic relationships just as well but I think it's mostly habit at this point. I don't feel that it's a hindrance but is this a dangerous path?

 

[djyngwie]

Just a fun fact after you mentioned the number of notes, did you know that the Babylonians had a number system of Base 60? (We use Base 10) Now, Imagine having to learn and memorize 60 different symbols for 60 individual numbers. THAT's pointless and excessive.

This is why we still have 60 minutes to an hour and 60 seconds to a minute.

But: there's a logical subsystem to the way those 60 symbols were represented. So, that's not so bad. The crazy part is learning the equivalent of a our basic multiplication table. I had to memorize a total of 10x9=90 different multiplication results while growing up, learning to do basic math. That's doable (well, it was for me anyway). But a babylonian would have to memorize 60x59=3540 such multiplication results (generally involving much larger numbers). That's a pretty big undertaking. (That said, I'm not sure the babylonians did multiplication this way).

 

[Mr. Big Noodles]

Is it a bad idea to think a lot in scales, rather than intervals? I understand intervallic relationships just as well but I think it's mostly habit at this point. I don't feel that it's a hindrance but is this a dangerous path?

Not necessarily. If somebody tells you "this is G minor", then plays a phrase and asks you what the last note was, can you tell them that it's a D? In music, it's never "instead of," it's always "as well as". Learn the intervals, learn the scales, learn the notes, learn the harmony.

 

[Solodini]

Is it a bad idea to think a lot in scales, rather than intervals? I understand intervallic relationships just as well but I think it's mostly habit at this point. I don't feel that it's a hindrance but is this a dangerous path?

Thinking a scale is a series of intervals, they just happen to be all 2nds. As long as you're aware of the notes, not just blasting a boxed fingering you should be pretty adaptable to intervals when you need them.

Try playing scalar stuff with the notes moved to other octaves and look at what intervals this forms. Putting every other note up or down the octave will give you 7ths or 9ths and 3rds. Try playing a scale but with every other note above the octave i.e. tonic, 2nd above octave, 3rd, 4th above octave, 5th, 6th above octave, 7th, double octave. Work out the intervals between each of those. Between each note in pitch order you'll have 3rds. Move every other one of those down an octave i.e. tonic, 3rd down octave, 5th, 7th down octave, 9th, 11th down octave, 13th. What intervals do you have in between?

It's a bit of an excessive exercise but you could stumble across some cool ways of splitting an idea into a couple of voices.

 

[JustMac]

Not necessarily. If somebody tells you "this is G minor", then plays a phrase and asks you what the last note was, can you tell them that it's a D? In music, it's never "instead of," it's always "as well as". Learn the intervals, learn the scales, learn the notes, learn the harmony.

In that case I'd almost certainly recognise it as the "fifth" and then remember that D is the fifth "interval" of G. I think it's just my train of thought thinking in that order (scale-interval-note name). If it finishes in a different octave than it started, I notice I have more difficulty deciphering, say, a sharp 5 and a 6th. I guess that's neglection on my part, of my inner "ear" though. Definitely something for me to work on....in which case I think I've answered my own question

 

[Konfyouzd]

You know for as much as you people are dissing on this, I'd think you are lazy players or just scared of learning a tiny bit of theory.

Hand me a guitar, tell me how it's tuned and give me a starting pitch... I'll tell you where the other 11 are from that point without a chart... GUARANTEED