Originally Posted by: LycaeanCongrats!!!!
Well, brace up because you are in for a big surprise!!! GT F#2 is difficult, most especially, the "Intervals" tutorial!!!
I've been going through the acoustic fingerpicking tutorials, but I jumped in and watched the interval one for ya. What he's saying is correct, but I can see how it might be a bit confusing. I don't know if this was a part of it, but when he jumps up to other strings, he just meant that what he was saying was the same for all strings, not just the E string. He didn't mean that moving from one note on one string, and then moving up a STRING at the same fret is a half or whole step, just in case that part was a little confusing (maybe it wasn't, I don't know).
Probably the most important things to understand from that lesson would be:
-in western music we have 12 notes to choose from.
-these 12 notes are spread all across the guitar fretboard, and six strings.
-For example, play any open string, and then move up the fretboard on that string one fret at a time. Each note, at each fret is different, right up to the 11th fret. The 12th fret (the one with the double dots) is where the notes start to repeat all over again. So if you play your sixth string, the low E, open, and then fret the twelfth fret of that string, it is also "E", one full octave above the open string.
-when we move up or down one fret, we are moving up or down a "half step".
-when we move up or down two frets, we are moving up or down a "whole step".
That's really the gist of what he's saying, though I don't know if I've made it clearer, or more confusing.. a couple of concepts that people sometimes struggle with:
"What's the big deal with half steps/whole steps...?" These distinctions are used to describe scales, for instance the major scale sequence is:
Whole Step, Whole Step, Half Step, Whole Step, Whole Step ,Whole Step, Half Step or simpler to read:
W W H W W W H.
Go ahead and try that on your guitar, just start on any string, any fret (but start low enough so you can move up the fretboard) and play that series of whole steps and half steps, and you will have played the major scale! The key of the scale will depend on whatever note you chose to start on.
"Ok, but when I play a B and then go up a half step, that note is a C, so what's up with that?? Isn't that a whole step?"
No. There are 12 notes, but only seven letters used to describe them. A B C D E F G then we go back to A. For most notes, to go from one letter to another requires a whole step, or two frets on a guitar. But B to C and E to F only require a half step, or 1 fret.
Hope this helps. The videos on this site are awesome, but this kind of theory is really best explained with a diagram, and practiced by writing it out first. I'd strongly recommend the text "The Guitar Fretboard Workbook"... it will make all of this complicated sounding stuff really clear.
