10th fret inlay mark

Michael Bauer

Thanks, Marc, for the advice, and it's obvious that you are satisfied with sub-standard reading comprehension. You go, boy! Don't let precision of language get in your way. You're doing great!

Stringswinger

Michael Bauer, you have insulted me (and all of us who prefer a 9th fret marker) in this thread. At this point, I am not going to keep lowering myself to your level and I am going to wish you well with your collection of 10th fret guitars.

Michael Bauer

I think you have it backwards, you insulted me, and since there isn't much point in my getting into a battle of wits with an unarmed man, I'll bow out as well. How anyone could say I insulted someone for saying that there is no logic to a 9th fret marker is beyond me. It can be liked for many reasons, habit being the most likely, but no one can ever, nor has ever, to my knowledge, made the case that 9th fret markers were logical, given the tuning of the guitar. If you find that to be a personal attack, you really do need to reexamine your reading skills, or perhaps just grow a pair. Signing off. One final thing, I have more 9th fret guitars than 10th fret ones. I play them. I just don't think they make any sense, and if you think about it, neither do you.

dennis

I have absolutely no care for dot positions or whether there is musical logic behind them but i do feel compelled to ask marc what difference it makes that a mandolin is tuned in 5ths or that the banjo has different tuning? You bring it up a few times to justify it voids the musical significance of the dots .. and again, i dont know and dont care if the dots are musically relevant, and i know you dont either but you do bring it up.

Even if the tunings are different, the strings are the same on the mandolin, just in reverse order (and missing two strings). And as far as the banjo goes, pretty much the same except the only odd string would be the c string...

I dont care for positions of dots, i think we shouldnt rey too much on them... My friend tcha limberger for instance cannot play on 10th fret dot guitars and i always tel him not to rely on visual aids.....

The only dots are care for are after the 15th fret because guitars are inconsistent in that respect, some guitars have more frets, others less, and it can be confusing playing a nee instrument and wanting to do harp harmonica but getting lost because there are less or more frets than the guitar that i m used to...

Anyway... Play nice fellas, michael bauer is the sweetest dude ever

klaatu

Yeah, play nice, guys. There was a cartoon years ago which I can't find now, titled "How it all got started in the Middle East." It showed a line of fish crawling up out of some ancient ocean on their fins. Two of them are sticking their tongues out at each other, and the leader yells, "I don't care who started it, CUT IT OUT!"

And as far as the rationale behind the 10th fret marker, we have overlooked one possibility. The guys in the Selmer shop were, after all, French. Maybe they just decided to be ornery. "Hey, you American guitar people with your silly 9th fret markers - we fart in your general direction!"

Stringswinger

Denis,

I am unconvinced of any reason for dot placement with the possible exception of (as was put out there by another poster in this thread) harmonic location. Perhaps the 10th fret marker aligns with harmonics on a mandolin or banjo? The chord shapes on a guitar are different than the chord shapes on a mandolin or banjo, so using the fret markers as a guide with the different tunings is a recipe for confusion.

It is true that many banjo players switched to the guitar and while in theory, using Banjo markers on the guitar (as Klatuu suggested) might help in their transition, that would only be so if they tuned their guitars in 5ths (some banjo players did do this, and conversely, Guitarist Tommy Tedesco tuned his banjo and mandolin in 4ths for studio work on those instruments).

Let's call a spade a spade here, using dots to find your way around the guitar is a crutch, kind of like needing the music stand and a real book to play a tune on a gig. I am just fine on a guitar with a 9th fret marker, a 10th fret marker or no markers at all. And I never bring a music stand to my gigs.

Personally, I find the American marker system more appealing visually, but after 47 years of playing the guitar, it is what I am used to. I do not know what possessed the Franco-Italian luthiers in France to go with their system. Italian luthiers had been building mandolins for centuries, and perhaps the 10th fret dot was more visually appealing to them.

If someone else prefers the 10th fret marker for whatever reason, great. Just don't tell me that I should agree. It is like driving on the left or right side of the road, neither is better or worse, but it is problematic when you are used to one, and are in a Country where you have to use the other. Consistency is useful, whether avoiding a car wreck or a train wreck ;-)

Cheers,

Marc

Jazzaferri

Buco wrote: »

It got too hard when I was doing an exercise that I got as an assignment in the class I'm taking, to go over "Stella by starlight" and go through the form playing only 3rds approaching half note below, and then 5ths and then 7ths.
I had to go back to the dots.
I guess this is something you could pull off without the dots if you could think in terms of how intervals relate to each other from chord to chord, instead of notes themselves.

That seems kinda like learning a poem by reading the middle letter of every second word LOL

kevingcox

I never thought this unassuming thread about fret markers would end up nearly as heated as the one about not referring to women "hot chicks" =D>

wim

I hear that hot chicks generally prefer dating guys with the 10th fret dot. Sorry 9'ers!

Al Watsky

Yes, Wim is on the right track. Why only this last week I played a gig with my Favino which has its 10th position dot with a band that has 4 woman musicians , but because I have white out marking the 9th position on the side of the fingerboard there was absolutely no chance of even a flirtation. They even mentioned it! That mark at the 9th fret sowed the seed of doubt ! Its a known fact then. This 9th dot caused them to have doubts about my sincerity, intelligence and my ability to pick up the check ! Sacre' bleu ! Brother Beware !!!!!