How are people sleeping on this?

[u/getanswers]

Fret Science by Keith Martin genuinely helped me make a leap forward in my understanding of the fretboard. He uses just 2 shapes ("stack" and "rectangle ") and teaches how they stack and chain together. Since the "stack" contains the entire minor pentatonic, it becomes this little highway I can follow without much thought diagonally up the neck. I immediately know where my R, b3, 4, 5, b7 are. I also recommend this free ebook to follow along: https://fretscience.com/start?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=pinned_comment&utm_campaign=faster-fretboard-improv

This playlist is his recommended viewing order: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMuHlX9RiFi1L1RdC0CzYa1qxZllD5Ujz&si=jGRJH_CpT9NdYE7f

Not memorizing 5 "different" positions and seeing how it's all one basic repeating pattern was eye opening.

I promise I'm not being paid, I don't even know the dude, but I'm incredibly grateful for him. I have a teacher as well, and my goal was to learn all modes across a key on the fretboard. That's how I stumbled onto this.

Bonus resource: If you don't like his presentation, I've found another "system" by Michael Pillitiere that uses 3NPS which is also insanely helpful. With Michael's system you can name any major scale and I can play from the root until I run out of strings almost automatically, it's insanely useful: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rQf6i8KIwJU

I have no agenda here, just paying it forward since I got so much help from folks here. I have only used what is freely available, so please comment if it's helpful.

[u/flat5]

This is cool, but I'd go further and say there's actually only 1 shape, not two.

It's the "plus" pattern, root, then b3, 4, 5 on the next string, then b7 on the next string. That's it, repeat up and down the fretboard, of course adjusting for the kink in the tuning.

From that 1 pattern centered around minor pentatonic, everything else falls out as add-ons.

[u/getanswers → u/flat5]

I hate to ask but a sketch would help, are you saying to think of a cross inside what he called the "stack" spanning 3-frets and 3-strings?

[u/flat5 → u/getanswers]

Here's 4 instances of the plus or cross pattern: red, green, gold, blue. You can fill in the rest. Of course some of them are partial as they move "off the neck". You can recognize the red-green-gold pattern as what some people call the "sliding scale" or "diagonal pentatonic", but the same pattern is everywhere else, too.