The Ultimate Guide To

Learning Your Bass Fretboard

Develop a deep understanding of your fretboard so you’ll know your it like the back of your hand

never get lost again

Learning Your Fretboard

Knowing your fretboard is one of the biggest wins you can have, no matter where you are in your bass playing. When you know the fretboard and have a deep understanding of it, you can do so much! You can:

• Instantly play a bass line if someone tells you the chords/roots • Change the key of a song instantly • Improvise without relying on ‘shapes’ • Play the same bass line, fill, or melody in several places on

your bass • Communicate easily with other musicians • Understand the music you’re playing on a deeper level

In short, learning your fretboard inside and out has the potential to take your playing to the next level. The process of actually learning your fretboard can be a bit tricky though. It’s not something that you instantly ‘get’ – it’s the kind of thing where you make very slow, incremental steps until you get to the point where you don’t even think about it anymore. Someone says, “Play G, D, and C in the verses, and give us E, A and F# in the chorus” And you have no trouble in finding the notes, but playing them confidently as well. This is the ultimate goal – freedom! It can be tempting to try ‘tricks’ or ‘hacks’ for learning your fretboard. Now there are certain ways you can accelerate your learning of the fretboard – we’ll talk about them towards the end of this guide.

However, I want to really encourage you to hold off from using these ‘tricks’ until you have a good understanding of how the musical alphabet works. When you know this and have a deep understanding of it, it’s going to be so much easier for you to learn the fretboard and really make it stick. Remember – aim not for familiarity, but for deep understanding.

The Musical Matrix In order to get this deep understanding and learn your fretboard in a way that you’ll never forget it, it’s important to learn the musical alphabet. I want to introduce you to a tool that I call the Musical Matrix – this will help you understand the bigger picture. There are just 12 notes that we use in music, from A to G. Here they are in the Musical Matrix:

You’ll notice a few things here. Firstly, there are only 7 notes here (if you don’t count the 2nd A), but we just said that there were 12 notes. Where are the rest of the notes? The 5 missing notes are in between these notes on the matrix. There are two places where there isn’t a note in between. If you look at B and C, you’ll see they’re right up against each other on the matrix. This means that there is no note in between B and C. It’s the same for E and F – see how there’s no gap between them? So what are these other notes? Well, you might have heard of sharps and flats – that’s exactly where the notes are. Now if you take a note

and make it sharp, you raise it by a half-step – the equivalent of going up one fret on your bass. For example, if you played your open A-string and then played the 1st fret, that note would be a half-step above A. You can call this note A#.

See how the A# sits above the Matrix? This is because sharps raise notes, so it makes sense to put them above the Matrix. The important thing to remember is sharps raise notes. Flats do the opposite. They lower notes by a half-step – once again the equivalent of one fret on your bass. So if you had the note B and you made it a B-flat, you have lowered it by one half-step. Here is B-flat on the Matrix:

This is where things get interesting. See how the A# and B-flat are right on top of each other in the Matrix? This is because they are the same note! A# and B-flat have the exact same sound, even though they have different names. This is the same with all of your sharps and flats – they can all be ‘spelled’ both ways. I like to think about it like this – I have a friend

named Brandon Coleman. Sometimes people call him Brandon, sometimes people call him Coleman. He’s the same person no matter which name he’s called. It’s the same with these notes. They have the same sound – the same pitch – no matter what you call them. So if you fill out the rest of the Matrix – putting sharps above and flats below – you end up with this:

This is the sequence of notes – the musical alphabet – that music is made up of*. It’s the same for you playing bass, and for everyone else playing every other instrument as well. If you compress the Matrix into just one line, you get this:

The question now is ‘How do I use this to learn my fretboard?’ Well if you know that your open strings are E, A, D, and G, then you can start there and figure out what absolutely every note on your fretboard is. Feel free to print out the Musical Matrix on the next page and have it with you as you go through. *Thisistrueforthemajorityof‘Western’music–thekindofmusicyou’dhearontheradioina‘Western’country.Therearelotsofkindsofmusicthatdon’trelyonthisparticularalphabet.

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Finding Every Note On Your Bass Step-By-Step

Now that you know the structure of how the musical alphabet is put together, it’s time to put it to work learning your fretboard. Here’s how: You’re going to start off with learning the first 5 frets of each string. Once you’re comfortable with that, you can easily go above and beyond, but 5 frets is a good place to start. The majority of a gig will be in the first 5 frets, so it makes sense to get really comfortable there. For this exercise, you’ll be using sharps on the way up and flats on the way down. This will be easier to begin with. Because we’re starting by going up, you’ll ready the Matrix from left to right. Start on your E-string. Obviously, the open string is an E, but when you go up to the first fret, what is that note? Remember, there is no note in between E and F, so the first fret on your E-string must be an F. Have a copy of the Matrix handy and refer to it as you need to. What happens when you go one fret above F? You get F# - remember, we’ll use sharps on the way up and flats on the way down. After F# on your 2nd fret, you’ll have G on your 3rd fret. Right above G, you’ll have G# on your 4th fret, and then finally you’ll have an A on your 5th fret. See how you had an F, then F#? G, then G#? This is why it’s easier to use sharps going up and flats going down. Repeat this same process on your A-string, then your D, then your G. When you get up to your 5th fret on the G-string, you turn around and come back down using flats. Remember, we’re going the opposite direction now, so we’ll read the Matrix from right to left.

You’ll be on a C, but remember there is no note between B and C, so the 4th fret on your G-string will be a B. Going down to your 3rd fret will be a B-flat – even though it was an A# on the way up. One more fret down and you’ll get A, then on the 2nd fret, you’ll get A-flat, and then you’ll be back at your open G-string. Once again, you repeat the process in reverse on your D, A and E-strings and you will have covered the first five frets of all of your strings. Congratulations! As you’re doing this exercise, there are three things I highly recommend. #1 – Say out loud, the name of the note AS you play it This is an important one. You want to start associating the notes with where they are on the fretboard. It’s no use if you just go up your first 5 frets without really paying attention. You want to link the 1st fret with the note F; link the 2nd fret with the note F# etc. The best way of doing this is saying the names of the notes as you play them – not before and not after. It might be tempting to play the note first and figure out the name later. Resist this temptation! You want to have the name of the note in your mind as you’re playing it. You’ll start building all kinds of neural pathways in your brain that will let you learn your fretboard like the back of your hand. #2 – At the beginning, go slow If you’re brand new to doing this, it’s going to be a bit slow – possibly even a bit frustrating. This is 100% normal! Learning your fretboard isn’t a race – you’re going to get much more out of this by taking your time and doing it thoroughly. Remember – aim for deep understanding, not just familiarity.

When you’re more comfortable, you can add in a metronome (or drum loop) and do the exercise with it. Start slowly and increase the tempo to your comfort limit. The added time pressure will really test you. You’ll see exactly where you’re doing well and exactly where you’re falling down. #3 – When you’re really comfortable, use flats going up and sharps going down This is the next level in fretboard mastery. Like I said before, it was relatively easy to use sharps on the way up and flats on the way down. You get G, then G#; B then B-flat – it’s fairly logical. However, using flats on the way up and sharps on the way down throws a bit of a spanner in the works. Rather than just repeating the last note with a sharp or flat, you have to either think ahead, then come one step back or just know your fretboard that well. Starting on your A-string, you’d get A, then B-flat, B, C, D-flat, and then D. On your way back down, you’d have D, C#, C, B, A# and then A. Do you see how that works? This is a great way of seeing how well you know your fretboard.

Next Steps Once you’re comfortable with the first 5 frets, you can go above and beyond. You’ll know the Matrix pretty well by this point – it’s just a matter of making those new associations with the ‘new’ frets that you’ll be using. Once you get to the 12th fret, everything repeats. Your open strings are the exact same notes as your 12th fret notes. That means that your 13th fret is the same as your 1st, your 14th fret is the same as your 2nd and so on.

This means that if you’ve learned your first five frets, you’ll also know the first five frets above the 12th automatically! You won’t even have to think about it!

4 Ways To Learn Your Fretboard Faster

Now that you have a solid understanding of the musical alphabet and you’re getting towards that deeper understanding of your bass, you can try any number of things to make it faster to learn your fretboard. These 4 are ways that I’ve tried that have worked for students of mine. You don’t have to do all of them – in fact, I recommend you try them all out and figure out which method (or methods) works best for you. Some of these are a little hard to describe through text, so be sure to watch the video lesson on the site.

Strategy #1 - Target Practice This strategy is great for building your knowledge of individual notes all over your fretboard. Master this and if anyone ever says ‘Play that same note up/down an octave’, you’ll have it covered automatically. Target practice involves picking just one note (your ‘target’ note) and finding every single version of that note on your bass. For example, let’s say you picked G-flat as your target note. You’d go through and find every G-flat that you could on your bass. Every note you pick is going to have at least 6 versions on your bass. That number gets even higher if you’ve got a 5 or 6-string bass or a bass that has an extended range. Using this strategy, you’ll also start to see some of the geometry of your bass. For example, you’ll have a Gb on the 2nd fret of your E-string and the 4th fret of your D-string. Two frets and two strings

separate these notes, and this pattern is the same for all of your notes. If you’re playing on your E or A-strings and you want to find the same note an octave above, you just move across two strings and two frets towards your bridge. If you’re on the D or G-strings, just do the same thing in reverse. Using this method is great for looking at the big picture rather than seeing all of the notes in isolation.

Strategy #2 – Stab In The Dark

This strategy is simple. You can do it by yourself, or if you have a friend who can help you out, you can do it together. It goes like this: Close your eyes, or look away from your bass, and without consciously ‘picking’ a note, put your finger on a fret. Look down at the fret that you’ve ‘picked’ and as quickly as you can, name the note, and say it out loud. If it’s a note that has 2 names, say both out loud! It’s almost like a game where you’re testing yourself. If you have a friend you can practice with, have them pick the frets instead to make the notes even more random. This is a great method for learning notes without having to count up from your open strings. A good idea for this strategy is to get familiar with the fretboard dots. If you know what all of those notes are, it will be easy to figure out any note – you’re never more than two or 3 frets away from a dot.

Strategy #3 – Notes on a Single Fret This is a simple concept, but it can be a bit tricky. For this strategy, you pick a fret – any fret – and name all of the notes on every string for that fret.

For example, let’s say you picked the 3rd fret. You’d go to that fret and name all of the 3rd fret notes. On the E-string, you’d have a G, on the A-string you’d have a C, on the D-string you’d have an F and on the G-string, you’d have a B-flat/A#. Once again, the notes with multiple names – use both of them. This gets tricky when all of the notes have multiple names, like the 11th fret. If this is the case, do one pass of the strings where you use flats, then one pass where you use sharps. This is a good way to start thinking ‘positionally’ – you’re thinking about all the notes in one place rather than isolating one string. Remember to say the notes AS you play them, as always. If you struggle with this method at the start – that’s normal! Thinking this way can be a little mind-bending. However, this is a very useful way of developing a deeper understanding of your bass. You’ll start to get much faster at picking notes out of thin air – especially notes on your more unfamiliar strings.

Strategy #4 – Notes of a Song/Scale/Riff etc. This final strategy is great if you already know some songs or scales, but haven’t really thought about the individual notes. For example, if you know the shape of a scale or a bass line, but not which notes are in it, you can use this strategy to help learn the fretboard. Here’s how it works: Take a song (a bass line, a melody, a riff, a scale – anything at all) and play it very slowly. As you do this, say the names of the notes out loud as you play them. At the start, try to pick songs that are relatively simple – if you jump right into a song or scale that’s really complex, it might be discouraging. This has the added benefit of actually being musical rather than just being an exercise. Go as slowly as you need to and aim for accuracy. It’s not about how fast you can play – it’s about learning the fretboard and doing it accurately!

If you have any questions about anything in this guide or anything in the video lessons on the site – let me know! I’d be more than happy to help out however I can. Feel free to let me know if this helped you out as well. I’d love to hear if you used this guide and it helped you in any way. The best way to reach me is by email: becomeabassist@gmail.com Or you can fill out the contact form on the website. Good luck with learning your fretboard – I’ll talk to you soon. Cheers,