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    Perfect Fourths Guitar

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    metaperl6453
    This document provides an overview of playing scales on guitar using perfect fourths or quartal tuning. It begins with acknowledging influences on the author's approach. Then, it explains the three octave shapes used, noting the starting and ending finger for each. It presents the seven positions of the major scale, specifying which strings are omitted in each position. Finally, it instructs the reader to play through the first three positions of the G major scale as an example and to continue practicing applications and techniques from another reference book.

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    Perfect Fourths Guitar

    Uploaded by

    metaperl6453
    861 views8 pages
    This document provides an overview of playing scales on guitar using perfect fourths or quartal tuning. It begins with acknowledging influences on the author's approach. Then, it explains the three octave shapes used, noting the starting and ending finger for each. It presents the seven positions of the major scale, specifying which strings are omitted in each position. Finally, it instructs the reader to play through the first three positions of the G major scale as an example and to continue practicing applications and techniques from another reference book.

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    a work in progress on perfect fourths guitar tuning

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    This document provides an overview of playing scales on guitar using perfect fourths or quartal tuning. It begins with acknowledging influences on the author's approach. Then, it explains the three octave shapes used, noting the starting and ending finger for each. It presents the seven positions of the major scale, specifying which strings are omitted in each position. Finally, it instructs the reader to play through the first three positions of the G major scale as an example and to continue practicing applications and techniques from another reference book.

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    861 views8 pages

    Perfect Fourths Guitar

    Uploaded by

    metaperl6453
    This document provides an overview of playing scales on guitar using perfect fourths or quartal tuning. It begins with acknowledging influences on the author's approach. Then, it explains the three octave shapes used, noting the starting and ending finger for each. It presents the seven positions of the major scale, specifying which strings are omitted in each position. Finally, it instructs the reader to play through the first three positions of the G major scale as an example and to continue practicing applications and techniques from another reference book.

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    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
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    The document discusses perfect fourths guitar tuning and covers the G major scale in this alternative tuning, explaining concepts like octave shapes, scale positions, and applications.

    Octave shapes are ways to play a complete octave across multiple strings. They have unique start and end fingers which allow you to move across the fretboard. Knowing the shapes is important for playing scales.

    There are 7 scale positions in a major scale. As the position number increases, more strings are omitted from the starting octave shape. Each position is characterized by the number of omitted notes and strings.

    Perfect Fourths Guitar

    Terrence Brannon

    November 23, 2010


    Contents

    1 Intro 2
    1.1 Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

    2 The Major Scale 3


    2.1 Octave Shapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
    2.1.1 Shape 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
    2.1.2 Shape 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
    2.1.3 Shape 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
    2.2 Scale Positions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

    1
    Chapter 1

    Intro

    This book covers an alternative tuning known as perfect fourths tuning.


    Highly recommended companion texts are “Total Scales, Applications and
    Techniques” and “The 12 Notes of Music”, both by Mark John Sternal.
    All the names I know for perfect fourths guitar tuning are listed below:

    1. EADGCF alternate tuning

    2. p4 tuning

    3. perfect fourths tuning

    4. perfect forths tuning

    5. quartal tuning

    There are plenty of articles motivating this style of playing. I think this
    knol sums it up accurately.

    1.1 Acknowledgements
    1. Chris Koloian - my initial guitar teacher

    2. Jamie Revell - an internet friend who plays in perfect fourths tuning

    3. The perfect fourths community on Facebook (Guitar Tuning in 4ths)

    2
    1.2 Heroes of p4 tuning
    Actve recording artists using p4 tuning:

    1. Stanley Jordan

    2. Allan Holdsworth

    3. Jamie Revell

    4. Justin Perdue

    5. Miki Birta

    3
    Chapter 2

    The Major Scale

    In this chapter, we will go over G Major Scale. Per Sternal, we will use 3
    notes per string. What is a scale? A scale is a series of scale positions. A
    scale position is a sequence of connected octave shapes, allowing one to move
    across the fretboard. So, before we can really get to studying scales, we have
    a few preliminary items. Let’s get going.

    2.1 Octave Shapes


    Octave shapes are a way to play a complete octave. They have a unique
    start and end finger. It is important to note the start and end finger of each
    octave shape, so that you can move forwards and backwards across the fret
    board.
    Instead of just reading about the shapes, be sure to play them. The
    number just below the shape diagram indicates the suggest “root fret”. The
    reason for choosing that fret is so that you are playing in the key of G — the
    octave shapes work in all keys. It’s just we are starting with the key of G,
    so we play our octave shapes there for now.

    2.1.1 Shape 1
    ccd
    c 1
    3 3 2
    dc

    5c5c
    1 1
    3

    4
    As you can see, shape 1 starts on finger 1 and ends on finger 2. It covers
    3 strings.

    2.1.2 Shape 2
    cc
    c
    ccc
    1 1

    3
    4 4 4
    dc
    2 2
    3

    As you can see, shape 2 starts on finger 2 and ends on finger 4. It covers
    3 strings.

    2.1.3 Shape 3
    ccd 1 1 1
    cc
    c
    3 3

    5
    dc 4 4
    8

    As you can see, shape 3 starts on finger 4 and ends on finger 1. It covers
    4 strings.

    2.2 Scale Positions


    There are 7 scale positions in any major scale. As we play increasingly higher
    scale positions, we omit 1 or 2 strings from the octave shape that opens the
    scale position, as shown in the following table:

    Table 2.1: Characteristics of the Major Scale


    Position Notes Omitted Strings Omitted Octave Shapes Played
    1 0 0 1,2,3
    2 1 1 3,1,2
    3 2 1 2,3,1
    4 3 1 1,2,3
    5 4 2 3,1,2
    6 5 2 2,3,1
    7 6 2 1,2,3,1

    5
    Let’s see what we can learn about the scale positions having looked at the
    table. First, note how the octave shapes move through a regular repeating
    cycle of 3, 1, 2 for the 1 and 2-string ommission scale positions. What do
    we mean by string omisssion? It’s simple. In the prior section we looked at
    full octave shapes. When the initial octave shape is played in scale positions
    2-7, we omit 1 or 2 strings from it. For example, in Position 2, we start with
    the 3rd octave shape, but we omit the first string and only play the last 3
    strings.

    2.3 Let’s Play!


    Ok, now that we’ve learned everything that a scale is, let’s play.

    2.3.1 Position 1
    Position 1 is quite simple. Put your index finger on string 6 (the thickest
    string, represented by the lowest line in the diagram). And then follow the
    fingering. You will play all of shape 1, ending on your second finger. That
    is your cue to continue with shape 2 (since it starts on the second finger).
    Then we round out by playing as much of shape 3 as we can before we run
    out of strings.
    Then we go backwards. We hit our first root note on the 2nd string (the
    2nd thinnest string) on our fourth finger. Since our second position ends
    with the fourth finger, it’s time to play that backward until we end up on
    our second finger and encounter another root note. At that point, we return
    to the start of position 1 by playing shape 1 backwards.

    2.3.2 Position 2
    In Position 2 we start on the 5th fret. 1 . Referencing the table, we dont play
    the first string of shape 3, but start with the second one. Then the same
    connected playing continues forward to the 1st string and then backwards to
    the 6th string.
    1
    You put your index finger where your 3rd finger was in the prior position

    6
    2.3.3 You know the routine
    The same procedure of omitting strings from the initial shape in positions 2-7
    continues. And the same procedure of connecting shape to shape backwards
    and forwards continues.

    2.4 Applications and Techniques


    Having taught you the scale, it is now time to crack open your copy of
    MJS’s “Total Scales, Applications and Techniques” and work through all the
    applications and techniques with this scale per his instructions in that book.

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