As someone who also used to overthink memorizing the fretboard: this is a bad idea. You should strive to just plainly memorize the names of all of the notes, the relevant scale and arpeggio patterns, etc, without any kind of tricks or "system" (no, not CAGED either). This is the only path to real fluency; imagine having a neat system of remembering what each English word means and having to go through it every time you wanted to speak!
Agreed. OTOH, if the question is should I also learn some different way of thinking about music/fretboard, the answer is always yes. If it makes neurons fire, add it to the mix.
That phrase is smuggling in a LOT of work that systems like CAGED help to simplify. I say this as someone who has played guitar for decades and slept on CAGED for too long.
I started learning the guitar exactly 22 days ago and I came to the same conclusion. I know enough about music theory, notation, sound modulation and even the cognitive science of hearing* that I knew such a system existed and that I could have some fun times exploring one (no doubt the author had a fun time with this; I know I would). However, after thinking about it for a few minutes I decided against it.
And good thing I did, I went to my local thriftshop and bought Hal Leonard’s Method for a couple of bucks, and have been going through it on a daily basis (now on song 67 of 100) and I am already starting to get an intuitive feel for where to move my fingers and which string to pluck within a beat or two, or rather, my muscles simply know where to move after reading the note (albeit quite often a beat or two late; though I suppose this will improve with practice).
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* This comes from a) having played the trumpet when I was a child (including reading standard notation), b) tried to learn the guitar for a few months 20 years ago and then give up, c) BSc in psychology, and d) done some hobby projects which involved modular analogue synthesizers and the low level Web Audio API
While cellos, violins, etc. don't technically have frets, the notes are of course in the same layout as instruments that do have frets, so this same method works.
(It's funny how different instruments live in their own worlds. Once I showed a movable scale fingering diagram for guitar to a cello player and they had no idea what I was talking about, even though the cello has the same kind of patterns, as would any parallel-stringed instrument. Another cello player did know about scale patterns but called them "universal fingerings".)
The notes are in a similar layout, but violin and cello strings are tuned to fifths, where guitar and bass guitar strings are tuned to fourths. The fingering patterns for scales and shapes of arpeggios/cords are going to be frustratingly close but different for anyone jumping into (or out of) the orchestra pit on a whim.
As someone who learned the double bass in school, jumping to bass guitar & guitar was super easy cause of the fourth tuning intervals. Anytime I ever jumped on cello, it was a nightmare cause all of the sort of "relationships" between the current note I was playing and other notes were totally different.
If you are learning the guitar and are interested in music theory (or meta-learning), one resource I cannot recommend enough is Absolutely Understand Guitar by Scotty West[1]. These are old video lectures from 1999 which have since been uploaded to YouTube.
As someone who also used to overthink memorizing the fretboard: this is a bad idea. You should strive to just plainly memorize the names of all of the notes, the relevant scale and arpeggio patterns, etc, without any kind of tricks or "system" (no, not CAGED either). This is the only path to real fluency; imagine having a neat system of remembering what each English word means and having to go through it every time you wanted to speak!
Agreed. OTOH, if the question is should I also learn some different way of thinking about music/fretboard, the answer is always yes. If it makes neurons fire, add it to the mix.
> the relevant scale and arpeggio patterns, etc,
That phrase is smuggling in a LOT of work that systems like CAGED help to simplify. I say this as someone who has played guitar for decades and slept on CAGED for too long.
I started learning the guitar exactly 22 days ago and I came to the same conclusion. I know enough about music theory, notation, sound modulation and even the cognitive science of hearing* that I knew such a system existed and that I could have some fun times exploring one (no doubt the author had a fun time with this; I know I would). However, after thinking about it for a few minutes I decided against it.
And good thing I did, I went to my local thriftshop and bought Hal Leonard’s Method for a couple of bucks, and have been going through it on a daily basis (now on song 67 of 100) and I am already starting to get an intuitive feel for where to move my fingers and which string to pluck within a beat or two, or rather, my muscles simply know where to move after reading the note (albeit quite often a beat or two late; though I suppose this will improve with practice).
---
* This comes from a) having played the trumpet when I was a child (including reading standard notation), b) tried to learn the guitar for a few months 20 years ago and then give up, c) BSc in psychology, and d) done some hobby projects which involved modular analogue synthesizers and the low level Web Audio API
While cellos, violins, etc. don't technically have frets, the notes are of course in the same layout as instruments that do have frets, so this same method works.
(It's funny how different instruments live in their own worlds. Once I showed a movable scale fingering diagram for guitar to a cello player and they had no idea what I was talking about, even though the cello has the same kind of patterns, as would any parallel-stringed instrument. Another cello player did know about scale patterns but called them "universal fingerings".)
The notes are in a similar layout, but violin and cello strings are tuned to fifths, where guitar and bass guitar strings are tuned to fourths. The fingering patterns for scales and shapes of arpeggios/cords are going to be frustratingly close but different for anyone jumping into (or out of) the orchestra pit on a whim.
As someone who learned the double bass in school, jumping to bass guitar & guitar was super easy cause of the fourth tuning intervals. Anytime I ever jumped on cello, it was a nightmare cause all of the sort of "relationships" between the current note I was playing and other notes were totally different.
If you are learning the guitar and are interested in music theory (or meta-learning), one resource I cannot recommend enough is Absolutely Understand Guitar by Scotty West[1]. These are old video lectures from 1999 which have since been uploaded to YouTube.
1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg1L-sBIxnY&list=PLJwa8GA7pX...
Top comment is "Anyone in 2026 here from Reddit?".
This approach is basically the same mental model as Adam Kadmon's Guitar Grimoire but with extra steps and music-agnostic vocabulary.