For what it's worth, I began music on classical violin in 1970 at age 10. They taught us to be good technicians, reading all those dots to become musical notes. But the concept of chords or chord changes was not taught. That was something you're supposed to get through private lessons. So I got very good at the violin, made all-state orchestra and all that, but had no clue about the fundamentals about what I was playing.

So I switched to banjo in 1977 and soon realized I had to un-learn quite a bit. As I explored the banjo I came to the conclusion that not much was explained here either. Since I had taken a lot of private violin lessons I had already been introduced to the idea of scales, but never made the leap to how that related to chords. Anyway, I finally had a few "ah-ha" moments, which I'm sure you're having as well, and came up with a way to comprehend the 5-string fingerboard. It is based on the idea you mentioned, where the stack order of a chord is how they move up or down the fingerboard.

It sounds to me like you have an analytical way of approaching things, so maybe this will help. You may have already seen this and if so, well, cool. At least, it should not hurt:

banjohangout.org/topic/361633

Some people's eye glaze over if you discuss anything that can be deemed "theory." People come at music from all different angles. I'm definitely in the OP's camp of finding a lot of value in learning the conventions of music.

Too often we are taught to play an instrument, not how to make music and understand the rules that underlie the making of music. I was fortunate enough to have a great teacher for guitar at 13 or 14. He explained the theory to me without calling it theory. He just said this is how it works. He taught me to hear chords and arpeggios and find scales. This was all done with me learning songs and tunes I chose. After all, music is music. When I took up banjo a couple of years later I realized that those arpeggios are the basis for banjo music. We tune to a chord and we play fingered and open strings together. Sometimes the notes are dissonant and that is part of the sound of banjo, and the charm.

I was also fortunate to have three years of music theory in public high school back in the 60's. All of this and some serious maturation on my part have made me a pretty good banjo player. I sometimes get to play with really great musicians who know no boundaries to their music. It humbles you.

Thinking too much is not good. Playing, feeling and thinking together is better.
The path has many obstacles. Each one has a lesson for you.

It is on the first page of the chord section of the Bradbury Method.  Not hard to find. 

In general, there are two fundamental approaches to teaching and learning. One is deductive; the other is inductive. Below is the Google AI explanation. Folk art teaching is usually skewed toward the inductive approach.

"Inductive and deductive learning are two distinct educational approaches. Inductive learning is an inquiry-based, bottom-up method where students observe specific examples to discover a general rule or concept on their own. Deductive learning is a traditional, top-down method where the teacher provides the rule or formula first, followed by examples and practice."

banjoy I'm at about a year of playing and recently read your PDFs. Its supercharged everything I was slowly learning, and exactly what I was trying to get to. I was desperate for this knowledge right when I found it. Literally an AHA moment when I put it to use. Just wanted to drop in and say thank you. Pat Cloud's stuff is next on my list to study.

I have found that most beginners are more interested in learning to play a song than they are learning about chords, inversions or scales. Most would become bored and quit if that's all they were taught. Thus, most beginner books cater to what the beginner wants: to make music, not to figure out how it's made.

Often after beginners learn the basics and have a fair grasp of how songs sound, then they may want to learn more about how music is made and whyand how it all goes together.

quote:

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Originally posted by jsinjin

I know I’ve asked this before but why is the pedagogy for banjo so haphazard with the understanding of these basic aspects of theory? I feel like if I was taught the scales and chord shapes day 0 instead of basic tunes and learning by ear I would have been miles ahead of where I am today. This was such a revelation and an hour of practice later so much made sense to me moving up the neck and connecting the various chords. I could completely unlock so much of the whole banjo and I don’t think I would have ever figured this out just playing with people or learning tunes. But the actual learning of it is so fundamental and makes th music so much easier to internalize and understand. I know it’s here in the forums but every method I’ve started from brainjo to my own teacher to even banjo camp takes this as an intermediate or advanced part of learning and I just feel it should be first or second just after the clawhammer or how to hold the instrument. This theory and understanding of the harmonics and what makes the chord brings rhw whole 1 4 5 thjng together completely and explains so much.

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I can tell you my take on it. Modern old time music (1970s on?) is heavily weighted toward instrumental tunes in a limited number of keys.

Some instruments (fiddle and banjo among them) are considered to play mostly melody, others mostly accompaniment (guitar, double bass).

Since banjo isn't considered a true accompaniment instrument (i.e., its role is primarily playing the melody), chordal accompaniment is less important. Knowing different inversions of chords isn't useful for the type of music that most current old-time players play.

You'll hear some fiddlers and some banjo players talk about old time being non-chordal music, and saying that they don't know the chords to accompany the tunes. Instruction takes the form or rote, phrase-by-phrase learning of instrumental tunes. 

quote:

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Originally posted by jsinjin

I know I’ve asked this before but why is the pedagogy for banjo so haphazard with the understanding of these basic aspects of theory? 

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To paraphrase Prince...

Party like it's 1899.

Every single American or British-published banjo tutor from the heyday of the banjo introduces music theory in the first chapter. The best of them are extraordinary comprehensive studies of basic to advanced theory applied to the banjo with relevant exercises.

Today we are subject to a culture of immediacy and the illusion of 'instant simplicity'. What this modern culture has eroded is the awareness that meaningful simplicity is the intelligent choice not to use what we have at our disposal; rather than an enforced lack  of choice.

I disagree. I have five beginner clawhammer books in front of me right this second and I signed up for with subscriptions Brainjo and other banjo beginner works and in every one of them the focus was on tunes and learning to play by ear without tab. Then a gradual I IV V. There was absolutely no discussion of triads or the relationship of chords or inversions. In fact I had to go to a colleague in the department of music at the college where I teach to get recommendations on how to start learning the theory but it was very difficulty to put together.
I don’t feel that most banjo introductory stuff is set up to explain the basics early. And I believe it would have helped me learn much quicker than trying to play by ear.

I pay for and take weekly lessons from a very esteemed banjo teacher who was also on the faculty of the Midwest banjo camp. Only in two advanced courses at the four day camp in one session taught by Lukas Pool on “Melodic patterns in Double C tuning that gets you down the neck” and then an advanced session by Furtado on “Fretboard Fluency in double C chord inversions around the neck and arrangements” was there any discussion of “what makes up the notes and chords on the neck of your instrument.”

These two sessions helped me more despite being a beginner by actually explaining why things work.

I teach a lot of highly technical things and I am a firm believer that the understanding of why is critical to mastering a subject. And it has been a huge struggle to get the why in learning to play this instrument and I think that information being available to students would be so much more helpful.

I do agree that some people want instant answers and spoon fed stuff. In banjo I feel like there is very little deep explanation. While I’m still at very slow pickup and play by ear and I’m very much a beginner, those two sessions on chord theory and melody had me furiously taking notes and enjoying every second of the content while so much made sense. I definitely did not hide from worksheets and chord theory and the circle of fifths but it certainly was not part of the pedagogy and when I look at the same workbooks my kids had in piano, not a single tune exists in the first 20 pages of the book, it’s all about octaves, note placement, timing, understanding chords and keys.

quote:

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Originally posted by jsinjin

I disagree. I have five beginner clawhammer books in front of me right this second and I signed up for with subscriptions Brainjo and other banjo beginner works and in every one of them the focus was on tunes and learning to play by ear without tab. Then a gradual I IV V. There was absolutely no discussion of triads or the relationship of chords or inversions. In fact I had to go to a colleague in the department of music at the college where I teach to get recommendations on how to start learning the theory but it was very difficulty to put together.
I don’t feel that most banjo introductory stuff is set up to explain the basics early. And I believe it would have helped me learn much quicker than trying to play by ear.

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Which is exactly why I'm pointing you in the direction of the richness of applied music theory resources freely available in banjo tutor books published  + or - 127 years ago. Search online.

What you currently have in front of you is the dehydrated powder, just-add-boiling-water modern 'instant' banjo version.

Are you also disagreeing with me? I literally posted an example… one of nearly 200 that have the same info, all of which are free to download.

Anti intellectualism has convinced people that they are not smart enough to learn this and the publishers agreed. All of modern method of clawhammer think you are too stupid to start with what children start with.

It is the modern simple method’s fault.

I learned piano at 50. I should've learned it when the rest of the grade schoolers were learning. Indeed, a piano keyboard is the embodiment of music theory laid before you.

If you've learned something kudos to you. Why not move forward then?
Oh yes, at what point do we learn to carve necks and stretch hides? Shouldn't we grown the tree? No wait. Shouldn't we learn agriculture, to grow the tree, to make the neck?

^ My thoughts as well. All this stuff is immediately evident on the piano. And if you can read music, shapes on the page correspond more or less directly to shapes on the keys.

If playing inversions in every key all over the neck was necessary for the music most banjo players today want to play, then you could expect to find it in current instructional methods. But that's just not the case. You don't need that stuff to play old-time banjo. You would have needed it 100+ years ago if you had wanted to be considered a skilled player, and instructional methods from that time reflect this.

quote:

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Originally posted by banjoboyd

^ My thoughts as well. All this stuff is immediately evident on the piano. And if you can read music, shapes on the page correspond more or less directly to shapes on the keys.

If playing inversions in every key all over the neck was necessary for the music most banjo players today want to play, then you could expect to find it in current instructional methods. But that's just not the case. You don't need that stuff to play old-time banjo. You would have needed it 100+ years ago if you had wanted to be considered a skilled player, and instructional methods from that time reflect this.

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There is a tendency for correct but over-emphasised to inadvertently become a straw man. 
Not strictly necessary to play old-time banjo - true - but nonetheless the OP is identifying that the supporting context of guidance in music theory would help him.

quote:

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Originally posted by Joel Hooks

Anti intellectualism has convinced people that they are not smart enough to learn this and the publishers agreed. All of modern method of clawhammer think you are too stupid to start with what children start with.

It is the modern simple method’s fault.

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Again it's overkill to cite the 'big guns' of anti-intellectualism here. That has the effect of reinforcing the 'difficulty' of traditional notation.

Actually there's nothing intellectual or 'difficult' about basic music theory as universally set out in the older banjo tutor books. In the culture in which those books were written and published it was simply common sense that a student was shown the basic building blocks of the sounds and patterns they were learning to play.

Tab has sidelined this logical and enabling explanation in favour of the dumb tyranny of the game 'Simple Simon Says'. Do this when I tell you without knowing why you're doing this.

Is it any wonder that the OP's hungry and inquiring mind senses something obvious is missing?