That pesky B string

This is just a short post to explain how I think of intervals that cross the G and B strings on the guitar. You can apply this to intervals in chords, scales, arpeggios or just for intervals themselves (aka: diads).

As you probably know the standard guitar tuning uses 4 semitones between the open G and B strings which is different to the usual 5 semitone interval that exists between all the other adjacent open strings. This gives a major third interval between the G and B strings as opposed to the usual fourths based tuning between the other adjacent strings.

You apply these rules where the lowest note of an interval is on the G string or lower, and the high note is on the B string or higher:

• if the target note is higher, then the note on the higher string is 1 fret higher than usual


• if the target note is lower, then the note on the lower string is one fret lower than usual

Simple isn't it?