If you care about music, not about freaking fingering patterns...
If you want to take your guitar playing to a whole new level...
Get ready for simple fretboard secrets that will knock you over.
Now that you have spent time with some of the free resources here at Guitar Theory in Depth, it looks like you're ready to take it one step further; this is where to start. Congratulations!
TESTIMONIAL
Hey Alex,
I have purchased Fretboard Essentials some time ago: been hacking away page by page on your lessons whenever I have a chance...
Nothing better than the thrill of achievement every time I grasp [finally], a concept from your lessons. My brain is a sponge with this stuff man —I am absorbing! I improve by 100% with every page I turn. Thanks so much.
Regards,
Grayson Love, New Zealand
Are you tired of playing "the same old thing"?
Are you sick of playing other peoples' music and not knowing how to make your own?
Do you want to be able to play covers easily, and create your own unique music?
It's not the fretboard. It's the music that drives you to play. Yet you find yourself trapped in your old fingering patterns, playing the same old thing over and over. Searching the web over for a solution and scratching your head.
Because you don't understand the notes. But it's not even the notes, it's what you can do with them.
This isn't really about the theory; theory is just a means to an (awesome) end: your music!
Are you already pretty proficient technically, but...
your understanding of the fretboard sucks?!
Read on: this is definitely for you!
You will discover how to finally make sense of the fretboard and start using it with freedom.
What if there's an easy way to stop thinking about the fretboard so you can start thinking about your music?
If you're like me, you're probably sick of chord bibles and endless collections of scale patterns. They take ages to learn and never really help you understand.
If you find yourself thinking too much about the fretboard, then it's time to revamp your understanding of the guitar. So you can do more with less.
Less practice time, less rote, less frustration, less fingering patterns: more music.
Fretboard Essentials will help you do just that, in an easy to implement, step-by-step method designed for beginners.
But the book is full of bits and pieces of information that you can apply straight away, even if you're an advanced player...
I care about music too. A lot. Maybe too much. So much that I got really pissed off at all the guitar methods and teachers that didn't help me understand music, or the fretboard.
At books that told me I didn't need to understand the fretboard, nor music. Books that say "just learn these quick-fix tricks and you'll be Hendrix in no time."
So I've spent the last 6 or 7 years of my life really thinking hard about this. And really thinking hard of ways to get it across in an easy way, so that everyone, even a beginner, can really get it.
This is not "quick-fix" info. This is stuff that will really make a difference.
TESTIMONIAL
Fretboard Essentials is great for the amateur guitarist, but it also covers elements that are valuable to the intermediate and even the advanced guitarist.
It is a very good book, and I only wish I had a Greek version of it for my students!It is written in a very friendly way, and proceeds methodically, following a simple rule:
learn step by step, focusing only on the things you need in order to accomplish your goal —being able to play all the basic elements of music, on the fretboard!
Dimitris Kotronakis,
classical guitar virtuoso
www.kotronakis.com
Freeboard Essentials is not for everyone.
If you're happy just to play from tab and learn from chord bibles, then this isn't the book for you: if you're OK with just a bunch of fingering boxes to learn your scales, look for them elsewhere.
If, however, you want to understand, so you can have more choices available, so that you can create...
If you're the kind of person who likes to know what they're doing, who likes to have all the options available, who likes to be in control, boy, is this for you! It's all about freedom, style.
Yours,
Alexander Cortés, the author
TESTIMONIAL
This book is exactly what I've been searching for with regard to guitar theory and playing.
I fully identified with your description of the problem: when you said people sometimes are able to "think" exactly what to play for example in a solo, but are unable to translate the music from their head to the guitar...
Countless times I've composed something in my head only to lose it trying to figure it out on the guitar.
Thanks!
Halsey Vandenberg, NY
www.verumsingula.com
Ever feel like there's some hidden logic behind the guitar fretboard...
but you can't get to it?
If you don't know the fretboard, you can't play a thing: the more you know, the more you can play.
Yet, all the books and methods you've ever bought probably show you all the different chords and scales
as completely unrelated fingering patterns.
The fact is: they are all part of the same thing!!!
If you understand all the correlations between scales and chords you will have more options available, and it will take less time to learn. Guaranteed.
Theory is practical. If you can bridge theory and practice you will be one of the select few who know what they are doing on the fretboard. You'd be surprised how few really do, at any level! Be one of the few: join the club today!
(And save yourself years by understanding this seldom-revealed fretboard secret.)
How much is Fretboard Essentials?
Fretboard Essentials is $29.99
But what is the cost of not acting?
because you really don't know what you're doing?
This is really simple, powerful stuff that I guarantee, personally, will make a difference:
Focused, step-by-step explanations you can actually follow and that get to the point; all the diagrams are all super-clear. This is not about me showing off what I know, it's about you being able to play the way you want to.
If it doesn't make a difference, then just shoot me an email within 90 days and I will refund the full price, no questions asked.
I will remain available to you and will answer any questions you may have. That's my promise: I'm always there if you need me.
Besides, you get some pretty cool bonuses, alone worth the $29.99 (or more), to top it off... scroll down to find out more.
TESTIMONIAL
Hi Alex,
Great site, I ordered Fretboard Essentials and both it and the other books look just fantastic.
I have loved playing (or trying to) classical and jazz guitar off and on my whole life, fearing and loathing the fretboard the whole time. I feel these books were written just for me!
Casey Walker, Florida
What will Fretboard Essentials do for me?
Fretboard Essentials will show you how to practice to save yourself time and maximize playing potential:
It will show you how to use the basic fingering patterns you already know to easily get to the real cool stuff...
The stuff that others spend years trying to learn, yet never fully understand. You will be able to apply this new knowledge from the get-go...
It will help you to easily understand, through fingers, brains, and hearing how these 5 key elements of music are all part of the same tone-matrix:
- Major and minor triads
- Pentatonic scales
- Diatonic scales
- Modes
- Chromatic scales
Integrating these points means less fingering patterns, more music; less rote and frustration, more fun; less practice time, more awesomeness!
By then, you will have internalized basic music theory to the point where you don't have to think about it any more.
When you realize how these things are all connected, there will be no need to learn a bazillion different scale and chord patterns.
It will all be there, literally at your fingertips.
This will mean you will be able to do these things with far greater ease:
To make a long story short, Fretboard Essentials gives you effortless fretboard navigation: you will know where your fingers have to go to get the awesome sounds in your head.
Fretboard Essentials sets you on the way to limitless fretboard creativity.
Fretboard Essentials: Contents
1. Why should I bother trying to get the hang of the fretboard?
2. What are the consequences of not understanding the guitar fretboard?
3. So, how do I figure out the fretboard?
Integrating guitar theory: the three-fold process
Setting guitar theory in context: the 3 spheres of guitar knowledge
4. What is the guitar's "height" relative to other instruments?
Range
5. How are guitar notes organized along the fretboard?
12 Tones: the equal-tempered system
Intervals 101: half steps, whole tones, and the chromatic scale
6. What about major and minor scales? Where do they fit in?
Intervals 202: diatonic notes -the white keys of a keyboard
Major and minor scales come in pairs
Only whole-tones and semitones
Intervals 303: diatonic notes -the white keys-, string by string
7. How are guitar notes organized across the fretboard?
8. What about the complete fretboard? How can I learn it?
Put together what you have learned looking along and across the fretboard
Getting down to business
9. What are pentatonic scales? How many kinds are there?
Pentatonic scales are 5 note scales that contain a triad
Pentatonic scales -the basics
Skip 4 and 7; skip 2 and 6
Triads in pentatonic scales
10. What's the best way of learning pentatonic scales on the guitar?!
Simplify: what have these scales got in common?
Guitar pentatonic scales, the smart way: harmonic and melodic fingerings
Correlations: simplifying pentatonic scales
If you're wondering about the remaining strings...
11. Is there a quick way to summarize triads, pents & diatonic scales?
You bet! Just look at them as sets and subsets...
12. What are modes?! Is a mode a special kind of scale?
Modes are simply scales we use starting on different "rungs"
Diatonic modes: 6 true modes
Relative and parallel modes
13. What is the best way of learning modes on the fretboard?
The smart way: relate modes to pentatonic scales
3 major-like modes: shift 4 and 7
3 minor-like modes: shift 2 and 6
For the remaining strings... understand pentatonic scales!
14. Are pentatonic, diatonic, and chromatic scales at all related?
15. What about all the different musical keys?
16. Notes or Tab? Should I bother learning to read notes?!
17. What's with all the funny words?
Glossary of musical terms
TESTIMONIAL
Alex,
YOUR SITE IS AWESOMEI want to thank you for the outstanding resources you put online.
Could not be happier with your product man. It is a wonderful work.
Eric King, US
Should you care?
The fretboard is an obstacle whenever you have to think about it. It stands right in the way, between you and your music. Freedom from the fretboard, freedom from having to even think about it, means more music.
I don't care what style of music you play on guitar. The rules of the game are still the same. And there is no way you're going to make something worth listening to if you don't know the rules, so you can start breaking them.
I've done all the hard thinking for you. Uncovered the rules of the game. So you can break free. Free from the fretboard.
Free to make music, free to play.
TESTIMONIAL
Hi Alexander,
Thank you for the updated and new material as well. Really good job indeed. I like the exercise book for daily routines.
I've been learning classical guitar for 6 years, had a 3 years break, and I start a new phase of my learning process and your fretboard teaching related to music sounds great to my understanding. It does help me a lot.
Best regards,
Daniel Buis, France
TESTIMONIAL
Wonderful educational resource. Your lessons on the guitar fretboard made the chromatic scale so CLEAR!
Excellent illustrations: the individual break-down of the notes and whole/half tones is really fantastic.
Thank you for providing this great resource!
Marla Berman, NY
TESTIMONIAL
I know almost nothing about the guitar and the structural components of music... or rather, I did not know a thing until I found your incredible web-site.
I cannot thank you enough for your amazingly clear, articulate, thorough and accessible approach to learning the "structural" architecture and fundamental elements of musical theory... your description of how scales are distributed as patterns on the guitar fretboard has been a revelation!!!
Your writing... your teaching, is truly inspiring!!!
So thank you, Alexander: you are a most remarkable and gifted instructor. I am excited to enter into your descriptive world each time I set aside the time to study. I want to master the guitar, the language of music, the structure on which music unfolds itself... and your teaching is the doorway that can take me there.
With enormous gratitude and the deepest thanks and with warmest regards,
Richard Waxberg
Director, Krishnamurti Study-Intensive & Retreat Programs
Ojai, California
TESTIMONIAL
I thank you so much for this excellent information. I was never trained in music, but have been teaching myself piano and music theory through reading for the last few months.
I have always played complex pieces by ear on guitar and piano. I think of compositions in my head that are very large scale, but have always been unable to write them down in order to complete and remember them.
This has really helped me draw meaning from what is happening on guitar and match it with things I'm learning on piano. Thanks so much!
Sincerely,
Aaron Colacion, USA
TESTIMONIAL
Thanks for the info you're putting out. This info gives a unique perspective of music theory: it is a lot easier to understand because it uses the "common sense" approach.
Rick Sib, US
100% 90-Day RISK-FREE
MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE
Fretboard Essentials is a unique system and you won't find any of this info anywhere else, on the web or offline.
As I've said, it's really simple, powerful stuff, and I guarantee, personally, that it will make a difference. If it doesn't, then just shoot me an email within 90 days and I will refund the full price, no questions asked. You have nothing to lose.
NO fine print, NO weasel clauses: if YOU are not happy, I am not happy. I'm sticking my neck out here because I know this works. Period.
You get instant access to Fretboard Essentials (it's an eBook) right after your order is placed.
Click the yellow Buy Now button below.
"Yes! I want less fingering patterns, more music!"
$29.99
No monthly fees. Nothing more to buy
You will need Adobe Reader (it's free) or other PDF software to access Fretboard Essentials
TESTIMONIAL
As someone who struggled with guitar modes for years I really appreciate your approach relating them to major and minor pentatonic scales and shapes:
This may just revolutionize my playing! Thanks!!
Frank Balash, USA
Fretboard Essentials is $29.99: that's only about as much as 3 sets of good guitar strings...
And you get to keep this knowledge for good!
But wait! That's not all you get... as a bonus, I'll also give you:
EspressoFretboard Essentials
- Quickest shortcut to all the goodness
- 100% practical, step-by-step guidance to all the theory in Fretboard Essentials
- Additional exercises, strategies, diagrams and examples
- Simplified explanations so anyone can follow
- Get this eBook on its own if you prefer
Electric Guitar Anatomy 101
- Know your instrument inside-out
- Take proper care of your instrument
- Set up your guitar to sound amazing!!
- Get your intonation just right
- Customize your guitar...
Plus countless other tips and tricks to enhance your sound and playing experience.
TESTIMONIAL
Hi Alex,
Your chord and triad diagrams are great. I've got a bunch of books and my teacher has me studying Van Epps to learn this stuff, but your diagrams are the clearest thing I've seen.
So, thanks for the great material!
Sigfried Gold, NYC
Complete Triad & Chord Charts
Print-ready Resource-pack
- Musical keys chart
- Chord/Scale boxes to fill in
- 6 staff and tab sheets
- 5 different fretboard charts
- 3 different bass fret charts
Plus other free surprises...
TESTIMONIAL
Undoubtedly the best, yet easiest and clearest explanations and building blocks to learning music theory for the guitar that I have come across yet.
Thank you!
Donald T. Brown, Alberta, Canada
100% 90-Day RISK-FREE
MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE
Fretboard Essentials is a unique system and you won't find any of this info anywhere else, on the web or offline.
As I've said, it's really simple, powerful stuff, and I guarantee, personally, that it will make a difference. If it doesn't, then just shoot me an email within 90 days and I will refund the full price, no questions asked. You have nothing to lose.
NO fine print, NO weasel clauses: if YOU are not happy, I am not happy. I'm sticking my neck out here because I know this works. Period.
You get instant access to Fretboard Essentials (it's an eBook) right after your order is placed.
Click the yellow Buy Now button below.
"Yes! I want less fingering patterns, more music!"
$29.99
No monthly fees. Nothing more to buy
You will need Adobe Reader (it's free) or other PDF software to access Fretboard Essentials