The Secret to Guitar Fretboard Memorization

Description: Learning the notes on the fretboard is often overlooked by many guitarists. This is a very easy trap to fall into. I avoided it for many years and it held me back in many ways in my guitar playing, improvising, and songwriting. It is an essential piece you shouldn’t neglect.

Keywords: guitar fretboard, secret to guitar, fretboard memorization

Title: The Secret To Guitar Fretboard Memorization

Do you feel like the fretboard is overwhelming or too complicated to learn? Have you tried learning the notes on the guitar and found it to be too much work to memorize it? Do you want a super simple and easy way to learn all the notes on your guitar so you can make playing guitar easier?

Learning the notes on the fretboard is often overlooked by many guitarists. This is a very easy trap to fall into. I avoided it for many years and it held me back in many ways in my guitar playing, improvising, and songwriting. It is an essential piece you shouldn’t neglect.

The fretboard is where most of the action is happening when playing guitar. It is also where we are looking the majority of time when playing. Despite this, many guitarists don’t even know what they are looking at. Deep down everyone who avoids learning the fretboard knows they are lacking in this. Every time they play there is a sense of inadequacy due to this. By knowing the fretboard you will not only make playing guitar much easier, but you will multiply your confidence every time you play.

Here are just a few of the many reasons you must learn the fretboard sooner than later. You will learn new songs will be much easier. Songwriting will happen faster. You will improvise with confidence. You will be able to communicate with other musicians with clarity.

It’s Simple

The biggest roadblock in people’s minds is the perception that it is too hard or will take too long to learn. There is good news. It’s simple.

First you must know your open string names. From thickest to thinnest they are E A D G B E. Or Elephants And Donkeys Grow Big Ears.
Next you must know that there are 7 natural notes. Natural notes are notes without a #(sharp) or b(flat) after their name. The 7 natural notes are A through G. Anytime you get to G the next note is A. It’s a cycle.
The most important thing you need is to know which notes are right next to each other. B and C are are always adjacent. E and F are as well. The easy way to remember this is to say something like Big Cats Eat Frogs(B C E F). All other notes have 1 fret between them, so it will go like this: A – B C – D – E F – G – A.
Let’s play all the natural notes on the E string. E is the open string. F is the first fret. Remember E and F are always adjacent. F and G are not adjacent so skip 1 fret to get to G. You will now be on the 3rd fret. Then skip to A, skip to B, then play C which again is next to B. Next skip a fret to play D. Finally skip to E. Are you on the 12th fret? If not that’s ok. Reread when I wrote above and start over. Sometimes this is confusing at first, but that is normal. Once you know the pattern you will see it is easy to play and find any note on the guitar on any string.

Now you have all the basic info on how the fretboard works. Start working on memorizing it right now. The fretboard is best learned by working on it for small increments daily over a long period of time. Then applied to real music. Without application it will be hard to connect it to real music. To learn more about applying it to guitar and real music talk to your guitar teacher.

About The Author: Ryan Duke is a songwriter, musician, guitar teacher, and owner of Seattle Guitar Mentor providing guitar lessons in Franklin.