Notes On The Whole Fretboard

Music Theory Notes On The Fretboard & Cycle Of 5ths
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Learn to use the Octave Shapes to find notes all over the guitar fretboard. :)


View the full lesson at Notes On The Whole Fretboard | JustinGuitar

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I recently started the Practical Music Theory course and, this morning, was studying “Know Where The Notes Are” on page 10 of the course. A few years ago, I learnt how to find notes on a fretboard using the Five Root Shapes which I now know quite well. This course shows a different system for finding notes. Is it important to learn this system or does the root shape system achieve the same result?

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If you can pick a random string-fret location and recall the note name it should be fine. It really doesn’t matter what method you use so long as you can do it fairly efficiently. Knowing those shapes and the intervals in them will come in handy when it gets to manipulating chord shapes (sus2, sus4, 7, maj7 …etc).

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Thank you!

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Hello @rpalanuk and welcome to the community.

You mention page 10.
Are you using the old eBook pdf that Justin has retired in favour of the newer, better, fuller theory course here: Practical, Fast & Fun Music Theory | JustinGuitar.com

Justin teaches here using octave shapes and it does tie in with root shapes and chord shapes. If you’re good, you’re good. The means is less important than the knowing in this case.
I hope that helps.

Cheers :smiley:

| Richard_close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide, Approved Teacher & Moderator

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Thank you! I’ll check that out.

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At 1.08 Justin talks about the 7th fret on the 5th string whilst pointing to and meaning the 9th fret. This sent me down quite a rabbit hole trying to figure it out until I realised what he’d done.

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@netwiz Congratulations on winning this month’s prize! You caught Justin making a human error.
:wink:

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Erm yes. I wasn’t complaining - it happens. I was just letting you know. Worth putting one of those correction bubbles on it.

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I was just kidding … hence the winky face :slight_smile:

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I had seen some of the Octave method a while back and noticed in the power chord lessons too. But the 4 Octave shapes have helped me a lot. I like the JustinGuitar NoteTrainer and use it on the train or in other free time instead of scrolling socials. The Octave shapes got me my best score in 3 mins I was able to name 27 notes so it’s definitely not 1 per second but it’s about 6 to 10 seconds but with some in just a sec or two.

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Another way to find notes on the fretboard is to recognize the same note occurs on the string below, beginning on the 6th string, 5 frets toward the nut, except on the 2nd (B string), in which the note occurs 4 frets up towards the neck. If there are insufficient frets towards the nut to get to 5 or 4, continue counting from the 12th fret. Perhaps Justin can offer this tip as an additional technique to locate notes quickly for the find the note exercise. It’s very simple.