Suck at Navigating the Fretboard? Practice This.

if navigating the fretboard with total confidence of where you are at all times is a skill you've always wanted to have as a guitar player but you just weren't sure about how to acquire said skill I have the answer for you it's called a circle of fourths you may have heard of the circle of fifths before don't worry about that for now we'll get to that very soon but basically what we have here is all twelve notes and western music laid out in a circle that when looked at clockwise has those notes separated by fourths B to e e to a a to d they're all four notes apart a perfect fourth to be precise to simplify this rather than thinking about in terms of a particular scale you can just think of it alphabetically b c d e equals a distance of one two three four notes or e to a efg a one two three four notes if you look to this diagram anti-clockwise then the notes would be separated by fifths so whilst B to e is the distance of four notes e to B is the distance of five e f g a b one two three four five notes so that's what the circle of fifths is that's a difference with this diagram that i am using if you go around it clockwise then you call it the circle of fourths anti-clockwise you would call it the circle of fifths it's that simple so why should you care about the circle of fourths well as a guitar player I use it as a tool for practicing note memorization on the fretboard as well as for practicing scales triads or arpeggios and all twelve keys within one area of the fretboard in less than a minute which strengthens my mental visualization of the fretboard and prevents me from getting lost when going for a solo see the key to not getting lost in the fretboard and playing some unintentionally sour notes which often leave us embarrassed and feeling the need to cover up with the always hilarious joke I totally meant to play that I was jazz yeah you guys the key to avoiding this is to know where the root notes are in the scale triad or arpeggio that you may be improvising with this is something you can train your mind to visualize so practicing these tools with the aid of the circle of fourths but before you can do that before you can visualize say the root notes of a scale you need to have something very fundamental in place first you need to know the notes of the fretboard fortunately this is something that you can also practice with the use of the circle of fourths how do most guitar players think they should learn the notes of the fretboard by a sending each string chromatically with the use of diagrams like this hmm not the most effective method in my opinion and I will explain why why do instead and why I teach my online students is to take the circle of fourths and apply it to each string on the guitar for example [Music] why do I feel that what I just demonstrated is better than the chromatic approach well you really have to look for each of those twelve notes when you're practicing the circle of fourths on each string as opposed to the chromatic method which basically tells you what the next note is going to be because you knew what the previous note was okay so now that you've memorized every single note on the fretboard was the next step towards mastering the fretboard work out where the root notes are in the scale triad or arpeggio that you happen to be using often and your lead playing I suggest using diagrams to map these out to begin with because it will take some time to get those originals memorized but once you do have them memorized then you can start to use the circle of fourths to practice the scale or triad or paid you that you use and you're playing a lot you can start to practice that in all 12 keys for example here's me practicing the major scale and all 12 keys within one area of the fretboard using the circle of fourths [Music] at this point you may be wondering how this relates to not getting lost on the fret board well the reason that I practice my scales in this way is not because I want to instantly be able to switch keys during a solo on the fly although it would be good for that the real reason I do it is because it's a great mental exercise for training your mind to identify brut notes in any position of a scale in any area of the fretboard in any key so that when you go to take a solo in a particular key you have the confidence to start that solo on any string and in any position this is what separates pro guitar players from beginners and intermediates one problem that a lot of beginner and intermediate have is that they haven't learned the notes of the fretboard they're mostly familiar with the high e the low E and the a string because they're used to playing cards like Barre cards with root notes on those strings as a result a lot of their licks will originate from the same position of a scale simply because they lack the ability in the confidence to start from any string and any position without the fear of making a mistake and mistakes are always gonna happen doesn't matter how much you practice you're always gonna be making mistakes but by practicing your scales your treasure arpeggios your memorization of notes on the fretboard using the circle of fourths this is something that will go a long way in helping you prevent mistakes from happening so with that being said here's a quick overview of how it actually works now I personally use and teach seven positions of the major scale I know that some of you watching may be users of the Caged system and it's five patterns but it doesn't really matter what you use because you can still apply this to those patterns again as long as you know where the root notes are in whichever skill positions you choose to use you're good so here's my position one of the B major scale I know that there are route notes here here and here to begin the exercise I'm going to ascend the scale across all strings easy enough when I reach the highest note in that position I then proceed to descend but in the next key in the circle of fourths which is e so I'm going to descend the E major scale from this area of the fretboard I'm not gonna take this scale position and simply move it up here to play the E major scale because that is a bad habit that we want to move away from again the goal is to be able to play anything in any area of the fretboard and in any key so it's okay to move up to a different position on the fretboard but you want to be doing that out of choice and not because the scale is controlling you so I'm staying in this area to train my mind to look for those e root notes and in this area of the fretboard I can see two one at fret 9 on the g string and one at fret 7 on the E string so knowing that I then think to myself which position of the scale has route notes in those places then once I've realized I will descend the major scale the E major scale using the most suitable scale position like so you can hear the last a major we start on B major but we descended an E major so then once I've descended that scale what do I do next I look to the circle of fourths what's the next note it's a so now I know that I have to a send the a major scale in this area of the fretboard so first you're gonna look for a root notes in this area of the fretboard I can see two there's one here at fret seven on the D string and there's also one at fret 10 on the B string again I think to myself which position of the scale fits the placement of these root notes once I know ia send the a major scale and continue round and round the circle of fourths until I've played through all 12 keys [Music] [Laughter] so we've just gone through B major a major and E major in this position B major a major and then a major and then like I just said I would continue to go around the circle of fourths until I've gone through all 12 keys in this position of the neck and then from there I might practice the same thing but starting in a different area of the fretboard for example starting on B major but from here a major a major D major on and on until we've gone through all 12 keys once again so that's the process for scales pick an area of the fretboard to start in ascend the scale in that key find the next key in the circle of fourths look for the root notes in that key in that position of the neck find the most suitable scale position to use for descending that scale in that area of the fretboard descend the scale in that key and then repeat until you've gone through all 12 keys a couple of things are developing mentally and physically as you practice this one is that your fingers are getting used to the feel of all positions of a scale not just the ones that you're currently comfortable with and the other is that you're constantly reminding yourself of where the root notes are in each of those scale positions what you will notice after a considerable amount of time spent practicing this is that when you find yourself in a particular area of the fretboard your mind will start to seek out the root notes in that area of the fretboard and then from there your brain will automatically make you visualize the rest of that scale position in that area of the fretboard based on where those root notes are now to fully explain how this works and how to practice it I need more time than a simple YouTube video so if you are intrigued by this and you to learn more about it in an in-depth instructional environment this is one of the fundamental concepts I teach and my first online guitar course bulletproof guitar player part one master the fretboard it teaches you everything you need to know in order to get to grips with the circle of force and applying it not only to memorizing the notes of the fretboard but to scale practice and to triads as well these routines are something that I carry on into my second course as well which delves into more advanced concepts like modes of the major scale extended chords and some other exotic scales as well links to purchase both courses are in the description box below practicing the circle of fourth scale and note memorization routines they're a real challenge in the beginning believe me and it's really important to not give up the second that you get frustrated it definitely took me some serious practice time to get to grips with visualizing the fretboard in this way but once I had it no exaggeration I really do mean this once I had it it was like putting on glasses after having seen the fretboard as this blurry massive nose right this video has probably gone on long enough so again if you want to learn much more about the circle of force and how I use it to practice no memorization and scales and triads and so on links to purchase and my courses are in the description box below like I said before for a full understanding of how this works you'll need to start with part 1 master the fretboard as part 2 of my online course it delves into more advanced concepts and assumes that you already have that knowledge in place thank you so much for watching this video guys if you stuck it out to the end and you learned something new please give this video a like down below and click the subscribe button for more and I will see you all in the next one [Music]

Channel: Ross Campbell

Views: 197,548

Keywords: fretboard visualisation, fretboard visualization, the circle of 4th's guitar, the circle of 5th's guitar, suck at navigating the fretboard? practice this., howe to visualise the fretboard, how to navigate the fretboard, how to master the fretboard, how to practice in all keys, how to practice guitar scales in all keys, how to practice guitar in all keys, how to memorise the notes of the fretboard, learn the notes of the fretboard, bulletproof guitar player, ross campbell

Id: WO_BW6g0CpI

Length: 14min 20sec (860 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 13 2019