The Little Guitar Book That Could

This LITTLE GUITAR BOOK THAT COULD showcases the ever popular C A G E D guitar chord and scale sequence exclusively in the THIRD POSITION for all to see and use. But, before thumbing through this book, there is some subject matter that the guitarist needs to be reminded of...even though he or she may have played for years. For example, in this book, six is the exact number of consecutive frets involved in the THIRD POSITION and it spans a full two octaves plus a perfect fourth when in standard tuning. Also when in the THIRD POSITION, the second and third fingers on the fretting hand are to remain stationary in their respective frets or "slots", initially, as their stationary qualities allow the first and fourth fingers to stretch or slide to those notes in the outermost frets. Concerning the picking hand, there is a very useful string picking pattern that occurs where that hand resides most of the time, down by the sound hole or bridge. This pattern involves every other string (one-three-five, two-four-six) and is best evidenced when the C A G E D main root note sequence is plucked alphabetically, starting with the A root as found on the first or thinnest guitar string. To discover it, start by picking the A there (first string, third finger); then C (third string, third finger); then D (fifth string, third finger); E (second string, third finger); G (fourth string, third finger) and conclude with the A on the thickest string (sixth string, third finger). The one-three-five, two-four-six string pattern naturally fits the fingers on the picking hand, helps with finger style, and is looped, forwards or backwards (six-four-two, five-three-one) as the A root notes found on the first/sixth string(s) are deemed interchangeable. There are also three musical terms that need some brief clarification for the purposes of THE LITTLE GUITAR BOOK THAT COULDl...those being main root notes, octaves and unisons. What are main root notes? Generally speaking, main root notes represent a specific set or cluster of root notes located in the center of the position, under the second and third fingers of the fretting hand. It should be mentioned here that there are two instances where the first and fourth fingers are involved with these main root notes, but those instances are not present in the THIRD POSITION C A G E D main root note sequence. In fact, all the C A G E D main root notes in the THIRD POSITION are fretted with just the third finger. That said, once the location of each main root note is learned, the attention then moves to their octaves. An octave is defined as the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its own frequency, some calling the interval a "perfect octave". In the THIRD POSITION, octaves are usually "one string one fret away" most of the time. This handy fact helps memorize their location even though, occasionally, two strings and or two frets are involved (the same concept applies in that there will ...