Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Uncle John on February 5, 2012 at 3:57am

Yeah, why not go at it blindly?  That's what I do!.    First off, look at Knot Lenny's CBG 101.   Learn that.  Then look at free lessons from Shane Spiel, Keni Lee Burgess and John  McNair on the nation or youtube.   Choose your early path.  Keep it fun. 

Permalink Reply by steve payne on February 5, 2012 at 6:57am

Hi John, yeah i have checked out those guys and there is some great stuff there to get me started and i definatly want to keep it fun, but i know i wasted a lot of time and effort and got some bad habits early on with my harmonica playing and i want to try to avoid that with my CBG which is why i recon a bit of music theory type knowlege would be a good thing.

It's a bit like taking a walk in the woods if you have a map for the route you are more likely to reach your destination without wasting time going round in circles and just cos your following the map does'nt mean you can't enjoy the journey or take the odd fun detour.

Permalink Reply by Uncle John on February 5, 2012 at 7:15am

Well, just an opinion, but if you want to sing and accompany yourself start with knotlenny.  If you want to make cool Delta sounds, buy John McNair's teaching DVD.  If you want to learn theory and become an accomplished musician, go with Keni Lee Burgess.   Shane's stuff should be mentioned there too....  I look at things from the viewpoint of someone that mostly just accompanies singing.   ---  Another great option would be to learn from Night Owl's teaching videos on the nation.

Permalink Reply by steve payne on February 5, 2012 at 10:34am

Hi John, thanks for the feed back, i am hoping to be able to accompany myself singing and maybe in a year or so playing some Harp in a rack so i'm not looking to be a tecnique guy i'm just after a basis in the theory and then i can work the rest out for myself (hopefully!)

All the best Steve.

Permalink Reply by Ron "Oily" Sprague on February 5, 2012 at 7:58am

Steve,

Unca John is wise. Use the vids, they're great. There are plenty of basic music theory pages on the Internet.

However, learning the fretboard on a 3-string is relatively easy, especially if you understand that, without accidentals ( sharps and flats), all music consists of just 8 notes. If you start with C, then you just make a circle, through D, E, F, G, A, and B, back to...C. That is a series of ascending notes. Descending notes go the other way, viz: C, B, A, G, F, E, D, back to...C. If you've ever seen the Circle of Fifths, then this will make visual sense.

You wanna set up another scale? Get kinky, and start with your G string! Your open G, lowest sounding string, is an octave (8 notes) lower than your highest sounding open g string. So all the notes at each fret on those strings will be the same, just an octave apart.


Stop me if this is too basic for you...let's map your fretboard. If you have fretted your neck chromatically, but with even temperament (standard guitar frets, as opposed to the major scale octave fret pattern you'd find on a mountain dulcimer), then you have to start taking sharps and flats into account. This will be a twelve tone scale, not an octave scale, because of the inclusion of sharps and flats at certain notes.

OK, so if you are going "up" the fretboard (toward the box) on the lowest sounding G string, the next note at the first fret is...G#(A flat). The note at the second fret is A. The note at the third fret is...A# (B-flat if you are "descending."Here again, the Circle of Fifths helps to explain that these are the same note. Sharps are added to increase the value of a note one half step, while flats are added to decrease a note a half step).. The next note at the fourth fret is C. And so on, until you get to the 12th fret, when you should find yourself back at G, which will be one octave higher, and will sound exactly like your open g string.

Here are the 12 notes in the chromatic G scale:

G - G#(Aflat) - A - A#(B flat) - B - C - C#(D flat) - D - E - F - F#(G flat) - G

Notice that not all the notes have sharps or flats, only some of them do. Again look at the Circle of Fifths.

Ok, now you should know enough to be able to draw a fretboard map for each string. It works the same for the D string in the middle; just start the scale at D, and work upward to the 12 th fret. Combine them, and viola! You got yourself a 3-string fretboard map for G-D-g tuning! This is your homework. You can find these on the Internet, but I'd really recommend drawing it out for yourself by hand. It will help solidify it in your eyes, hands and brain.

You will also find that slide chords at the 3rd, 5th, 7th and 12th frets are the bluesy ones. From your newly constructed fretboard map, you should be able to tell what the notes at these frets are.

Hope this helps you get started!

Permalink Reply by steve payne on February 5, 2012 at 10:28am

Wow Oily, what a great post! that pretty much is exactly the info i was looking for and really clearly explained.

I have the circle of fifths on a T shirt! so that will do for that bit of research, i will draw a fretboard map after work tomorrow and tape the side of the neck with markers so i can find the key notes more easily untill i have set down the muscle memory, so now it's practice time.

I took my finished CBG to my local music shop on friday cos i was having trouble getting the saddle in the right place and the guy who owns the shop set it up and tweeked the strings and adjusted it for compensation then pluged it into an amp and proceeded to play some shit kicking slide and my little CBG sounded bloody Amazing! so i know what it has the potential to do now so it's all up to me to do it justice.

Thanks for your help, all the best Steve.

Permalink Reply by Uncle John on February 5, 2012 at 10:42am

Lots of good info from Oily.   Go to work man, enjoy.