Wow, Thank you Ben. The light is coming on, now I understand how to work the whole neck. Not good at it yet but that will come with time.
Discuss the Mandolin lesson: Mandolin Fretboard Geography- 1, 4, & 5 Chords
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One hour playing and i feel completly difreent. Really nice job. Greatings from Spain
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Wow! That’s quite an endorsement! I may have to pick up my mandolin and spend some time with this lesson. (Probably after the camp.)
Thanks for the feedback, @jornada82!
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Wow, great feedback, thanks!
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I am brand new to your site and am working my way around. For this particular lesson, I am having difficulty in figuring out which fret each of the measures is starting on. Hope that makes sense. For instance, in the lesson that includes measure 21, what fret do we start on. For measure 25, what fret do we start on, etc.? Thanks.
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Hi @dusty1014 Lowery Welcome to @BanjoBen 's Forum.
Measure 21 Eco Combo is the start of the exercise pattern which runs from 21 throu to measure 28
Measure 29 is the start of the next exercise Shifty Combo,
You will see Ben has given each exercise a name above the start of each exercise, Hope this helps
PS. If your working from the PDF Tab Files I would strongly encourage you to download the free tab player Tefview ( then download the lesson tef files) that way you can listen and see what going on in the Tab and makes it so much easier to follow the lesson…
Checkout the thread below which explains more fully the benefits of working with TEF TAB Files
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Welcome to the forum, @dusty1014! @Archie gave some good advice, and I don’t know if you have a question beyond what he stated. It sounds like you might need to watch the lesson on how to read tab: https://banjobenclark.com/lessons/how-to-read-mandolin-tab-mandolin-beginner
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I promise to give this a try… And provide feedback.
The thing is… It will take me a bit to grasp, perform and absorb… but I will work on it!
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Good stuff. Where do we go from here?
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Hi @granaghan Welcome to @BanjoBen 's Forum. At this time Ben is without power due to a tornado passing through his home town. I am pleased to report Ben and his family are fine. But it may be a while till he sees your post and gets to reply as he is also preparing to host the first Cabin Camp this year in just a few short weeks.
I am not a Mandolin Player but what I will say if your are new to the mandolin focus on the beginner section for now. Learn the fundamentals because you will need these as you progress to the next level.
Maybe @Mark_Rocka or @Fiddle_wood can offer some guidance. Good luck
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Hi @granaghan and welcome to the forum!
If you have a good understanding of the whole beginer section you can either pick another song or exercise or you can expand further on this exercise by using your imagination.
Some ideas on expanding this lesson:
Change which finger you start the lick with. These licks (and many others) can be played starting with any finger but the fingering changes if you hold the same hand position through each chord. (this can be very challenging but is great for dexterity and more understanding of hte scales)
Change the chord progression to any song you already know or another song lesson on the site.
You could go through the Bag o Licks lessons and combine it with the same ideas of from this lesson.
Hope this helps some.
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If you’d like to apply what you’ve learned in this lesson series to more exercises, I’d recommend the pentatonic scale lessons followed by the scale lessons.
https://banjobenclark.com/lessons/introduction-to-pentatonic-scales-mandolin
https://banjobenclark.com/courses/mandolin-scale-studies
But there’s also a lot of fun to be had in learning actual songs. If you’re ready for fun, pretty much any song that you’re drawn to is a good place to start. Just make sure you don’t do like I did and go for the really tough stuff first. Work your way up to it. Going too difficult in the beginning can get discouraging.
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You’ve got me inspired to work on this lesson next!
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This is the greatest lesson I’ve found on this site yet! More like this for Mando and Guitar will keep me coming back for more! I think I saw one on Banjo, so I need to check that out (even though I play Clawhammer, the fret work is applicable to both). Thanks!!
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Thanks for posting on the best forum for the first time! Happy to have you and hope to see you post often in the future!
By the way, I lived the small town of Milford, Michigan so I did a double-take when I saw your user name… 
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Great lesson thanks so much for the geography lesson.
Quick question about double stops in relation to the I IV and V chords. In the key of G it seems like the double stop most often played is the D the string above but I’m having trouble finding a one for C.
I’d love a lesson just like this that shows where the double stops are along the way since often times they lead into or out of licks.
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I am certain some with more experience than I will answer your question but I did want to welcome you the the forum @techmandu!
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I am not quite understanding what you mean. D is most often use for G
There are several DS that have both a D and G in them. What they “are” is a matter of what inversion you may be using and what chord is in the rhythm at the time.
You can have a G doublestop with D either above or below the G
Also with B either above or below the G
A D double stop many times had an A with the D.
There are also many positions to find each of these combinations.
Some common C double stops
C with E over or under
C with G over or under
I C is the melody note (by something else…usually at end of a phrase in key of C) you can use combinations of the E and G: over it to create a C chord and stay out of the way of the melody.
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I would love a fretboard lesson for guitar. I’m trying really hard to learn my fretboard. So just wanted to add my request here. Thanks!
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Mind Blown. This rivals the Alan Munde Banjo Fretboard Lessons.
Thanks
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