Strings, frets and notes
The six strings, low to high, are E A D G B e. A common memory line: Eddie Ate Dynamite, Good Bye Eddie.
One fret is one semitone, the same step as one key to the next on a piano (white or black). Twelve frets up, the string plays its own note an octave higher, which is why the 12th fret has two dots.
The natural notes are the white keys: C D E F G A B. Between most of them there is a sharp (a black key, one fret). Between E–F and B–C there is none: they sit one fret apart. Learn that and you can name every fret by counting from the open string.
The natural notes on the low E string. E–F and B–C are next to each other; every other pair has a fret between.
Intervals: piano → guitar
octave = 12 semitones = 12 frets up the same string. Sounds like the start of Somewhere Over the Rainbow.
- A string, fret 15same string, 12 frets up
- G string, fret 52 strings over, 2 frets up
- B string, fret 13 strings over, 2 frets back (crosses G–B)
The G and B strings are tuned a major 3rd apart (4 frets), every other pair a perfect 4th (5 frets). So any shape that crosses from G to B moves one fret further up than the same shape lower down.
Jumps worth knowing
Major 2nd: the step
Two frets on one string. It is the distance between most neighbouring notes of a scale, so scale runs are mostly 2-fret steps with the odd 1-fret one. Across strings it is three frets back on the next string, which you rarely need.
Perfect 5th: the power chord
Seven frets on one string, or the next string up and two frets up. That second shape is the power chord (root plus 5th). It works from any string except across G–B, where it becomes the next string and three frets up.
Octave: the same note higher
Twelve frets on one string. Across strings there are two shapes to know: two strings over and two frets up (from the E, A strings), or three strings over and three frets back. Crossing G–B shifts either shape up one fret. Octave shapes are how you find a note everywhere on the neck.