Hi kslowman1,

I personally have always worked in patterns on the fretboard and was aware of the fact, that the patterns always stay the same all over the fretboard and the only thing you have to do is to shift whatever pattern you use by 1 fret when crossing the line between G and B string.

I think there are several kinds of players out there - the ones who need a theoretical approach and the ones who are more into an optical, pattern oriented way of percieving the fretboard. I´m a very visual person, so i always tried to put the theory, once i understood a certain concept of it, into patterns that i can visualize. Like for example the 4 basic triads. They all consist of major and minor thirds stacked on top of eachother. So what i did was to look on how a major and a minor third looks like on the fretboard and voila - now i can find any of those chords anywhere on the fretboard without having to actually think about what notes are in there.

Btw - that "perfect fretboard" is also nothing really new - Bob Culbertson has that very same concept on one of his tutorials on the ChapmanStick - he calls it "the 7-stringed instrument".

Other than that, i think the idea behind it is very good and i have been teaching my students that "visual" way of looking on theory for quite a while now, because i think its way easier for someone who has no clue about theory. After a while i blend the theory in to show them the theoretical background behind the patterns. Works fine and ppl tend to be very surprised how easy basic theory can be if you explain it right.

I have been thinking about creating a whole tutorial line based on those visuals for several years now, but the problem is that i just don't have enough time to do it.