Same Melody on Two Octaves.

Not easy on Guitar!

Hey guys, today I will share with you these powerful exercises that will challenge (and motivate) many of you.

I was thinking about how easy it is to transpose the same melody on two octaves on the piano. Each octave is the same, so you can learn the melody one time and move it up and down without changing the shape or fingering.

With the guitar is a completely different story.

You can play symmetrical phrases with the same shape, but that doesn’t apply for melodies played with open strings, so everything we play in the position I (first three frets of the guitar neck) includes open strings will have a different shape when transposed one octave higher.

In this exercise, we will be learning a set of melodies on two different octaves.

It’s a great way to improve finger dexterity, musicality, and versatility, plus it’s super fun to play.

As always, take things step by step and learn one melody at a time.

Let’s get started.

The Video

How does it work?

The goal is to repeat the same melody on two octaves.

Sounds easy but trust me, it isn’t. It will take some practice before you can actually play the whole thing fluently.

Let me show you how it works.

The red square shows you the first melody. It’s a simple progression of notes using fretted notes and open strings.

The yellow square is the same melody but one octave higher.

Notice that the yellow square looks completely different from the red square even though it is the same.

How Should you Practice

There are a few things I highly recommend you do when practicing this exercise.

Left hand: Use the same fingering shown on the video. Don’t end up playing the melody with just one or two fingers. Use all four fingers.

Right hand: Always use alternate fingering.

Another thing you could do is to practice one octave at a time. In that case, you will learn all the phrases in one octave before move on to the higher melody.

Good luck.