How To MEMORIZE The Guitar FRETBOARD 

@josephcarroll6263, glad you found the lesson useful Joe :)

@bryonguernsey9794, you are most welcome! I am glad you find the video helpful and appreciate you taking the time to let me know. Keep in touch and let me know how you get on with it :)

@waynemacleod5648 , you are very welcome! Very kind of you to say and I appreciate it very much :)

@NDFlyFisher, you are very welcome! Glad you liked the lesson :)

@mookytc, you are very welcome! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you too :)

@randywhite1422, you are welcome! Let me know how you go with this.

@sunjaybedi4389, you are most welcome! :)

@sansypansy4999, you are very welcome! Glad you liked the lesson :)

@androgynastronaut, you are very welcome! So glad the video is helpful to you :)

@BillBrown101, you are welcome! Glad you liked the lesson :) I get where you are coming from regarding the fretboard diagrams, however, this is how you will see the fretboard in most resources. And if you think about it makes sense, as it is from the perspective of you, the player. If you sit down with your guitar and lay it flat on your lap, you'll see it matches up with the diagrams in the video. Closest to your line of sight is the low thick string etc. It's about how you are seeing the fretboard from your perspective, not how it matches up with me on the video. Hope that makes sense :)

I know it's not a question for me, but I am going to answer it. the illusration that Simon shows on the screen (if that is what you are alluding to) is the point of view from which I see my guitar neck as I'm holding it while watching a guitar lesson on youtube and works perfect for most of us who are used to it and I beleive he knows it.

@dawin6710, yes, that's correct :)

Makes sense, that’s for taking time to reply.

You are most welcome! :)

@garythompson4103, glad you liked the lesson and found it helpful :)

@dianasoto9803, you are very welcome! And thank you for the sub, much appreciated :) Let me know how you get on with the note naming.

@frankaq3951, you are welcome! And thanks for the sub, much appreciated :)

@oakmtnman, you are very welcome! :)

@JohnMahony-nn1lx, you are very welcome! Glad the video was helpful :)

@isabellaaimonette9602, I have put that on my list of videos to create as that is a good idea :) I do have an eBook on playing guitar with the capo that might be of help to you. You can get it here: acousticguitarlessonsonline.net/playing-guitar-with-a-capo

@herbie759, you are welcome! Make sure you do this every day for 5 - 10 mins and don't get bogged down with any one note. Let me know how you go :)

@JacobMoen, glad you liked the video, and the method :)

@OtRatsaphong, glad you liked the lesson :) Let me know how you get on with the note naming.

@@acousticguitarlessons This morning is officially day 2 of my fretboard learning project, using this method. I. Was able to do A to D. Invested about 20 minutes slowly going over the exercise. I later found the associated article on your website. Very interesting. Will go over the notes. I’m a visual type of guy, so seeing the shapes helps a lot. Will keep you updated. 👍😀

@@OtRatsaphong great stuff! Keep it going. Consistency is the key :)

@user-xr4ok8rz1k, glad you think so :)

@gilashroot8697, you are welcome! I am glad you liked the video :) Regarding memorising chords, you must relate the shapes you learn to each other. There are many common traits between shapes plus one chord shape can be a fragment of a larger shape you already know. So the more shapes you learn the easier it is to memorise chords because you have more shapes to relate them to if that makes sense. Triads is a great place to start :)

@@acousticguitarlessons I know the basics of music theory. However you lost me at the "first and second inversion". My mind did not want to listen. I saw visual how the shapes work,but my mind would not let me understand how to work out which shape works at which interval. I know the root note (maybe not spelling 😅), but I stop listening every time you speak about the interval i🙈. Do if you can explain without "triggering technical words" I would be very appreciative. How do we work out the interval, shape, and whether it is inverted and how to invert it without technical language 🤔?! Thank you 😊 💓.

@larryherbert252, you are very welcome! :) I don't typically do song instructional videos, but I am sure you can find some for these on RU-vid.

@dawin6710, glad you liked the video! :) Yes, I do say recall the note names as you say them, however, there really isn't anything to memorise per se. It's all about familiarising yourself with the notes. Once you do, there they are, right in front of you every time you look at your guitar fretboard, so no need to memorise anything. It's like having the answers to the test right in front of you. I hope that makes sense :)

@@acousticguitarlessons It actually did make sense the first time I heard you say it in the video. And inteded to do just that. Moreover that I have no particular aversion to learnining by heart even if we called it that way. Thanks

@outsiderview3335, you are very welcome!

@khinmaungwinwin6, you are very welcome :)

@micheleruest2866 , glad you liked the video :) In answer to your question, one note up and then another note back down. No need to combine notes ascending or descending. Hope that helps :)

@ericweiss8968, Yes, although I mostly play my Maton, the Guild is a really nice guitar too!

I’m the owner of a 1966 Guild Starfire II since it was new. The standard I use for comparison for electrics. My acoustic is a Gurian Jumbo (J-R) owned since new in late 1974. But anyhow, I was once classified by an academic type as a “solid intermediate jazz” guitar player and have renewed my playing after a lifetime of career(s). Basically, when I played in jazz workshops NYC I relearned literacy after a period of self taught playing by ear and my self taught “paint by numbers” and “relative minor” keys. I’ve played with ensemble almost the entire Real Book and usually blending with the horns and reed sections for the “head” and then comping with each solo section, taking solos as well in turn. Anyhow, I caught myself listening to your entire video (learning the notes exercise) and appreciate very much the material in this presentation. I usually stick with the “up an octave” (“C” on the E strings at the 8th fret) for reading and then revert to my old self taught for much of my coverage on the fretboard. It doesn’t hurt that I played years of piano before focusing on the guitar. Anyhow - this little lesson of yours was certainly a great one to be focused on to expand my playing literacy! Now to add this to my warmups (chromatic up and down the fretboard for dexterity, major scales up and down for 2 octaves moving up 1/2 step up each and then back down at that up an octave position)…. Then again to complete that routine is a matter of physical conditioning. Then on to tunes….. wish me luck! I’ve subscribed to your channel. Thanks again!

@redpillpusher, you are very welcome. I'm glad you find the video helpful :)

@Rancanfish, you are welcome! It's a Guild S4CE Songbird :)

@terrydavis5915, the course is on building your fingerpicking skills to a high level. This could help with playing hymns if you plan to take a fingerpicking approach to them, but is not a course on playing hymns :)

@eastcoastwilly1373, sounds good! I think the bottom line is that you just need to be naming the notes on the fretboard regularly within various different contexts. Do this regularly and it will all start to become second nature :)

Exactly it is just another piece of the repeating patterns puzzle to click for people....everything you mentioned in your video is complimenting what I talked about....great video my friend!

@davidfarmer657, you are very welcome. I am glad this video is helpful. Let me know how you get on with the note naming :)

I will and thank you for responding.@@acousticguitarlessons

@pants_schmants, not so sure about that. Just naming the notes regularly will get you familiar with them in time. The colour-coded thing becomes another layer to get through to know the note names whoch adds time to working them out etc. Perhaps I am not understanding you properly, but it seems like an unnecessary step. Just name the notes :)

@Cordmichael, it is a S4CE Songbird :)

@davidpatrick1813, glad you liked the video :)

@christiand7437, you are wleocme :) This video is just about finding the notes, not finding keys.

@acousticguitarlessons Tjanks...Do you have a video on that?

@@christiand7437 I would recommend thsi channel for a video on sclaes and keys etc: www.youtube.com/@MusicTheoryForGuitar

@WoddyBlueberry, did you own a Guild S4CE? I've had my fair share of guitars I regret selling over the years :)

I bought this guitar when I was 23. It has appreciated in value ever since. I intend to buy it again one day on Reverb.@@acousticguitarlessons

@JR-pr8jb, I think it's 22 frets. I don't have it at hand atm but I think that's how many frets. The model is a Guild S4CE Songbird. I bought it from a student many years ago for a bargain. Was looking for a guitar at the time but couldn't pass it up :)

@@acousticguitarlessons Thanks for the info. Having smallish hands, I'm always interested in good small-body acoustics, the extra frets would be a bonus.

Great lesson no one ever mentioned it as it’s so simpler I loved 0 seconds time to know the next note

@@kiavooshdevansallare8145, glad you liked the lesson and found it helpful :)

@gerardedit, I am not sure the point you are trying to make. It seems to me that you are implying his courses are expensive? If so, expensive compared to what? Guitar lessons and courses are not a commodity. They differ greatly in the quality of content and the results that can get you, the student, which is really what you are investing in with lessons and courses. Tomasso's courses have 2 membership levels starting at $57 per month or $97 per month. I know that if you do what Tomasso is telling you to do in his courses you will achieve really great results with your playing, and to me, that is worth way more than the affordable investment you are making each month. Compare that to your average local teacher, who will charge you somewhere around $80 for an hour long lesson. That's an investment of over $4,000 a year at 1 lesson per week! And that is on an ongoing basis as long as you are taking lessons. I am not saying that is a rip off necessarily, it could be, but it depends on the teacher and the results they can get for you, because again that is what you are investing in :) My point is, that if you make a decision about who you study with solely on price, you are focusing on the wrong thing. Yes, of course, we all have a budget for these things, so if it doesn't fit in your budget, that's fine, but for what Tomasso's courses will do for your playing, $57 or $97 a month is nothing. Cheap lessons and lousy teachers will cost you A LOT more in the long run :)

@travisbond4218, not sure I understand?

​@@acousticguitarlessonsMe neither. Weird comment.

Spend $10,000.00 on a guitar 🎸 and then come back so I can talk your brain to oblivion.

I didn’t see any ads 😊

@@DWVAR1 : Perhaps it's just a Canadian thing. Whenever I am inundated with ads lasting longer than 15 seconds, I simply move on.

Research ad blockers

@@stefgav: Thank you. This was done years ago plus at least two of my browsers have ad blockers built in.

On my phone it's automatically broken up into chapters. Start with the 3rd chapter "Foundation" the first two chapters are orientation & promotion of the value of the material and can be skipped. I like the idea presented, it uses learning the whole fretboard for learning by learning each of individual notes at every occurrence on the fret board. The sharps & flats will be fast to pick up and since you know the entire fretboard you can repeat the learned notes and going up the scale do sharps & down the scale do flats. What I will do do differently is BC pair all over the board first, C label will include concert pitch octave number, Low E is E2. Then EF pair, then the other letters starting on A, then sharps/flats as offsets from its name note. Music written intended for guitar is written (transposed) 1 octave higher on the staff than the sound made. Just keep that in mind for written music you're looking at. Phone apps are nice for; sight reading, rhythm training, ear training,. for learning fretboard I think this is much better, but after you know the fretboard you could use such apps like games.

Maybe I can help if you tell me what is confusing?

@@acousticguitarlessons Hi Simon, from what I can see you need to learn every single not on fretboard 138 of them, then each one individually in each position . No short cut no hacks no quick way round just learn every single note including sharps and flats. Why don't they label the neck with all the notes on them ? To be honest I have seen so many 'Learn the fret board in 10 seconds guaranteed', and could not be further from the truth. CAGED is the same, if you know the c chord, then you know every chord in the world, how ? I am probable way to old/dense to even think about learning the guitar, not made for anyone over 70. Never seen anything make such little sense. Thanks for the offer though.

@@quotemenot7520 you're absolutely correct there is no quick fix for actually learning you need to put in the effort but I mean this in all sincerity this is the best least complex approach. I urge you to go back to minute marker 6:35 you'll see its very straight forward. I hear frustration in your comment but please dont be Ive been there myself most everyone at some point I imagine. This is really not difficult just will take some effort but go at your pace and embrace the process and you will find the enjoyment in the learning and eventual playing. I hope you continue to pursue playing guitar it can be very fulfilling. For me personally its one of the true joys in life. You can do it i KNOW you can. Im not the smartest tool in the shed and I ain't no spring chicken 😉 and I was able to learn this fabulous instrument 😇

@romienomie, the last I checked the note arrangement on an acoustic guitar is the same as an electric so maybe this video might be relevant to you :)

@rogerpercival5486, this is not the CAGED system

You make no sense at all. The bottom E string is the thick one and the high E string is the thin one. So maybe you should get that right first before imparting your wisdom. And the way I convey the fretboard in the diagrams IS how the rest of the world does it, and also makes most sense.

It may be possible to find unconventional ways of notating guitar that a particular player uses or finds helpful, but the standard convention is for fretboard diagrams to reflect tab with thickest E string as the lowest line of tab and thinnest as the top line of tab. Unless we’re talking about left hand notation and diagrams or unusual ways of stringing and tuning, any book of standard tab and all the tabs on sites like ultimate guitar will use this convention in the same way that’s displayed in the video.

@kazuki2748, you are welcome! :)

If you don’t like it, move on mate lol. Btw, I don’t know what material you’ve been looking at for 60 years but fretboard diagrams and Tablature have the low E string (that’s the thick one) at the bottom and the high E string (that’s the thin one) at the top, period. So first, get that right, second learn to comment respectfully as opposed to ranting, otherwise go and bother someone else

@ArrogantBaSStard, you are not memorising the notes as such, more familiarising yourself with them :) I know this may not technically align with the title of the video, however, when people are searching for content on this topic they are going to use the term memorise more than familiarise, so for relational and SEO purposes I used the word memorise in the title of the video. As far as the method, yes you do have to learn where the note names are on the fretboard but there is an important mindset shift from memorise to familiarise. This may seem trivial, however, it is of utmost importance. There is no need to memorise anything that is always going to be staring you in the face when playing the guitar, ie, the notes. Therefore familiarise yourself with where they are, but don't try to commit them to memory, rather do exactly as is outlined in this video. If you are willing to invest time and trust in this strategy it will work :)