May 15, 2019 by Klaus Crow
Photo by Bigstock photo
Whenever you try to deepen your guitar knowledge and you buy a guitar music theory book or look up something on the internet you keep bumping into the CAGED system.
There comes a point when it’s unavoidable, that means it’s time and probably something worth knowing about.
Let me rephrase that “definitely something worth knowing about”.
So then, what’s all the fuzz about the CAGED system?
Well, if you want to be serious about guitar playing and you want to understand how the guitar in relation to the fretboard works, the CAGED system is an absolute valuable tool. Let’s take a good look and see what this is all about.
The CAGED system gives you a logic overview of the fretboard. It makes it much easier to find your way around the neck and understand how chords, chord shapes and scales are related to each other as well as a lot of other things on the guitar. (arpeggios, triads, licks, etc.)
The CAGED system is derived from the five open major chord shapes: C, A, G, E and D. Each chord shape can be moved up on the fretboard. To do so we first have to take the 5 open chord shapes and turn them into closed chord shapes. That means there are no open strings in the chord. By barring the fret and then playing the shape next to it you can easily move the chord up and down the neck and play each shape in all 12 keys.Continue Reading