Learning how to play up the neck

[cpeehler7]

Originally Posted by ljguitar

Hi cp...
I was a music major and it wasn't very interesting...pretty boring actually.

That's what it sounds like. I'm liking Psychology right now, and have started signing up for a few Psych classes. So I think this spring I'll just continue on going to major in Psych, and maybe consider going to a different school next year that I can minor in music. Hopefully a D3 school or something so I can run if my leg heals up. I'll check out some of those books you guys posted above though, I'm interested in learning theory now, which is strange for me. I always thought I just wanted to play guitar for fun and not worry about theory, but the more songs I learn the more I wish I knew more about theory.

Well I'll see how it works out, I'm going to keep an eye on that theory class to see if it opens up. I know it filled fast because everyone in the university needs 3 art/music credits to graduate, so that's just a gen ed for everyone to take.

[mr. beaumont]

See...theory...that's not what this is...this is fundamental stuff...notes and locations.

A lot of the stuff guitar players call "theory" is covered in method book number one of any instrument--including guitar methods. Theory gets heavy, and isn't probably needed by most musicians...trust me, you'll know when you really need it.

[Zamfir]

Whether chords, or single notes: if you really want to know every note on the neck (useful!) as a "feel" thing as well as an "ear" thing, try this exercise that helped me immensely on guitar and now bass, courtesy of a jazz educator/honcho I know:

1. Get to know your friend and mine, the Circle of Fourths. (C -> F -> Bb -> Eb -> Ab -> Db -> Gb/F# -> B -> E -> A -> D -> G -> C). These are now your root notes for this exercise, in that sequence.

2. Pick any note from the Circle of Fourths anywhere on your fretboard. Sing its name ("G"), in pitch, as you play it. You can start on 'C' at the beginning to get comfortable with this, but eventually you want to start on any note (e.g., Db, F#, whatever) and learn to go from there.

3. Find and play the next note. Sing its name, in pitch, as you pluck it.

4. Wash, rinse, repeat until you get back to the note you started with, or some octave thereof.

On stringed instruments tuned in fourths like bass (and guitar, but for the G to B strings), it's almost too easy to find the adjacent string and/or jump two frets down for this exercise. So: after doing the obvious, easy solution for a while, force yourself to play someplace OTHER than the next adjacent string or two frets down. Jump the correct interval plus another octave, up OR down. Jump across strings. Figure out neat patterns that will let you move up your index finger position up chromatically on the neck, or down in some regular interval.

Do this every day, just for 5-10 minutes per day for a month or two, and I guarantee you that you will come to know and love spots on your fretboard that you didn't use to play much.

The extra value you'll get: so much of Western popular music uses chord sequences whose roots move in intervals of fourths, such as the standard "ii-V-I" change. If that's too much theory, don't worry about it; you will come to love the Circle of Fourths as a familiar signpost and you'll see it over and over again.

The same educator from whom I got this loves to point out "There are no hard notes or keys - only unfamiliar ones."

[Bern]

Originally Posted by ZekeM

For lead work start with the major and minor pentatonic scales.

I agree...and don't go any further than that until you really know it.

[delaorden9]

Hi. I am illiterate on musical notation, theory, scales practices etc...But I am a chords hunter. I walk all the way up and down the neck looking for new tuning and sounds. And I succeed most of times. 80% of the chords I "discover" I just can't name them accurately. I just compare them with a major chord and I figure that this "new chord" is a variation of the one I compared. In short, I know this sounds bad, but I don't pay much attention to chords names just to how they sound.
That guy on the video is superb.

[Davis Webb]

I would carefully read everything that LJ Guitar said and more. In my opinion his posts are always direct, to the point, answer the question and are based on decades of work as a teacher. His reasoning is solid and sound.

Music theory is best learned on a keyboard because the relationships are obvious on those white and black keys. As far as learning to play up the neck, again Larry hits it out of the ball park....all jazz instructors demand that students master chord inversions all the way up the neck as their first step.