Hey friends! Here’s a quick question & answer video, where I’ll talk about walk-ups and walk-downs, giving a quick to-the-point overview of what these are, when to use them, and how they work. This question comes in from Song Notes member Bill, who wrote:
“David, could you address walk ups and downs. Are there standard ones for each chord transition (a - c, c- g etc.). They really make a huge difference. I’m not sure where to start in adding them.”
In answering Bill’s question, I’ll be showing my web tool FretMonster — which helps visualize the notes in any key you pick, as shown on the fretboard. This tool also lets you change between seeing the notes with their name (e.g., C, F, G), or view those same notes but with their scale degree (e.g. 1, 4, 5). This can be a helpful way to see the notes of a scale in action, as they’re positioned on the fretboard. And of course, I’ll explain how walk-ups and walk-downs are essentially using these exact notes.
First, I’d suggest using my KeyMaster interactive web tool to see a quick summary of the notes in each common major key. This tool lets you click-and-hear the sound of each note to recreate these walk-ups or walk-downs without a guitar. It’s a handy way to learn!
If you want to go deeper on understanding how scales work, check out my Practical Music Theory course if you’re curious to learn how the major scale in each key is formed. Again, this helps us understand where these notes (used in each walk-down) are coming from.
Likewise, you might want to grab some of my Major Key cheat sheets. Each cheat sheet focuses on one of the common keys (C, G, D, A, E) — and on the pages therein you’ll find information about that key’s notes, chords, scales, and more.
If you want, you can download all the cheat sheets as one file — it's a single ten-page PDF, including each of the five cheat sheets.
Download All Major Key Cheat Sheets
If you want to download them individually (2-3 pages each), use the links below.
Membership to Song Notes Premium is required to download these cheat sheets. Premium membership also gives you access to all my other instructional PDFs. Thanks for supporting me and my lessons!
Premium
VIP
Beta Tester