Hi, I've been playing on my own for about a year now, and as I haven't said it before, thanks to all you guys at guitarnoise.com. The articles, newsletters, lessons have been really helpfull.
I haven't spent much time in these forums mainly due to internet constraints but I'm struggling trying to put together a good practice schedule for myself which is going to improve my guitar skills and music theory knowledge.
So what can I do so far? I can strum through a couple of songs (by Johnny Cash, Levellers and Nirvana), my fretboard knowledge is coming together (so thats where the whole tones are...) and my fingerpicking is... ok.
I've got a few books which I've bought over the year about learning blues guitar, and guitar in general, some of which were bought without much knowledge of what was contained within. Part of me was probably hoping that just by owning them the strange mysteries of the myxalodian and pentatonic would be absorbed by my eager brain.
Sadly this has not been the case. Which brings me to my current question. I'm trying to learn scales. I know, not the most taxing of things, but some of the info out their seems to be confusing me more than helping.
Now I know how to work out my major scales thanks to the help on the absolute beginners sections with my W-W-H-W-W-W-H (W=Whole Tone, H=HalfTone). My minor scales aren't far behind either.
I know where the notes are on the fretboard so I can work out the scale as I go, although this can be quite slow as well.
One of my books is talking about scale shapes. Also a method called the C-A-G-E-D method for learning them. Basically you learn the shapes for the C, A, etc. scales on certain frets, and then you can play most scales using these shapes but starting on other frets... This is where I start to get lost.
I found something similar for the pentatonic scales in this: Turning Scales Into Solos article where its saying that I can take the 5 pentatonic minor scales and depending on what key I'm in they will follow a progression from one shape to the next as I go up the neck on the guitar. Is this similar then to what this other book is talking about with the C-A-G-E-D shapes?
Any help would be most appreciated.
BTW, I'd love to get a hold of Tom's book on guitar theory for guitar, but only the US amazon.com website seems to stock it. In the UK it was quoted as being £54 on amazon.co.uk as it needed to be shipped from the USA. Anyone know of an easier way to get hold of it Brit-side?
Here's a good diagram for the pentatonic scale:
Ted Viera's Pentatonic shapes.
And look at Greybeard's scales and Greybeard's scale patterns and check out the links to the CAGED patterns on Greybeard's Music Page.
Well we all shine on--like the moon and the stars and the sun.
-- John Lennon
Cheers for that Musenfreund.
Sometimes seems that theres so much info out there that its hard to find the "good stuff" or most appropriate.
Hi Dylan, and welcome to the discussions!
Guitar sure can be confusing. Instruments like the piano are straightforward - one middle C - but the guitar presents a lot of choices... 5 middle C notes, for starters!
In any scale, you have a series of tones, and choices to make on the fretboard for where to play them. The methods of scale shapes, the CAGED system, and others, are just a way to organize useful fingerings from these tones... once you learn where they are, the systems should have less importance - you'll know where the notes are. They're really just learning tools.
As you work your way up the fingerboard, there are notes in the scale, and there are notes that aren't in the scale. Taking C major for an example, there's at least one scale note on every fret except the 11th... so you can really have 11 different starting frets, and 11 different scale fingerings.
Some are going to be more useful than others - that's where scale shapes come in. The easiest scales will start on the 2nd or 4th finger, on the 5th or 6th string. Those give you four places to play a major scale - in A, for instance, you'll have fingerings at the 2nd fret (4th finger on the E string), 4th fret (2nd finger on the E string), 9th fret (4th finger on the A string) and 11th fret (2nd finger on the A string). That covers the neck pretty well, except for the middle range.
There's a useful fingering starting with the 1st finger on the E string that closes that gap, but it stretches more than the other four.
Those five fingerings can be related to the open chords... and there are only five open major chords: CAGED (where that system came from). If you like CAGED, use it... if you like finger shapes, use them... the key is to learn what notes lie where on the neck in any given scale. Once you've done that, you'll know all the 11 possible fingerings without really having studied the more awkward ones.
Pentatonic scales are similar. They're usually taught in four or five 'boxes' on the neck. If you learn those, and then use them to visualize the fretboard, you'll no longer be stuck in the boxes.
Oh, and the easiest way to get my book in the UK is to contact Greybeard from this site - he's my EU distributor :)
Guitar teacher offering lessons in Plainfield IL
Learn the 5 patterns from the article. Learn how to link them. Learn how to use them to play in different keys. Then learn the full corresponding major scale patterns. Learn how to link them. Learn how to use them to play in different keys.
It took me a long time to do this but I cannot describe how much it opened up the fretboard and helped my playing. It is tedious but it is worth it. Eventually you will know them so well you won't need to think about using scales when soloing.
Try to find a CD full of jamtracks in different keys. I have several that cost about $10. Use them to improv a solo in all keys.
