Week 7: getting off the 5th fret
Week seven of a 32-week guitar practice path: learning box 2 at the 7th–10th frets and crossing the seam between positions mid-phrase.
- Week
- 7 of 32
- Days
- 7
- Played as
- blues or rock
Six weeks in one position is long enough to own it and short enough not to get stuck. Both tracks learn box 2, sitting directly above box 1 and sharing notes with it — those shared notes are the seam you travel through.
The trap in both is learning box 2 as a second independent pattern, which gives you two cages instead of one. Practise the join: start a phrase below, finish it above. Blues treats the slide itself as a sound worth hearing; rock treats the shift as a timing problem to solve at tempo.
Blues treatment
Connect Box 1 and Box 2 of A minor pentatonic with slides and position shifts
Six weeks in one position is long enough to own it and short enough not to get stuck there. Box 2 sits directly above box 1, from around the 7th to the 10th fret, and it shares notes with the box below — those shared notes are the seam you travel through.
The trap is learning box 2 as a second independent pattern, which just gives you two cages instead of one. Practise the join instead: start a phrase in box 1, slide into box 2 mid-phrase, finish there. The slide itself is a blues sound, not just a transport mechanism, so make it audible rather than hiding it.
The daily session · ~26 min
- Warm upHands + anchor Box 14 min
- Box 2 of A minor pentatonicThe next shape up5 min
- Slide between the boxesFind the seam6 min
- Two positions over the formPhrase across the seam6 min
- Jam, 12-bar blues in APut it together5 min
Check yourself
- Play box 2 cleanly on its own, and find the A roots inside it.
- Start a phrase in box 1 and finish it in box 2 without stopping to reposition.
- Over a chorus, cross the seam at least twice in both directions.
Reference
Rock treatment
Connect Box 1 and Box 2 of A minor pentatonic and shift positions at tempo
Six weeks at the 5th fret is enough. Box 2 sits above it, and the two share notes at the join — that shared ground is what makes a shift a slide rather than a jump.
In rock the additional demand is tempo. A position shift that works at 90 often falls apart at 130, because the hand arrives late and the first note of the new box gets clipped. Practise the transition itself, slowly, as its own exercise: the last note of box 1 and the first note of box 2, over and over, until the shift stops being an event.
The daily session · ~25 min
- Warm upHands + anchor Box 14 min
- Box 2 of A minor pentatonicThe next shape up4 min
- Shift between the boxesSmooth at tempo6 min
- Two positions over the vampShift in time6 min
- Jam, minor rock vampPut it together5 min
Check yourself
- Play box 2 cleanly and find the A roots inside it.
- Shift from box 1 to box 2 mid-phrase at tempo with no gap.
- Over the vamp, cross the seam twice in both directions without slowing down.
Reference
How the week runs
Whichever accent you pick, the material stays the same for all 7 days and the tempo and intent move. Day one takes it slowly, day two chases clean notes, day three brings it to target tempo and into the jam, day four pushes past comfortable, and day five drops back to tempo to record and listen. Days six and seven are yours.
You can switch accent any day without losing your place — it is the same week either way, so week 7 means the same thing in both.