Originally Posted by: russell haywardYes thanks I knew about octaves, guess I have never put the effort in to memorise the fretboard in detail.

Wrote out the notes for postion 1+2 of the pent on a fretboard map and am now looking at it as I play. Actually seems to be working !

I've even worked out the major 3rds ? from A,D+E and have started to add those in a bit.

I guess sevenths will be next.

It really does help understanding what you are playing rather than just memorizing how to play it, it's given me a bit of impetus to get on and learn some more.

Understanding what you're playing is a language, the better you speak, the better you express yourself. When I was in Mexico I had to understand the meaning of certain words, ie; Cervaza, Carne Asada, etc. With that tackled, I knew that I wouldn't starve to death, but I couldn't express myself (which is a given for most of us after drinking Cervaza all day long). At best I expressed a mumbled form of Spanglish followed with constant smiling and nodding my head for no reason. I did however ace the phrase "Uno mas Cervaza, Por Favor".... TO THE POINT THAT i COULD EVEN ADD AN ACCENT AS IT ROLLED OF MY TONGUE!!!!!!!
The point is, to express yourself through playing with great results, you must speak the language (now you know why many guitarists constantly move their heads all around and make quirky gestures with their mouths because smiling the whole time just would not be cool)... It's imperative to understand the Major tonal function in music, in order to properly relate with it's minor creation. For Every Major tone there is a minor and vice versa. When you look at the make up (or formula) required to create a Major chord (the 1st, 3rd and 5th intervals in the Major scale), an interesting relationship occurs by the seqence and distance between notes.
Example; The notes in a C Major chord are;
C (1st=R1) E (3rd=M3) G (5th=P5). Result = Root-Major 3rd-Perfect 5th
When viewed in sequence we get;
(C - E) = Major 3rd + (E - G) = minor 3rd (G is the minor 3rd of E). Result = playing a Em chord in a C Major progression functions well. The E Major chord won't.
The Major and minor 3rd relationship work in either direction from the Tonic, only opposite in function.