A professional photographer, Benjamin Perlin also enjoys playing music. Benjamin Perlin learned to play the bass guitar from musician Denny Sarokin.
Key to understanding the bass guitar fretboard is the rule of fourths, which simply means that each string on the bass guitar is a perfect fourth away from the one above and below it. The first string, for example, is tuned to a G, which is four tones away from the second string's D note. This is four tones away from the third string's A, which is four tones above the E of the fourth string.
As soon as the musician depresses a string at a particular fret, it changes the tone. Each fret is a half-step up from the fret below it. This means that the next note in a scale will typically be two frets up from the previous, with the exception of the third to the fourth and the seventh to the eighth note of the scale.
Once the musician remembers the tones of the scale, he or she can start learning octave patterns. A bass guitarist can find the next octave up from a particular note by playing two frets across and two frets up, or by playing 12 frets up or seven frets up and a single string across. The combination of these patterns can help the developing bass guitarist to find any note smoothly and with less in-the-moment calculation of placement.
Key to understanding the bass guitar fretboard is the rule of fourths, which simply means that each string on the bass guitar is a perfect fourth away from the one above and below it. The first string, for example, is tuned to a G, which is four tones away from the second string's D note. This is four tones away from the third string's A, which is four tones above the E of the fourth string.
As soon as the musician depresses a string at a particular fret, it changes the tone. Each fret is a half-step up from the fret below it. This means that the next note in a scale will typically be two frets up from the previous, with the exception of the third to the fourth and the seventh to the eighth note of the scale.
Once the musician remembers the tones of the scale, he or she can start learning octave patterns. A bass guitarist can find the next octave up from a particular note by playing two frets across and two frets up, or by playing 12 frets up or seven frets up and a single string across. The combination of these patterns can help the developing bass guitarist to find any note smoothly and with less in-the-moment calculation of placement.
