A message to all fellow guitar Players:
As one of your own, I would like to make known to the world of a problem that plagues many ignorant guitar players.
That problem being knowing what notes are the same.
Enharmonic notes- Notes that are played two different ways, yet produce the same note
for example
E—0
B—5
G—9
D—14
A—19
E–24
These notes are all that same High E. I have seen many people complain that someone’s online tab isn’t right because they have
D-3 instead of A-8
These are the same notes people! I would like to encourage every guitar player to expand your knowledge…and the Enharmonics of the strings. It will make you a better guitar player, and make you appear less ignorant when with other guitar players who do know enharmonics. Plus with Enharmonics…you can modify pieces if they are too hard to make them sounds the same, but play easier
If you don’t know where to find Enharmonics lists…and guitar resources…cyberfret.com is the best site out there for learning musical notation on the guitar
Cyberfretbass.com for Bass Player (I am an original Vocalist turned percussionist turned bass Player turned Guitarist. gotta have love for them all!
thank you for you time, and if you are an upset with it as I am, hit this thread up!
If guitarists don’t know this already, they can’t have been playing very long. Learning that the same stuff can have different voicings is like the next thing you learn after bar chords.
It’s an age of tablature. I’ve often been amazed at the number of people who don’t even know what chords they’re playing, it’s all just fret numbers to them. They never learn any basic theory at all.
Speaking as a guitarist with no formal training, and as someone who has never even heard the word “enharmonics” before opening this thread … doesn’t this information fall under the No Shit category?
What’s the next big break through? You can play D two ways, open and barred? A is two half steps up from G not one?
I don’t use tabs or sheet music to play guitar, though I can read music (I was in Band and took Music Theory). I’ve noticed that some guitarists who haven’t had any of this type of training tend to be like the OP said, but not all.
But IMHO, it’s a bit of a wash. For me, it’s more about attitude and emotion than mechanics…
And the beauty of guitar is that you don’t have to be formally trained to make good noise. It’s a true folk instrument in that it’s something you can make reasonable music on with a minimum of effort.
And I learned power chords before I learned bar chords. Top that!
Who the fuck uses tab any more? Tab went out when Diet Coke came in. This is one guitarist that can read in all 7 clefs, and can transpose on sight. And there are more than two voicings for D, there are upwards of 20.
Yeah, if you haven’t figured that out and you’ve been playing more than oh, say, a couple weeks, I wouldn’t think about quitting that day job just yet.
I’ve been playing classical guitar for about 4 years. While you may be able to get the same note in different places, there will likely be one that is more ‘correct’ to use, depending on the complexity of the song, and where your fingers are going to be before/after that note.
so… how the hell long will it take me to learn barre chords? I’ve been learning guitar, from knowing NOTHING at all, for about 4-5 months. I still can’t get those bastards at all. My fingers just won’t cooperate.
Why is this in the pit anyway? Funny thing about the 'same note ‘phenomenon’…I learn songs off the CD, and there’s many times I’ve worked my fingers into some weird config to match what I’m hearing, only to realize that I’m just playing a simple seventh chord in some unnecessarily torturous position.
The way to learn guitar is to start out slow and work your way up. So, cut off at least two fingers on your left hand (most guitar students opt to excise the pinky and ring finger). Add them back after you can groove with the reduced number.
B) Probably wrong, just because a given note is playable in several places doesn’t mean that a given piece does not require some note(s) or sequence of notes to be played in a specific position
C) Tab sucks (my own lame rant over)
D) Bad tab with inappropriate enharmonic substitutions sucks big time, producers and apologists for badly tabbed music should be have their fingers crushed in a capo
Most people learn power chords before they learn barre chords. Power chords are easier. When I taught guitar I always taught power chords first (along with the open chords) before working them up to a full barre. It only makes sense.
Exactly. It took me awhile to be able to really appreciate the difference, too. When I was in lessons I would cringe when someone played a note in the alternate position, and it was left sounding dead and flat.
I don’t use tab much, nor have I ever, so I really don’t know how prevalent this is, but you don’t really have the problem of using those alternate notes when you’re reading sheet music, so I figured that most everyone would understand that there was a specific reason for using this fret to create the note rather than the alternate.
I was self taught (with my brother to tutor me occasionally) for a year or so before I took up lessons. I was working on bar chords within a few months. Yeah, it can be tough to get the fingers positioned, but the more you exercise working your fingers and creating that manual dexterity and sort of intuitive knowledge for placement the easier it will be. Just pick a few notes or chords that you are quite familiar with and transition between them, back and forth. Do it until the transition is as smooth as you can get it, and your fingers can work without you having to think about it.
Yeah, I have to echo some of the posts in here already. Yes, it’s technically the same note, BUT the timbre is different form an E played on the 24th Fret of the low E string vs the open pluckin’ of an E on the High E.
Some people want to be excessively precise when it comes to tab and want to replicate what the artist they’re tabbing has done. Joni Mitchell songs are good example of this too. Sure, you could finger all of the strings so they played the same notes that she does on each of the 6 strings, but if you don’t change the tuning you miss the flow of the openness of some of the strings. I’d been playing some Cheryl Wheeler songs from what I heard on the CDs, her website just put up the exact way she capos, tunes, and fingers the chords. A song I was playing with the capo at 4 turns out to have the capo at 1, I was playing the same notes but it sounded much more accurate when I played it at 1.
Ah, what the hell, the rant is lame enough to hijack – in well edited “standard” notation, appropriate fingering is always indicated (at least where there is any ambiguity), but this is not universally true, I’ve seen many appalling misfingerings (having their fingers crushed in a capo is too good for some people).
Mostly, I wonder what you mean, XJETGIRL – why are enharmonic alternatives not a “problem” in “standard” notation?
Tab has a couple of advantages over standard notation, one is its apparent accessibilty, the other is its explicit rendering of “position” – if anything, the ambiguity of (unfingered) standard notation is problematic (though it could be argued that such decisions are “up to the performer”).
