Blues Scale Trainer...Flash Cards

Kimball

Blues Newbie
I need some help. Try as I might, I can not understand how this system works. I know it's not based on making a WAG every time, but that's what I end up doing. What is the method for determining the correct box that works every time? What am I not seeing? I hope I posted this in the right category, but this is as close as I could figure. Moderators, please feel free to move this to a better location.
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
Boxes.jpg

Here's a chart from "Slow Blues Supplement" showing which Minor and Major boxes are to the left and right of a root note on each of the 6 strings.

You need to know this information before using the scale trainer.

The trainer is a way of randomly testing yourself to see how well you can apply the info in the chart.

It doesn't teach you how to figure it out.

It only randomly tests what you already know.

You have the option of asking it to give you any combination of a root note, a string and a left or right facing Major or minor box.

You need to already know how to find root notes on any string and how to play pentatonic/blues scales to the left or right of that note.

The "Hint" will show you where the correct box is, but not how to get there.

Hopefully, you've already learned that in one of Griff's courses.

If not, you're not ready for the trainer....yet.:sneaky:
 
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Kimball

Blues Newbie
So what you're saying is I need to know all this stuff to use it, but it doesn't say anything thing about how/where to learn it. There must be a process one applies, given that they do know the required material. And I do know most of it. I'm looking for that process. Thanks, Paleo, for taking the time to answer my question.
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
This might help.

https://bluesguitarunleashed.com/blog/you-might-be-practicing-your-boxes-wrong/

Or any lesson where Griff teaches you to play scales from root notes within Boxes rather than from the lowest note on the 6th string.

We all learn the 5 Boxes.

The "process" is to know where the Major and minor root notes are in each Box and whether you go to the left or right from a given root note for a given scale.

"Major Minor Blues Shapes" and "Slow Blues Supplement" are 2 courses that explore this.

Griff also explains this, in part, in the video below the Scale Trainer.

And provides a link to a pdf showing the Boxes with their Major and minor root notes.:sneaky:
 
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Paleo

Student Of The Blues
Be sure to check out Griff's email today, "it all goes flyin' out the window".:sneaky:
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
I should qualify that my previous comments were from the perspective of someone who already knows the notes on the fretboard and where the Major and minor root notes are in each box.

In that case, the trainer is simply a way to "check" yourself or maybe see how fast you can come up with the "answer".

It's not going to "teach" you anything you don't already know.

(But it might reveal a weakness in a particular key that you didn't realize you had. :sneaky:)


At the other extreme would be someone who doesn't know any of the notes on the fretboard or any notes in the boxes to begin with.

They could "deal", then check the "hint" and memorize whatever it was.

Over time they could memorize every possible combination.

That just seems like a pretty inefficient way to go.

Especially if they had no previous instruction regarding what the scales or boxes even are.

Possibly they could eventually figure that all out on their own, but I wouldn't assume they would.

Hopefully they've already at least been introduced to the scales and their "Boxes" before they tackle the trainer.


Then there could be someone who is in between the extremes. As in Griff's email example.

Someone who has discovered a "weakness" in a specific key, like Bb minor.

As Griff explains, they could set the root to Bb and the "mode" to minor and have the trainer generate a string and direction.

Then they could practice, and eventually memorize, each "hint" that comes up.


The trainer is a very versatile "tool" and there's lots of different ways you can utilize it, depending on where "you're at".

I didn't mean to give the impression that you already had to "know" every thing before you can make use of it.

Even though that's what I actually said.:confused:o_O
 
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Griff

Vice Assistant General Manager
Staff member
Rather than trying to memorize that table first, I would focus on one area, or root, at a time.

The blog post @Paleo referenced earlier will definitely help explain this as well.

I would suggest starting with 1st or 2nd string roots first, simply because they are the most common and most useful...

Pick a key (preferably one where you have a jam track available for that key also) and then look for that root on the 2nd string.

Now, from there, can you comfortably (really, without thinking about it) play either left or right from there? For minor, going to the left would be box 2, to the right would be box 3 (which the chart above will also tell you.)

When you have noodled around in those areas and you are seeing it, turn on the track and just play for a while in that region, using those 2 boxes, returning to that root note to remind yourself of what you're doing and where you are.

To do that, the flash card tool is not necessary, but as you get better, and you feel more comfortable with more keys, strings, boxes, etc., the tool can help you test yourself and find areas you are weak.

Griff
 

Paleo

Student Of The Blues
Boxes.jpg

I guess I should have previously included the sentence that precedes this table in SBS.

The table comes after you've gone through all the boxes, both minor and Major, from every root note in each box.

I wouldn't suggest that you learn the table first.

That would be like picking up a math textbook and learning all the formulas in the appendix before going through the book.

The idea would be to go through the book and learn how to use each formula one at a time as you are introduced to it.

Then you have a summary of all the formulas you learned in the appendix for quick reference so you don't have to hunt back through the book to find it.

Then you could make flash cards of the formulas to help you memorize them.



In SBS you learn all the boxes and root notes in G Major and G minor. Then what you just learned is summarized (and generalized) in the table.

You don't have to memorize the table. You already learned all the info that's in it. It's there in case your memory slips.

The trainer or flash cards are simply ways to randomize the info in the chart.

To be successful in figuring out what box you'll be in every time you are dealt a completely random hand you will eventually have to know everything in the table.

To get to that point you could learn one string at a time, rather than a whole box like you do in SBS (and MMBS which is also centered on G).

If concentrating on the second string, you may have already learned the "4 Note Solo pattern" and the "House pattern" or did the November 2017 Challenge on the "Core Area" from the 2nd string.

Regardless, you need prior knowledge of what to do before the trainer "deals you a hand".

There's no "process" to go through once it's been dealt to figure out what box you're in other than recalling and applying the knowledge you already have from previous exposure to the boxes, wherever that may have come from.

Otherwise you have no idea what to do.

Or you can make a guess.

Which is the situation that @Kimball is expressing in the OP.

The only other option is to look at the hint and try to memorize the info then, so that you'll know what to do next time the same situation comes up.

It'll be a lot easier to learn what to do in general beforehand.

(I ain't contradicting anything Griff is saying. After all, I learned it from him when I did SBS. :))
 
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Paleo

Student Of The Blues
What is the method for determining the correct box that works every time?

So what you're saying is I need to know all this stuff to use it, but it doesn't say anything thing about how/where to learn it. There must be a process one applies, given that they do know the required material. And I do know most of it. I'm looking for that process.

This has been on my mind for several days now. I'm trying to come up with a "simple" answer. So one more final response.

It's the nature of flash cards in general.

You have some kind info on the front, usually a question, and the answer on the back.

You can use them to check/test or reinforce information you already know because you already went through some kind of process to learn it.

If you don't know any of the information beforehand you can use them to show the answer and start learning the answers purely by rote.

You might come up with your own system for remembering the answers.

You might even discover the "correct" process you would have gone through to learn the material beforehand.

With either approach, the flash cards themselves don't teach you a process. They just give you a question and the answer.

You either already know the process that lead to the answer or you come up with one.


Example: The trainer comes up with minor left from E on the 5th string.

If you don't already know that that's going to be Box 3, or aren't familiar with the Boxes in general, there's no way to figure it out now.

If you don't know that E is at the 7th fret you're already screwed.

So you can look at the hint and it will show you the "answer".

Then you can memorize it.

And hopefully realize that any time minor left from any 5th string root comes up, it'll be Box 3.

So now you know.

Either you already knew it or you just learned it.


So that's the only "process" I can come up with once the trainer has dealt you a hand.

You recall and apply what you already know or you look at the hint and memorize it now and recall it when it comes up again.


To acquire that knowledge beforehand you can learn string by string as Griff suggests above or Box by Box as he taught me in SBS.

But to do either of those you gotta get the info first, either from the chart or the pdf on the trainer page or the appendix in BGU or the Scale Encyclopedia in the front of several courses or from having done SBS (like I did) or MMBS or any number of other sources.

You don't start out by learning the entire chart by rote or all the boxes in the pdf at one time.

But you eventually need to know, by whatever process, all the info in the chart because that's the info that the trainer based on.


Flash cards don't teach you a process to get to an answer.

You already went through some kind of process that will lead you to the answer.

Or you turn the card over and memorize the answer.

That's my final answer.
 
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Paleo

Student Of The Blues
Sorry Regis, I know I said final answer, but.........

Right after my last post I got on my bike for a ride and a “process” came to me.


You have to at least know either: 1) the scale formulas and interval shapes or 2) just that there are 2 notes on each string.

Then you can “simply” work your way from the root up to the 1st string or down to the 6th, which ever is closer.



In the example of minor left from the 5th string E:

1) You can work your way “backwards” to the lowest note on the 6th string.

The b7 (D) will be down a whole step at the 5th fret.

Then the 5 (B) is always at the same fret as the root, one string down; 7th fret of 6th string in this case.

Then the 4 (A) is a whole step down at the 5th fret of the 6th string.

(Or you might already know where the I, 4 & 5 are down from a 5th string root.)

In minor, the 4 is actually the 3rd note of the scale because we skip the 2.

In minor, the number of the Box is the same as the number the note is in the scale.

So the 3rd note (A) is the lowest note in Box 3.



2) You can make it simpler by just knowing that there are 2 notes per string.

So the 5th note is on the same string as the Root (E) and the 3rd and 4th notes are on the 6th string. The 3rd note is the lowest, so you’re in Box 3.


Or you could count up from E. The 2nd and 3rd notes will be on the 4th string. You don’t even need to know what they are or where. The 4th and 5th notes will be somewhere on the 3rd string and there will be the octave root and 2nd note on the 2nd string and the 3rd note of the scale will be the lowest note on the 1st string. Again telling you it’s Box 3.

You can do the same thing is Major realizing the Box number will be the note number plus 1.

This seems way more complicated trying to explain it in words.

I'd be happy to demonstrate on the guitar.:)

You are simply counting up from 1 to 5 or backwards from 1 down.

Again, I’m counting the note number, not scale degree.



But if you can do this, you could actually have discovered all the 5 Boxes for yourself, rather than having learned them from some source.:sneaky:


I also starting thinking “Why are we trying to come up with a Box when the whole idea of the Trainer is to get you out of the Boxes and playing to the right and left from a root note?”o_O
 
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Griff

Vice Assistant General Manager
Staff member
In addition to what @Paleo has mentioned, I always used box 1 as my "home base" when I was learning.

So, if you look at the example he gave of "The trainer comes up with minor left from E on the 5th string" - if I didn't know it...

I'd play box 1 in E (12th position) minor...

I'd find the E on the 5th string (7th fret)

So, I need to get from the 12th position to the 7th position... and, in fact, since it's left facing, the 7th fret E will be the "upper" side of whatever box I find.

I start my way down... box 5 is in 9th/10th position...

Box 4 is in 7th position, we're close now...

Box 3 is in 5th/4th position, and the root, E, is on the 7th fret, 5th string, which is what I want.

At first, you just get better at finding the boxes based off the 1st box... but after a while, you know them without the intermediate step.

Hope that helps, this is a great question/thread with some good insights into making it all work.
 
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