The Little Guitar Book That Could: First Position

THE LITTLE GUITAR BOOK THAT COULD, in an organized and thoughful way, sorts out all the FIRST POSITION stock C A G E D guitar chord and scale shapes plainly for all to see and use. Before opening and using this book, there are some things the typical guitarist needs to understand...even though he or she may have played guitar for years. For example, in this book, six is the exact number of consecutive frets involved in FIRST POSITION (the open strings count as one fret) and each guitar position spans a musical two octaves plus a perfect fourth. Also in the FIRST POSITION, the 2nd & 3rd fingers on the fretting hand are to remain stationary in their respective frets, or "slots" as some would say, because it is their stationary qualities that allow for the fourth finger to stretch or slide that additional fret.

And right here, before we go any further, one must understand something quite important. When playing guitar in the FIRST POSITION there is no first finger stretch. Get it?...no first finger stretch. The open strings take care of that making it an exception, the FIRST POSITION is, to the rule. And this exception, just by chance, happens to make things easier to learn and play.

Another thing that makes things a touch easier to play pertains to the picking hand down by the soundhole. There is a useful picking pattern that occurs when the C A G E D sequence is placed in alphabetical order starting on the thinnest or first string. This A C D E G A picking pattern is likewise featured in the pages of this book.

In addition to that, there are some musical terms that that need to be addressed for the purposes of THE LITTLE GUITAR BOOK THAT COULD...and those terms are main root notes, octaves and unisons. All are found in any guitar position. What are main root notes? The main root notes represent a specific set or cluster of root notes that fall under the 2nd & 3rd fingers of the fretting hand when playing in any given guitar position.
Following the main root note material are their subsequent octaves and unisons. An octave is technically defined as the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. Some correctly call the interval a "perfect octave". In guitarland octaves are usually "one string one fret away". This handy guitar fact helps to memorize their location. However, occasionally, two strings and or two frets are involved. Even so, the same concept applies in that there will be some sort of string skipping.
And lastly, unisons are defined as when two or more music notes happen to sound the same pitch. In guitarland it usually means "same note different string or fret". The term implies that the unison occurs in the given guitar position at hand.

Accepting these guitar and music facts as musical reality allows one to then take full advantage of the material presented in this book. Have fun rediscovering the fretboard and thanks for choosing THE LITTLE GUITAR BOOK THAT COULD!...