Hey, I'm 16 and just got back into Cello playing. I stopped playing for Four years, but your videos and some anime openings have inspired me to pick it up again. Thank you!
The 3rd and 4th degrees of ALL major scales sit next to the 7th and 8th degrees, no matter where you are on the fingerboard. This pattern repeats itself in many places along the fingerboard in each key. Thinking in terms of degrees of scales is superior to note letter names. Not only can you play in any key after that without ever thinking about a note name, you can sight read a piece in one key and play it in a completely different key of your choice at the same time. If you want to play in a jam by ear, this will help so much. (I play cello in jams by ear in a foreign country without understanding a single word)
This is excellent of you know about each degree in a scale. However many newbie students don’t know the theory. I’m now going to remember that each 3rd and 4th degree is the same fingering for 7th and 8th degree. I play piano and have my theory up to grade 6 for both so I understand where you’re coming from.❤
Brilliant idea! I've been teaching for a looooong time, and see this as a very good way to help with that difficult concept of the invisible geography of the fingerboard. My solution (with more advanced students) was what I call SOOS, Scales On One String. You mention this but I agree they take the LH through slant into thumb position, so for more advanced students. I like here also that you are teaching replacement shifts, which is a very good and often-used technique in shifting. Thank you for posting this! Oh, and that cello has a wonderful rich sound. What is it? Looks a bit like my Leonhardt.
This is SO helpful. I've been trying to figure out how to place each note correctly in the upper regions. This exercise definitely makes it clearer for me. Thanks so much!
what a gift this is, thank you so much. A multi-faceted complex exercise that you've presented in manageable chunks. I can sense how much I'll learn from this and am excited to get going! Thank you
Hi Billy. I'm an electric Bass guitar player but use cello instructional books for more advanced technical exercises and methods to playing. I found you via your Adult Cello e-book. Truly amazing. I'm 58 so I'm absolutely going to have a serious crack at learning the Cello. I've always loved the Cello and complete daily Bach Cello exercises on the bass guitar. Madness I know, but it's in my blood. Thanks for a great e-book.
This was super helpful! It's just what I'm looking for!!! I'll try it out and let you know how the results are, but so far just watching the video, gave me some aha moments!! Thank you Billy!
. I am thinking it might be better for me to acquire a tradition cello and play it on the right side (i.e. scroll on the right shoulder, right hand on the fingerboard and left hand with the bow) and try to make due. Perché, I lack figures in my left hand, and had thought it best to peruse such so have a traditional 5-fingered-hand available to the finger board. Have you ever heard mention of any one trying something similar?
Hi Billy! This is very helpful thankyou so much! I’m 22 years old approaching 23 in two months and i just started studying Cello about a month ago, since i live in Southeast Asia it’s hard finding cello players let alone adult cello beginners, would you consider making a discord for your community to share similar experiences and just hangout with eachother? Just wondering! Thanks again
This is genius! I am SO excited to try this!!! Thank you for all the time and effort you to take to make these videos in helping all us in our cello journeys 🎶🎻🎶
The most helpful tip for learning the geography... I've been looking for a video like this for a long time. I burned my cardboard fingering chart first :) Thank you!
Billy, I would like to play the walk up all the way up the same string, so would the fingering be thumb on the harmonic and then 1, 2, all the way and then 1,2,3 to the tonic ? Great video , thank you.
I really like this. I'm going to work on it. I do almost 100% sight reading. I think this will help a ton. Question: What's up with your buzzing overtones when playing a C on the G string?
Great content, and thanks for sharing your scale method. Will there be a scale book forthcoming? I think there's a fair few of us here who would be interested in purchasing it!
So, in order to learn which notes are where on the fingerboard, I should say the note names as I'm doing the walkup? I've done 2-octave scales for all major and minor keys and am currently working on 2-octave arpeggios and broken thirds, and somehow I still don't know what notes I'm hitting, in spite of naming the notes as I was hitting them. I'm remembering the patterns, but the note names are just not sticking. I mean, I can name the notes as I'm doing the exercises, because they're in stepwise order, but ask me to name a random note and I'm lost. I'm a bit better at identifying the notes on sheet music, but I tend to mostly read finger positions.
Non-cellist here (I'm thinking about taking the plunge but have not yet; I have some experience with fretted stringed instruments). It seems like the "different keys / different patterns" thing must be due to these fixed hand positions. If you just shifted hand position according to the key, you could use the same pattern, for any key, right? (with some limitations at the nut) So is it really much easier to memorize all these per-key pattern differences, than it would be to develop a sense of the fretboard note positions without the convention of first position, second position, etc.? [Edit: I assume the answer must be "yes", BTW. I don't imagine that with my 0 cello experience I'm coming up with a better alternative. But I'm interested in the answer and why. Are there any eccentric cellists who do spurn hand positions? Is it something people try and fail? Or is it just so obviously a bad idea that no one does?]
I’m coming from piano and guitar to cello and just now leaving first position so I have the same question. I showed a guitar scale pattern to my career professional cellist friend and she had no idea what I was talking about! My guess is cello pedagogy is very focused on reading, like classical piano is, and they regard the absolute notes as the basis of everything, like on the piano. Non-classical guitar tends to switch to a relative pitch perspective very early. Jazz piano is a lot of effort to learn because you have to treat the piano with a relative perspective, but it is physically attached to the C major/A minor scale (the white keys) so it’s 12 times as much work as on the guitar to “now do it in every key”. So the mystery is why cellists inflict the piano-like rigidity on themselves when they actually have a guitar-like freedom of key. All I can think of is that they mostly read music, seldom transpose or improvise.
Thank you! Very helpful - I am going to try this. My teacher says my fingerboard geography is getting way better but I still feel all at sea. How many years of playing did it take you to get really solid? I just wish I had it all under my hand now!! Cello is so difficult.
Hi! It definitely took a while to feel like I had a complete concept of the fingerboard in my mind's eye, and of course even longer to feel like I could shift to all of these positions reliably, but I think this walkup exercise cut months and possibly even years off of the process. :)
Okay...this is getting kinda weird Billy! I was just telling my husband yesterday how I get "lost" on the finger board!!! I'm sure you don't have my home bugged... right?😂😂😂
Hey, I'm 16 and just got back into Cello playing. I stopped playing for Four years, but your videos and some anime openings have inspired me to pick it up again. Thank you!
Thank you so much, I'm so excited to hear that!! 🎻
The 3rd and 4th degrees of ALL major scales sit next to the 7th and 8th degrees, no matter where you are on the fingerboard. This pattern repeats itself in many places along the fingerboard in each key. Thinking in terms of degrees of scales is superior to note letter names. Not only can you play in any key after that without ever thinking about a note name, you can sight read a piece in one key and play it in a completely different key of your choice at the same time. If you want to play in a jam by ear, this will help so much. (I play cello in jams by ear in a foreign country without understanding a single word)
This is excellent of you know about each degree in a scale. However many newbie students don’t know the theory. I’m now going to remember that each 3rd and 4th degree is the same fingering for 7th and 8th degree. I play piano and have my theory up to grade 6 for both so I understand where you’re coming from.❤
Brilliant idea! I've been teaching for a looooong time, and see this as a very good way to help with that difficult concept of the invisible geography of the fingerboard. My solution (with more advanced students) was what I call SOOS, Scales On One String. You mention this but I agree they take the LH through slant into thumb position, so for more advanced students. I like here also that you are teaching replacement shifts, which is a very good and often-used technique in shifting. Thank you for posting this! Oh, and that cello has a wonderful rich sound. What is it? Looks a bit like my Leonhardt.
This is SO helpful. I've been trying to figure out how to place each note correctly in the upper regions. This exercise definitely makes it clearer for me. Thanks so much!
what a gift this is, thank you so much. A multi-faceted complex exercise that you've presented in manageable chunks. I can sense how much I'll learn from this and am excited to get going! Thank you
Hi Billy. I'm an electric Bass guitar player but use cello instructional books for more advanced technical exercises and methods to playing. I found you via your Adult Cello e-book. Truly amazing. I'm 58 so I'm absolutely going to have a serious crack at learning the Cello. I've always loved the Cello and complete daily Bach Cello exercises on the bass guitar. Madness I know, but it's in my blood. Thanks for a great e-book.
Great approach to incorporate higher positions in scale work which i usually dont do. Works on shifting also need that too.
Thanks Billy, what a great exercise. Likewise, i'm finding the positions in between 1st and 4th 'unfamiliar territory' your exercise definitely helps!
I have played a couple of years but have been looking for exactly this! I feel like this will be incredibly helpful! Thank you!
This was super helpful! It's just what I'm looking for!!! I'll try it out and let you know how the results are, but so far just watching the video, gave me some aha moments!! Thank you Billy!
Great video, I love that you talk about being proactive about the left hand shape.
. I am thinking it might be better for me to acquire a tradition cello and play it on the right side (i.e. scroll on the right shoulder, right hand on the fingerboard and left hand with the bow) and try to make due. Perché, I lack figures in my left hand, and had thought it best to peruse such so have a traditional 5-fingered-hand available to the finger board. Have you ever heard mention of any one trying something similar?
Hi Billy! This is very helpful thankyou so much! I’m 22 years old approaching 23 in two months and i just started studying Cello about a month ago, since i live in Southeast Asia it’s hard finding cello players let alone adult cello beginners, would you consider making a discord for your community to share similar experiences and just hangout with eachother? Just wondering! Thanks again
This is genius! I am SO excited to try this!!! Thank you for all the time and effort you to take to make these videos in helping all us in our cello journeys 🎶🎻🎶
Thank you Billy this will be very helpful and I will also try to work out going all the way up each string. Great exercises.
The most helpful tip for learning the geography... I've been looking for a video like this for a long time. I burned my cardboard fingering chart first :)
Thank you!
I am 63 and found your channel
So grateful for your effort and advice
Eternally grateful
Am I the oldest....?
I began last year at 70.
Nope. I’m 74, restarted 3 years ago. After playing for 5 years from 40-45.
This looks like Bass Pattern System for cello! Exactly what Im looking for!!
Billy, I would like to play the walk up all the way up the same string, so would the fingering be thumb on the harmonic and then 1, 2, all the way and then 1,2,3 to the tonic ? Great video , thank you.
this was realllly really helpful, thank you so much for creating this method
When you started doing this with different keys, did you write out the music or did you figure it out by ear?
You’re a legend!! Keep making videos!❤
I really like this. I'm going to work on it. I do almost 100% sight reading. I think this will help a ton. Question: What's up with your buzzing overtones when playing a C on the G string?
Amazing walk up routine for an adult beginner ❤❤❤❤❤
Great idea! Thank you for sharing it.
That's great stuff! Do you have and sell the other scales, too? I'd love to do it for the more difficult scales like A flat Major and the others...
I am so interested in your help with this.... :-)
Great content, and thanks for sharing your scale method. Will there be a scale book forthcoming? I think there's a fair few of us here who would be interested in purchasing it!
Great! Thank you, Billy!
So, in order to learn which notes are where on the fingerboard, I should say the note names as I'm doing the walkup? I've done 2-octave scales for all major and minor keys and am currently working on 2-octave arpeggios and broken thirds, and somehow I still don't know what notes I'm hitting, in spite of naming the notes as I was hitting them. I'm remembering the patterns, but the note names are just not sticking. I mean, I can name the notes as I'm doing the exercises, because they're in stepwise order, but ask me to name a random note and I'm lost. I'm a bit better at identifying the notes on sheet music, but I tend to mostly read finger positions.
Thanks Billy.
Non-cellist here (I'm thinking about taking the plunge but have not yet; I have some experience with fretted stringed instruments). It seems like the "different keys / different patterns" thing must be due to these fixed hand positions. If you just shifted hand position according to the key, you could use the same pattern, for any key, right? (with some limitations at the nut) So is it really much easier to memorize all these per-key pattern differences, than it would be to develop a sense of the fretboard note positions without the convention of first position, second position, etc.?
[Edit: I assume the answer must be "yes", BTW. I don't imagine that with my 0 cello experience I'm coming up with a better alternative. But I'm interested in the answer and why. Are there any eccentric cellists who do spurn hand positions? Is it something people try and fail? Or is it just so obviously a bad idea that no one does?]
I’m coming from piano and guitar to cello and just now leaving first position so I have the same question. I showed a guitar scale pattern to my career professional cellist friend and she had no idea what I was talking about! My guess is cello pedagogy is very focused on reading, like classical piano is, and they regard the absolute notes as the basis of everything, like on the piano. Non-classical guitar tends to switch to a relative pitch perspective very early. Jazz piano is a lot of effort to learn because you have to treat the piano with a relative perspective, but it is physically attached to the C major/A minor scale (the white keys) so it’s 12 times as much work as on the guitar to “now do it in every key”. So the mystery is why cellists inflict the piano-like rigidity on themselves when they actually have a guitar-like freedom of key. All I can think of is that they mostly read music, seldom transpose or improvise.
Thank you! Very helpful - I am going to try this. My teacher says my fingerboard geography is getting way better but I still feel all at sea. How many years of playing did it take you to get really solid? I just wish I had it all under my hand now!! Cello is so difficult.
Hi! It definitely took a while to feel like I had a complete concept of the fingerboard in my mind's eye, and of course even longer to feel like I could shift to all of these positions reliably, but I think this walkup exercise cut months and possibly even years off of the process. :)
Where is this walk up sheet? I cannot find a place to download it. This will be so helpful! Thank you!- Got it!
Here it is: www.adultcello.com/scale-walkup :)
@@adultcello I looked for the pdf also but couldn't find it. Is there a way to print it out?
Great video, thank you .
Here's a link to get the sheet music: www.adultcello.com/scale-walkup
Help. I can’t download the exercise.
Okay...this is getting kinda weird Billy! I was just telling my husband yesterday how I get "lost" on the finger board!!! I'm sure you don't have my home bugged... right?😂😂😂
Ditto! So uncanny that I found this, out of the blue. But really wanted to find it.
This is amazing! Thanks so much for sharing. Do you have the same concept on sheet music for other keys and scales?
I broke my C string within the first 5 minutes of messing with it for the first time.
Too much words.