4 ms·

Why didn't they put DOTs BETWEEN the frets?!? Arrrrrrgh!

bmelton 4y ago
I know it's not the convention, but I almost prefer it this way. As someone who is self-taught (read: bad) on guitar, I spent literally years playing songs and suffering hand cramps before realizing that it takes a lot less pressure to fret the note closer to the fret. All because I initially learned on tablature, and tablature typically shows it "wrong." (or I read it wrong for a long time -- feel free to blame me as much as you deem appropriate if you are fond of tabs)
olnluis 4y ago
You'd use a lined fretless bass this way, so it might have been a lined fretless guitar on that drawing! Also, when you're pressing a fret, the pitch isn't coming from where you have your finger, but from the following fret which is making contact with the string. You can actually press the actual fret instead of the area between the fret and the one before it, and it should sound the same. Now if the person that drew this knew that, I don't know.
brudgers 4y ago
This is from the era when guitar tab was not so ubiquitous…and I seem to remember a lot of the chords in pop song books printed with dots on the fret 45 years ago. But it has been awhile.
- DonaldFisk 4y ago
  I have music books I bought in the 1970s, and those all have dots behind the frets.
  - brudgers 4y ago
    I think you are right, and I just checked out a preview of Mel Bay's Rhythm Chord Guitar Method, and it's dots between frets. Maybe it was my guitar teacher who wrote tab that way when I asked him how to play something. Which makes sense to me since it seems like it would be simpler to write tab that way by hand...as opposed to typesetting it where it would probably be about the same amount of work either way. What I mean is dots on frets would almost certainly be how I would write down tab for myself...and it seems like it would be clear enough to anyone who had a guitar in their hand.

I know it's not the convention, but I almost prefer it this way. As someone who is self-taught (read: bad) on guitar, I spent literally years playing songs and suffering hand cramps before realizing that it takes a lot less pressure to fret the note closer to the fret. All because I initially learned on tablature, and tablature typically shows it "wrong." (or I read it wrong for a long time -- feel free to blame me as much as you deem appropriate if you are fond of tabs)

olnluis 4y ago

You'd use a lined fretless bass this way, so it might have been a lined fretless guitar on that drawing! Also, when you're pressing a fret, the pitch isn't coming from where you have your finger, but from the following fret which is making contact with the string. You can actually press the actual fret instead of the area between the fret and the one before it, and it should sound the same. Now if the person that drew this knew that, I don't know.

brudgers 4y ago

This is from the era when guitar tab was not so ubiquitous…and I seem to remember a lot of the chords in pop song books printed with dots on the fret 45 years ago. But it has been awhile.

DonaldFisk 4y ago
I have music books I bought in the 1970s, and those all have dots behind the frets.
- brudgers 4y ago
  I think you are right, and I just checked out a preview of Mel Bay's Rhythm Chord Guitar Method, and it's dots between frets. Maybe it was my guitar teacher who wrote tab that way when I asked him how to play something. Which makes sense to me since it seems like it would be simpler to write tab that way by hand...as opposed to typesetting it where it would probably be about the same amount of work either way. What I mean is dots on frets would almost certainly be how I would write down tab for myself...and it seems like it would be clear enough to anyone who had a guitar in their hand.