Fretboard positions
A shape's name is the solfège syllable of the note at string 6's starting fret. So in any key, each shape only occurs at a handful of frets — the start-fret buttons list exactly the ones that exist. Click any note on the board to hear it, and read the selected position as practice tab below.
The selected position, played from its lowest note up to the highest and back down — 4/4, one eighth note per note, with the last note of each pass held to the barline.
A shape's name is the solfège syllable of the note at string 6's starting fret. String 6 open is E, which is mi in C major, so the Mi shape can only start at fret 0 or fret 12. The start-fret buttons above only list the frets where this actually happens in the current key.
Changing key shifts every shape together. Switch the key to D major and the Mi shape moves from fret 0 to fret 2 — the other shapes all shift by the same two frets.
The pentatonic scale is just the major scale with fa and si removed, leaving do re mi sol la. In 7-note mode those two notes are marked with hollow green circles so you can see at a glance what pentatonic drops. There are only five shapes — Do, Re, Mi, Sol, La — because Fa and Si's starting notes aren't in the pentatonic scale at all, so they can't anchor a shape.
A major scale's pentatonic and its relative minor's pentatonic are the exact same notes. C major pentatonic = A minor pentatonic — the only difference is which note you treat as home. For a minor-flavored solo, resolve to la.
The tab below follows every control above. Change the key, switch 7-note vs pentatonic, pick another shape, move the start fret — the tab redraws for that position. Use the Exercise toggle to switch between the straight run and the groups-of-four sequence, and build speed against a metronome.