This ActionTab is from the Fundamentals lessons in the Guitar Theory Section.

The note we start from tells us WHICH chromatic scale we are playing. We call it the root note. This is considered the dominant tone for any scale or chord that you play. That is why even though a C major chord has different notes blended together (C, E, G) we call it a C major chord and not an E or a G chord. C is the dominant tone, hence the chord is named by it. The other notes are considered relative to it.

The same is true for scales. If we start from the A note and play all 12 notes, then we are said to be playing the A Chromatic scale. Like in our previous exercises and examples. If we start from a C (and play through to the next C) that will be called the C chromatic scale.

Here is the C Chromatic scale:

C - C# - D - D# - E - F - F# - G - G# - A - A# - B - C (octave)

Notice the 12 notes that we play are exactly the same as the A chromatic scale - the only difference is that we cycle through them starting from C (the dominant tone / root note) to the next C (octave). That is from frets 3 - 15 on the A string.

Remember that the notes with # symbols could be called by their b names instead. Here we are just choosing to use the # names to keep things straightforward.