Learn Guitar Notes Of The Fretboard

This short article will highlight how you can make learning your guitar notes on the fretboard easy Although an instrument with 24 frets

may have 288 different note locations to remember there are really simple ways to to make it easier to memorize all the notes about the fretboard.

learn guitar notes

First of all we are able to cut the number of positions that should be remembered in half since the guitar fretboard repeats following the 12th fret

(the very first 12 frets are an octave, the following 12 are the octave above it). The notes appear in the exact same order in the 12th to the 24th fret as

they do from the 1st to the 12th. This means nowadays there are only 144 note locations to consider.



In total there are 12 different notes in western music, these are: C, C#/Db, D, D#/Eb, E, F, F#/Gb, G, G#/, A, A#/Bb and B. As you can see the #’s and b’s

(sharps and flats) lie between the notes C and D, D and E, F and G, G along with a, A and B. Therefore we can now cut the amount of notes we need to learn right down to just

42 because we will automatically see the sharps and flats appear between your other notes once we’ve memorized the positions of C, D, E, F, G along with a.



Now find a picture of all the notes on the fretboard (you can find one out of the free e-book that you get when you join the Guitar Theory Revolution newsletter)

and find the universal note pattern that every note follows. Between the 1st and 12th fret each note appears once on each one of the six strings.

If you take the start of the pattern to become the notes appearing on the low and high E string then you’ll begin to see the pattern repeat again and again for each note.



Learning this note pattern has become the quickest way to learn all the notes on the guitar fretboard, although there are others. For example if you know

the circle of fifths and fourths then you’ll be easily able to find all the notes since the strings on the guitar are tuned in fifths. The circle of

fourths and fifths is going to be covered in future articles and lessons.



As I mentioned earlier it is advisable to focus on the notes C, D, E, F, G, A and B first because this way you’ll automatically start seeing the sharps and

flats between them. In addition you should always sing the notes that you are playing in order to enhance your ability to recognize notes by ear.



Finally be sure you learn the locations of the notes without reference to other notes. Although it’s useful when you are the beginning it’s not good to maintain doing

this as it will slow you down because you’ll always be checking where other notes are before you find the one you really want. To memorize all

the notes in the proper way check out the exercises in the free e-book How To Learn All The Notes On The Guitar Fretboard which you can download when

you sign up for the Guitar Theory Revolution newsletter.

learn guitar notes