Learning Guitar Notes on the top Three Strings of the Guitar

Knowing the notes on each string is a very important first task to learn when learning to play the guitar. Notes are the foundation of chords, scales, lead guitar and more or less everything else you’ll learn on your journey.

Unfortunately, it’s not the most exciting thing, but I can share with you a pattern of how to find out any note on the guitar neck.

At first you’ll have to count frets and maybe work backwards from which ever note it is you’re playing to the open string to figure it out, but over time you’ll begin to memorize the guitar notes on each string.

Let’s dive into it…

So there are only so many notes to learn on the guitar neck. These notes are A, B, C, D, E, F and G. Of course there are sharps and flats in there but we won’t concern ourselves with those just yet.

The spacing between each note is either a Full step or a Half Step. This idea of half and full steps originates from the piano but we can easily understand it in terms of the guitar neck as well.

Each fret is what we call a half step, so every time you go up one fret on any string of your guitar you’re increasing one half step. To increase one whole step you move up two frets (two halves make one whole). So with this in mind we can look at the spacing between each note and determine where each note resides on the neck.

Thankfully the spacing between most notes is the same, one full step. There are only two exceptions to this rule and they are: One half step from B to C and from E to F. Putting it all together we can see that the following spacing exists between notes.

A to B = One full step, or two frets
B to C = One half step, or one fret
C to D = One full step, or two frets
D to E = One full step, or two frets
E to F = One half step, or one fret
F to G = One full step, or two frets

Don’t worry if this doesn’t make a ton of sense yet, there’s a video below you can watch that will explain it all. These concepts are often much easier to understand after watching someone else do them and then you can practice what you see.

So take a few minutes to watch the video and then go grab your own guitar and give it a try for yourself.

For more great beginner guitar information that you can learn at home why not consider a guitar lessons dvd. All the same great content you’d learn in private lessons but you learn from the comfort of your own home and on your own schedule.