The Musician's Guide to Fretboard Memorisation
Nothing will have a bigger impact on your guitar playing than learning the notes on the fretboard properly. In this course, you’ll learn how to learn the notes in a way that not only develops your fretboard fluency but reinforces your overall musicianship.
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Introduction
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The first colour TV
The guitar becomes more alive as we become more aware of exactly what’s happening under our fingers.
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We don't start with colour theory
We aren’t trying to name every note in real time. But, we do want to be subconsciously aware of each note, ready to bring it to mind if we need it.
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Identifying visual cues
There are a lot of visual cues on the guitar that we can use to help familiarize ourselves with where the notes on the fretboards are.
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Shortcuts aren't worth the pain
The problem with patterns is that no matter how fast you are at using them, you will always have to go through that sequence in your head every time you want to recognise a note.
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Understand when to use your tools
The octave is a system is a hack that will give you a false sense of progress and cause you a lot of frustration down the line.
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Practice tracks
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Using the practice tracks
Throughout this chapter, you’ll use practice tracks to slowly build familiarity with the notes of the fretboard on every string.
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Day 1 - Low E String (E, F, G)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first three notes of the Low E string.
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Day 2 - Low E string (E, F, G, A)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first four notes of the Low E string.
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Day 3 - Low E String (E, F, G, A, B)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first five notes of the Low E string.
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Day 4 - Low E String (E, F, G, A, B, C)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first six notes of the Low E string.
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Day 5 - Low E String (E, F, G, A, B, C, D)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with all the notes of the Low E string.
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Day 6 - A string (A, B, C)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first three notes of the A string.
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Day 7 - A string (A, B, C, D)
This section includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first four notes of the A string.
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Day 8 - A string (A, B, C, D, E)
This section includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first five notes of the A string.
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Day 9 - A string (A, B, C, D, E, F)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first six notes of the A string.
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Day 10 - A string (A, B, C, D, E, F, G)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with all the notes of the A string.
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Day 11 - D string (D, E, F)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first three notes on the D string.
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Day 12 - D string (D, E, F, G)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first four notes on the D string.
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Day 13 - D string (D, E, F, G, A)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first five notes on the D string.
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Day 14 - D string (D, E, F, G, A, B)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first six notes on the D string.
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Day 15 - D string (D, E, F, G, A, B, C)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with all the notes on the D string.
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Day 16 - G string (G, A, B)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first three notes on the G string.
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Day 17 - G string (G, A, B, C)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first four notes on the G string.
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Day 18 - G string (G, A, B, C, D)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first five notes on the G string.
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Day 19 - G string (G, A, B, C, D, E)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first six notes on the G string.
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Day 20 - G string (G, A, B, C, D, E, F)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with all the notes on the G string.
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Day 21 - B string (B, C, D)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first three notes on the B string.
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Day 22 - B string (B, C, D, E)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first four notes on the B string.
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Day 23 - B string (B, C, D, E, F)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first three notes on the B string.
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Day 24 - B string (B, C, D, E, F, G)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with the first six notes on the B string.
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Day 25 - B string (B, C, D, E, F, G, A)
This lesson includes three practice tracks to help develop your familiarity with all the notes on the B string.
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Identify notes in common chords
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Identify notes in open chords
Use open chords you're familiar with to practice identifying the notes in a musical context.
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Identify notes in bar chords
Use bar chords you're familiar with to practice identifying the notes in a musical context.
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Identify scale degrees in bar chords
Understanding which scale degrees are being used allows us to quickly identify chord quality.
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Practice with a metronome
Having the accountability of the metronome when you're practising notes is a great way to identify any areas where you might be less familiar.
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Note identification variations
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Identify notes horizontally
Practice identifying the same note horizontally along the entire fretboard.
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Identify notes vertically
Practice identifying the same note vertically along the entire fretboard.
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Identify notes outside to inside
Apply the idea of moving from the outside to the inside of your horizontal and vertical patterns.
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Identify notes alternating strings
Find ways of breaking any patterns or sequences by identifying notes on alternating strings.
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Use a single finger
Use a single finger when identifying the notes on the fretboard to avoid relying on interval shapes.
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Identify notes by timbre
Associate variations in timbre with notes as we are learning their position on the fretboard.
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Using the major scale
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Navigating the fretboard
The more visual cues we can associate with where the notes are, the easier they will be to remember.
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Understanding the B string
Understand the unique characteristics of the B string and how to compensate for them.
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Major scale expressions
A unique aspect of the guitar is the ability we have to play a scale in two different directions from the same root note.
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Interval relationships
Use left and right expressions to improve your knowledge of intervals and recognise notes on the fretboard.
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Melody directions
Notice how two notes that may otherwise seem unrelated can be used together in a meaningful way.
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Identify notes using triads
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Identify triad inversions
Practice with triad inversions to improve your knowledge of the notes on the fretboard in a musical context.
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Unison triad inversions
Identify every place you can play triads of the same pitch along the fretboard.
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Sequential octave triad inversions
Identify every place you can play triads in sequential octaves along the fretboard.
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Bass to treble triad inversions
Identify every place you can play triads moving from bass to treble positions along the fretboard.
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Identify notes in chord progressions
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Identify chord progressions
Identify notes that occur in each of the chords you are playing in a chord progression.
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Chords on the same string set
Identify notes that occur in each of the chords you are playing in a chord progression along a single string set.
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Chords in the same box
Identify notes that occur in each of the chords you are playing in a chord progression within a single position.
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Ascending and descending bass notes
Identify notes that occur in each of the chords you are playing in a chord progression with an ascending or descending bass line.
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Alternating bass notes (or top notes)
Identify notes that occur in each of the chords you are playing in a chord progression with an alternating bass line.
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BONUS LESSON - Harmonics
Identify the notes of the three most common natural harmonic positions.
Matthew Stuart
Meet your instructor
Matt is a guitar teacher with over 16 years of experience pushing the boundaries of how we think guitar should be taught. A multi-instrumentalist and an expert in technical development, Matt approaches guitar education through a holistic lens that will have you wondering why no one has taught it this way before.
What you’ll learn
Practice tracks
Work through 75 practice tracks designed to help you develop fluency with the notes on the fretboard in no more than 10 minutes per day.
Why bother?
Discover why learning the notes on the fretboard is guaranteed to speed up your progress and maximise your enjoyment playing the guitar.
Musicianship
Develop fluency with the notes on the fretboard in a way that will indirectly enhance your knowledge of intervals, scales, and chords.
Course FAQ
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If you follow the instructions in this course to the letter and practice consistently, you’ll likely have the notes down in between 25 - 75 days. But if you’re trying to get the best results, don’t worry about how long it’s taking. Remember, we’re trying to learn the notes properly, NOT to learn the notes quickly. If you’re going through the course material and still don’t feel like it’s helping, you can always send us a message and we’ll put you on the right track.
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There isn’t a free trial but it is risk-free. If you’ve diligently worked through the course material for 30 days and haven’t seen any progress, we’ll give you a free private lesson to figure out what’s going on. If you don’t have the money to buy the course right now, you can always check out our free fretboard memorisation lesson here.
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If you’re a Guitar Nutrition member, you already have access! Just make sure you’re logged in and select the course.