Play great guitar Rooksby... · 2020. 1. 17. · You know, my lover she ain’t gone! Must be...

Play great guitar

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“The guitar is a small orchestra. It is polyphonic. Every string is a

different colour, a different voice.”Andrés Segovia

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brilliantideas

Play great guitar

Brilliant ideas for getting more out of your six-string

RIKKY ROOKSBY

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Copyright © The Infinite Ideas Company Limited, 2008

Music copyright © 2008 Rikky Rooksby

The right of Rikky Rooksby to be identified as the author of this book has beenasserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 2008 byThe Infinite Ideas Company Limited36 St GilesOxford, OX1 3LDUnited Kingdomwww.infideas.com

All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of small passages for thepurposes of criticism or review, no part of this publication may bereproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by anymeans, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning orotherwise, except under the terms of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act1988 or under the terms of a licence issued by the Copyright LicensingAgency Ltd, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP, UK, without thepermission in writing of the publisher. Requests to the publisher should beaddressed to the Permissions Department, Infinite Ideas Limited, 36 St Giles,Oxford, OX1 3LD, UK, or faxed to +44 (0)1865 514777.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978–1–905940–56–1

Brand and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of theirrespective owners.

Designed and typeset by Baseline Arts Ltd, OxfordPrinted in India

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Brilliant ideas

Brilliant features .................................................................................................................xii

Introduction.........................................................................................................................xiii

1. It’s a classical gas, gas, gas ..........................................................................................1

You play guitar, so what is more important than choice of instrument? First brilliant idea:

get a new guitar. Go on, admit it … you hoped I’d say this, didn’t you?

2. This machine kills boredom...........................................................................................5

Walk down a city street anywhere in the world and the chances are if you meet a guitar-

wielding busker they will be singing to the backing of a strummed steel-strung acoustic.

3. Tune up, plug in, turn on ...............................................................................................9

So you think electric guitars are only for unwashed youths in low-slung denim who like noise

with a capital N and have band names like Unholy Doom tattooed on their knuckles?

4. Cop a capo.....................................................................................................................13

Think of Paul Weller’s ‘Wild Wood’, Oasis’ ‘Wonderwall’ and Travis’ ‘Why Does It Always

Rain On Me’ … you’ll never get any of them to sound right on guitar without one of these.

5. A rule of thumb ............................................................................................................17

They may be digitally challenged in the finger-length stakes – but hey! Equal rights for

thumbs now! Your music might occasionally need a fretting thumb.

6. Going offbeat ................................................................................................................23

Here’s a quick way to make your guitar playing take off. The clue to playing many songs

in folk and blues fingerstyles is the offbeat (syncopated) pattern.

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7. Flatpicking – best of both worlds ..............................................................................27

You know about playing guitar with a pick or playing with your fingers.

But why not do both at once? Think you can’t do both at once? Read on.

8. The art of strumming ...................................................................................................31

As famed French hot-jazz guitarist Des Cartes once said, I strum, therefore I am.

Strum well and the whole world strums with you (in an air guitar kind of way).

9. Learn some new chords ...............................................................................................35

If harmony is a continent of sound and emotion, each chord is a village. So why not go

travelling occasionally and find other places to make your own.

10. Get flat – stay sharp ....................................................................................................41

Think of a piano keyboard. It has two colours, white and black. Chords are that way too,

on piano or guitar. So come and meet the five flats and sharps.

11. Seventh heaven ............................................................................................................45

It only takes one extra note to move from the vanilla world of major and minor chords

to the chocolate chip tub of the sevenths … and in four flavours too!

12. Be diverted – get inverted!.........................................................................................49

Strum any major or minor chord. It’s a familiar sound. But did you know there are two

more shades of the same colour contained in what you’ve just heard?

13. Exotic stacks .................................................................................................................53

If Idea 11 was seventh heaven, then step up now for cloud nine. Here are some ninths and

elevenths – chords that are seriously stacked.

14. Triads you can trust......................................................................................................57

When it comes to chords, size isn’t everything. Three-string friends to beginner and

experienced player alike, here are the triads – the harmony gang that’s on your side.

Play great guitar

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15. New light on ‘power-chords’ .......................................................................................63

Did you know that music harmony has its own neutral zone? It’s true – a strange dank

realm of drooling zombie flesh-eating chords that emerge as neither major nor minor.

16. Lift a finger/add a finger .............................................................................................67

There’s one reliable fall-back for finding new sounds and ideas on the guitar. Sometimes

all that is required is ‘adjusted original digital technology’. In other words, move a finger!

17. No holds barred, or no barrés held? ...........................................................................71

Here’s your free upgrade to the ‘adjusted original digital technology’ of the previous

section, called ‘digital removal software’ … otherwise known as lifting a 1st finger that’s

holding a barré!

18. Move on up, move on back .........................................................................................75

One way to find new sounds on the guitar is to take an open string chord and move it

up or down. Get ready for hideous, kinky, startling and terrific.

19. The one-note shift........................................................................................................79

Altering one note at a time in a chord leads you down new musical paths. Let your fingers

reshape themselves into new chords and go places you haven’t been before.

20. Instant blues.................................................................................................................85

Blues is like a universal language. Everybody recognises it, everybody can follow where a

blues is going, and for decades the guitar has been its main mouthpiece.

21. Sweet blues ..................................................................................................................89

Woke up this morning … Dang! You know, my lover she ain’t gone! Must be celebration

time, and to celebrate on guitar you need another set of five notes.

22. You hexy thing ..............................................................................................................93

You’ve heard of that old black magic so many blues guitarists claim to know? Well, put

aside that shredded bat wing and the voodoo doll, and grab some musical magic.

Brilliant ideas

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23. The not so famous five ................................................................................................97

There are five-note scales that don’t get played as often as those used in blues and rock.

Here’s a chance to explore some of these not-so-famous five.

24. Seven up (and down) .................................................................................................103

Is there life beyond pentatonics? Does everything go in fives? Will our caped guitarists

escape the hex and find the missing two notes? Tune in to this section’s exciting episode!

25. Magic numbers, magic changes.................................................................................107

With a three and a four and a twelve and a … You might have heard people say that music

has a mathematical element. Well, maths was never this much fun.

26. It’s the reel thing ........................................................................................................113

Here’s a new musical avenue to explore that may see you in future years in the corner

of a boisterous pub playing folk tunes with others, your fingers a blur.

27. The twang’s the thang................................................................................................117

Before Hendrix and Clapton, the guitar came to the forefront of popular music by doing

what singers do: it carried a melody – but in its own twangy way.

28. Two notes from one ...................................................................................................121

It’s 3 a.m. In the lounge bar the barman sets you up another drink.

There’s no sign of her. You sigh, grab your guitar and play … octaves!

29. Two voices, two fingers .............................................................................................127

With only two notes you can create the illusion of two voices and even whole chords.

Do what two singers do when they harmonise, but lay it on the fretboard.

30. Riffing out ...................................................................................................................131

Heard of ‘carbon neutral’? Heavy rock wants to be tonal neutral. There are no major

or minor chords in the lost, dark dimensions, just a two-finger fifth.

Play great guitar

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31. A hand full of weather...............................................................................................137

The sky changes, the land stays still. Make a low open string your land and let your

fingers make weather. Here is the dramatic foundation of the pedal note.

32. When a note stays the same .....................................................................................141

Imagine music where one note stays the same regardless. Where one note stays the same

regardless. Where one note … Let’s hear it for the drone … drone … drone.

33. A touch of retuning ....................................................................................................145

Let’s twist again … with those tuning pegs. They can do more than just keep things in

tune. With a turn of even one peg, new music beckons in ‘drop D’.

34. A sneaky rocker ..........................................................................................................149

‘Drop D’ tuning is not just for folk-style fingerpicking and gentle acoustic singer-songwriters.

It’s a motherlode of heavy guitar riffs. GrrrROWWLL!

35. Voyage to the bottom of the C..................................................................................155

Take the 6th string down even further but add a new dimension to the result by putting

on a capo. Result: deep bass, and new sounds from common chords.

36. Top down a notch .......................................................................................................159

Guitar retrieved from baggage hold yields new music after long flight? Can it be true?

Yes it can. Find some new chords with this one easy tuning change.

37. Through a harmonic rift .............................................................................................163

Remember those nasty sharps and flats? Time to seek out new musical ideas, and to

boldly go into the harmonic rift and into the Kingdom of the Enharmonics!

38. Look Ma, no hands .....................................................................................................167

Wouldn’t it be great if you could just play guitar with one finger … no more struggling

with four-finger chord shapes … but wait! There is a way …

Brilliant ideas

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39. Taking the lead ...........................................................................................................171

Here’s a chance to try some lead guitar phrases over a chord sequence. Get to grips with

some classic bends and scale positions, then play your own.

40. New wine from old bottles........................................................................................177

Get those favourite phrases out of the cupboard and dust them down. If you’ve been

playing for a while, you’ll have plenty. You can do more with them.

41. Learning to decorate ..................................................................................................181

There’s more than one way to skin a cat, says the proverb. Likewise, how do the pros get

to sound so good? There’s more than one way to play a note.

42. Ethereal bells ..............................................................................................................185

Hidden on each fret of the guitar are the high-pitched ‘ghost’ notes known as harmonics.

Learn how to get them and where to find any harmonic you want.

43. White knight/black knight.........................................................................................189

Here is the grandaddy of all rock rhythm figures, from boogie-woogie piano and

Chuck Berry in the 1950s to Status Quo and Oasis doing ‘Cigarettes and Alcohol’.

44. Moonlit stroll ..............................................................................................................193

Simple guitar fingerpicking can be an accompaniment to singing. But with a few

embellishments it can sound like instrumental music in its own right.

45. A fistful of lute...........................................................................................................199

Take a trip back in time with the Infinite Ideas Time Machine and sample (no, not that

kind of sample, Perkins!) the sound of the age of Elizabeth and Shakespeare.

46. The transatlantic rag ..................................................................................................203

Could it be two nations divided by a common … key signature? Here’s a fusion of

American and British fingerstyle guitar music to stretch your hands and your musical

imagination.

Play great guitar

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47. The big ring .................................................................................................................207

You know that irritating moment when you’re trapped in a bus or train, and there’s a big

ring, and someone reaches for their cellphone? Well, this is so much better!

48. Twelve’s ocean.............................................................................................................211

Think of the intros to The Eagles’ ‘Hotel California’, David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’,

Led Zeppelin’s ‘Tangerine’, or Boston’s ‘More Than A Feeling’ … what gives those acoustic

guitars that sparkle?

49. The joy of bass............................................................................................................215

The pulsing, deep throb of the electric bass. You may have never consciously listened

to it. But it’s there, in the depths, driving the groove of most songs.

50. Write a happy song ....................................................................................................219

Have you got a song inside you? Many harbour the desire to write a song. It isn’t that

difficult a thing to do, otherwise there wouldn’t be so many people doing it!

51. Write a sad song.........................................................................................................223

Is it raining on your parade? Everyone likes sad songs. There have probably been more

tear-soaked chart hits than happy songs. Songwriters will tell you its easier to write a sad

song than a happy one.

52. Listen to a new guitarist ...........................................................................................227

Many great players have played the same basic instrument as you. Down the decades

their recordings still sound, to amaze and inspire. It’s your inheritance.

Where it’s at .....................................................................................................................234

Index

Brilliant ideas

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Play great guitar

Brilliant featuresEach chapter of this book is designed to provideyou with an inspirational idea that you can readquickly and put into practice straight away.

Throughout you’ll find three features that will help you getright to the heart of the idea:

■ Here’s an idea for you Take it on board and give it a go – right here, right now. Get anidea of how well you’re doing so far.

■ Defining idea Words of wisdom from masters and mistresses of the art, plus someinteresting hangers-on.

■ How did it go? If at first you do succeed, try to hide your amazement. If, on theother hand, you don’t, then this is where you’ll find a Q and A that highlightscommon problems and how to get over them.

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Introduction

You know, you’re never alone with a guitar

Hold a guitar and you hold the world’s most popular musical instrument.The piano may beat it for range and complexity, but you can’t take a pianoon the bus or hitch-hiking. The guitar is seriously portable. And if your guitar is thetype that doesn’t need electricity, you can carry it anywhere and play almostanywhere. Right now, there are thousands of people across the planet, squatting on abeach somewhere or sitting in a city park, strumming a few chord shapes and singing.

You’re never alone with a guitar, whether it’s acoustic or electric. We’re accustomed tothem now, but back in the 1950s, it was as if electric guitars were from Mars. Anelectric guitar is the sound of the later urban twentieth century. Plugged in, it makes asimple chord last for many seconds. Plugged into a powerful enough amplifier andturned up L-O-U-D, the six strings of a guitar make enough noise to fill a hall the sizeof an aircraft hangar. Don’t you think that’s quite something?

You’re never alone with a guitar because of its history. Run your hand over those sixstrings, those frets, and think of the thousands of great popular songs that originatedin it. The guitar is also an instrument that allows even a beginner who knows onlythree chord shapes to make pleasing harmony. And certainly enough sound to singover. Think of all the buskers in the subways and the parks. Many songs that only hadthree chords have made the world swoon.

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You never finish learning a musical instrument; it’s an adventure that never ends. Thisbook is another part of that adventure. Exploring music is exchanging one eventhorizon for the next, in any direction, 360 degrees of opportunity. Which way you gojust depends on what kind of music you want to play.

If guitar is a hugely popular instrument, it is also one which people learn in odd andhaphazard ways. When I began my journey with the guitar there were almost no tutorbooks, no guitar magazines with TAB transcriptions, no tutorial videos and DVDs andno websites. Sheet music for songs was arranged for piano/vocal. If you were fortunateit might include chord boxes … but not necessarily the right ones nor in the right key!So you figured things out as best you could by ear, by looking at photographs ofplayers’ hands, or by knowing someone who could show you something new.

On the guitar journey there’s always something new to find out. Often doors will openwith a touch of lateral thinking. Play Great Guitar gives a range of new ideas for theinstrument, whatever style of music you like. Everyone has times with the guitarwhere it seems as though there’s nothing new to discover. You feel stuck with whatyou know, and what you know seems overfamiliar. Flick through these pages and tryout these ideas, and this will help you get unstuck.

These examples provide ideas and techniques which apply to a variety of musicalgenres. It doesn’t matter whether you play on acoustic or electric, with a pick or withyour fingers. Some give chord boxes for you to experiment with in your own way.Others provide standard music notation with guitar TAB underneath. These areavailable as mp3 files (see opposite) on the Infinite Ideas website, so don’t worry aboutwhether or not you can read music. The combination of audio and TAB will ensureyou pick things up. The audio gives you the rhythm and an overall impression, theTAB tells you where to put your fingers.

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Play great guitar

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Play Great Guitar can be dipped into as you please. Discover new sounds, and connecttechniques and patterns you already know. You’ll maximise the knowledge you alreadyhave, and glimpse new musical horizons. Things you never understood before willbecome clear. You’ll find new slants on chord shapes, chord types, fingerpicking andstrumming, scales and single note melodies, and altered tunings. There are even a fewshort pieces for you to learn, and, if you harbour some creative ambitions, a few hintsabout writing a song. Among these pages you may find the sound that will personallyappeal so much that it prompts a whole new musical adventure.

Think of your guitar. Maybe you can see it propped up, out of the corner of your eye asyou read this. The silence of your unplayed instrument, waiting, is not an emptysilence. It is a silence teeming with potential sounds – like an ocean crowded with fish– with as yet undiscovered music. Over the years I’ve been out fishing many times,and I’ve pulled some of the ideas and approaches in these pages out of that silence.Now they’re waiting for you, your fingers, your guitar. Go and discover them!

Throughout the book some ideas are marked with the symbol . These ideasfeature short original compositions by the author that will help you put intopractice the techniques detailed in the text. To help you follow the pieces, Rikky hassupplied MP3 files of himself playing the compositions. To hear Rikky playing hiscompositions go to www.infideas.com/guitar and follow the instructions todownload the MP3 files you require.

Introduction

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It’s a classical gas, gas, gasYou play guitar, so what is more important than choice ofinstrument? First brilliant idea: get a new guitar. Go on,admit it … you hoped I’d say this, didn’t you?

The guitar is a versatile music-making tool. Whatcould be more natural than to have two? Imagine a mechanicwho turned up to fix your car with only one spanner.

GUITARS OLD AND NEW

If you go on a journey, it is sensible to choose a good travelling companion. A newinstrument can really reignite your passion for the guitar. So let’s review thepossibilities.

Before parting with your money, you want to know what a particular type of guitarcan do for you. So take a fresh look at your own guitar. How old is it? How long haveyou had it? How did you come by it in the first place? Did you choose it, or didsomeone get it for you? Is it the right guitar for what you want to do? Is it holding youback in some way? Is there a style of guitar music you would like to play which won’twork on your current model?

People usually learn guitar on a cheap, knocked-about instrument. That’s a gooddiscipline, tough as it seems, because when you get a better one it makes many thingsseem easier. But it is not good to persist with a poor instrument if it discourages you –either because it is hard to play or because it doesn’t have a good sound for the music

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you play on it. Cheap guitars have twomain vices. First, they are hard to tuneand are not in tune consistently acrossthe fretboard. The higher up thefretboard you venture, the more obviousthis becomes. Second, they have a high‘action’. The action is the height of thestrings from the fretboard. A high actionmakes it hard to hold down notes,especially more than one at a time, as in abarré chord.

When you go to buy a new guitar, checkthe action of the guitars. Try a barréchord at the first fret andanywhere from the fifth fretupward. How easy is it to holddown? The action should, atthe extreme, never be higherthan a ¼ inch anywhere onthe neck. Play a chord and

listen for how long it sustains. Run your fingercarefully along the edge of the fretboard to makesure there are no sharp edges on the fret ends.See that you feel comfortable with the weightand the shape of the instrument. Compare asmany as you can. Guitars can vary in qualityby a surprising amount even in the same pricebracket.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...It isn’t fair to say the classical

guitar has only one sound,

dictated by the nylon strings.

Experiment with where you

strike the string and the tone

changes. Play close to the

bridge to get a treble, brittle

tone; play on the edge of the

soundhole for a neutral

sound; play right over the

edge of the fretboard to

achieve the mellowest tone.

These tone variations apply to

all guitars, including electrics,

but are especially noticeable

on acoustic guitars, and a

central means of expression

on the classical guitar.


THE CLASSICAL/SPANISH GUITAR

Assuming you have a steel-strung acoustic, the first new guitaroption to review is the classical or ‘Spanish’ guitar. Associated inworld music with flamenco, and in the concert hall with greatssuch as Andrés Segovia, Julian Bream and John Williams, aclassical guitar has a very individual character. They are foundmore often in second-hand shops than other types, so youcould save some money that way, although these will oftenbe poor quality. Mason Williams’ single ‘Classical Gas’, JoséFeliciano’s cover of The Doors ‘Light My Fire’ and the Beatles‘And I Love Her’ are good examples of popular songs thatused it.

In terms of playability the neckof a classical guitar is wider, sobarré chords are more of avertical stretch. The fretboardis shorter and access abovethe twelfth fret is limited,unless you get a modernmodel with a non-

traditional cutaway. The action is often higher thanother types of guitar, but this is compensated for bythe tension of the strings being less. The all-important bit is the fact that it is strung withnylon strings. These are softer on the frettingfingers and have a different tone colour to thesteel strings of a folk acoustic – not so brightand ringing, more rounded and warm. Forchildren there are smaller sizes available.

Idea 1 – It’s a classical gas, gas, gas

Defining idea...‘The guitar is a small orchestra.

It is polyphonic. Every string is

a different colour, a different

voice.’ Andrés Segovia

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4

Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q I have a classical guitar. Can I not strum chords on it?A You can, but strumming chords is less effective compared to strumming a

steel-strung acoustic. The nylon-strung guitar has less sustain, it doesn’tsound so bright when strummed, and the ‘muted’ quality of the sound isincreased if you don’t use a pick but strum with your thumb or the side ofyour hand. Therefore, the darker, mellower tone sounds better playedfingerstyle. String bending is not an option, and the options for alteredtunings are limited.

Q Do I have to read music to play classical guitar pieces?A There are books of classical guitar pieces available which also provide TAB

notation (and sometimes a CD of the music played), but my advice would beto avoid these and go with learning to read music. This is not that difficult,because you soon recognise the open strings and they act as a signpost tothe pitch of everything else.

Q Are there any techniques special to classical guitar?A To get the most tone during a solo playing single notes, use the technique

known as the ‘rest’ stroke. Strike the string with a fairly straight finger, almostat right angles to the string, bringing it through the string until it rests on theone immediately lower in pitch. This technique is never used on a steel-stringor an electric, but funnily enough it is used on electric bass guitar.


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This machine kills boredomWalk down a city street anywhere in the world and thechances are if you meet a guitar-wielding busker they will besinging to the backing of a strummed steel-strung acoustic.

The ‘folk’ guitar has become the true guitar of thepeople. This is the type of guitar that allows you to createa loud enough harmony to sing famous songs and write yourown.

THE STEEL-STRUNG/‘FOLK’ GUITAR

It’s as portable as a classical guitar but makes more sound, which is ideal forstrumming in those busy precincts. Steel-strung acoustic guitars come in more shapesand sizes than you might think. Not all are physically bulky and deep-bodiedmeasured front-to-back, so shop around and try slimmer-bodied acoustics – like the so-called ‘parlour’ models – if the larger ones feel too awkward. If you think you want tostand up and play, check that the guitar has the requisite strap-buttons alreadyattached to it.

The thickness of the neck and width of the fretboard also contribute to how playablethe guitar feels. Check the width of the fretboard by playing a first position C chord.We can notate this shape x32010. The first character is the lowest pitched string (the6th) and the last character is the top (1st) string; the numbers are frets, and ‘x’ is astring not played. See if it is hard to put your first finger in position so that it doesn’ttouch the first or third strings and stop them vibrating cleanly. Make sure the nails on


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your fretting hand are kept very short, otherwise they interferewith holding down notes and making a good contact with theneck. Fingernails can also leave marks on the fingerboard. (Also

on the subject of fingernails, if you wantto fingerpick with your nails keep

them well-shaped so thatthey’re less likely to snag on

something and break.)

Another possible design featureis a single ‘cutaway’ – a bite out of

the body that allows easier access tothe higher frets. Unless you play lots

of high single-note ‘lead’ lines acutaway is not important (though some

like cutaways for aesthetic reasons). Mostacoustic guitar music is fingered wellbelow the seventh fret, and relative

beginners play mostly in the ‘open’ positionaround the first couple of frets, where open-string chord shapes are located.

Some steel-strung acoustics also offer theoption of a built-in pick-up so the guitar can be

played through an amp. You may think thisonly means you can play it louder, andif not performing it isn’t somethingyou will use. Well, surprise! Actually,

that pick-up is potentially an entry to awhole new world of sound. It means youcan plug your guitar into an effectsprocessor and subject it to sound

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Experiment with your string

gauges. When it comes to

strings, choice is a

compromise between

conflicting gains. The lighter

the string the easier the

guitar is to play. Barré chords

and string bending are easier

with light strings. The heavier

the string the less likelihood

there is of fret buzz and

rattle, and the more volume

and tone you can get from

the guitar. But heavier strings

are harder on the fingers and

can make the action tougher

because of increased string

tension. Err on the side of

lighter gauge to begin with

and see how you get on.


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modifying, such as chorus, phasing, reverb andecho. You can plug into an amp, add a little reverband a short echo, and then place the amp severalfeet away facing you. Balance the volume of theacoustic guitar to what comes out of the amp, and geta fuller, more colourful sound, great for playing onyour own.

In terms of playability the neck of a steel-stringacoustic is narrower than a classical guitar, so barréchords are less of a vertical stretch but may requiremore pressure. The fretboard is longer and joins thebody around the fifteenth fret. The brighter, metallictone colour is effective as a background for otherinstruments or for dominating anarrangement. Fingerpick it or strum it orboth, play instrumentals, sing or writesongs, bend or retune strings – the steel-string acoustic does all these things.

In popular music the steel-string acousticis everywhere, appearing in a hugenumber of styles from folk, country,blues, rock ’n’ roll, pop and on TV andfilm soundtracks. The sound of thesteel-string guitar signifies countryand urban living, roots, sincerity.This was exemplified by the MTVUnplugged series of concerts in the1990s, in which famous bands andguitarists put aside their electrics andamps to get closer to the people bygoing acoustic.

Idea 2 – This machine kills boredom

Defining idea...‘You play less [on acoustic],

and it counts more because

you don’t have the amp to

resonate the notes.’

Izzy Stradlin, Guns ‘n’ Roses


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Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q Do I have to read music to play acoustic guitar pieces?A Not necessarily. Most books of steel-string acoustic guitar pieces available

provide TAB notation (and sometimes a CD of the music played). Theseencompass folk tunes, standards, show tunes, chart instrumentals andarrangements of famous songs. If you prefer at this stage to strum the chordsto songs, look out for the chord songbook format which provides lyrics andchord boxes.

Q Are there any techniques special to steel-string guitar?A Probably the first ones that come to mind are playing slide (or bottleneck)

guitar, as in blues, and bending strings, neither of which are done on aclassical guitar. To play slide effectively, however, the guitar needs to have ahigher than average action and heavier gauge strings. This is to stop the sliderattling on the frets and pushing the strings against the fretboard. Slide guitarmusic is often performed in altered tunings, which is another technique morecommon to steel-string guitar than classical. Tunings feature in Ideas 33–38,45 and 47.

Q Owww … Help! My fingers are sore.A Don’t worry. When you start playing on steel strings, either coming from nylon

strings or beginning guitar, it is usual for your fingers to get sore on the tips.Stop well before you get to the point of blisters. Practise a little each day.Gradually the soreness will go away and the skin will harden.


9

3

Tune up, plug in, turn onSo you think electric guitars are only for unwashed youths inlow-slung denim who like noise with a capital N and haveband names like Unholy Doom tattooed on their knuckles?

Take a fresh look at the most abused instrument inthe known musiverse, the sound of the urban mid–latetwentieth century, all in six strings, 22 frets, and severalelectro-magnetic pick-ups.

TURNING ON TO ELECTRIC GUITAR

If you already play acoustic you may wonder, what is it like to make the transition toelectric? It may be much less of an issue than you imagine. For a start, the electric istuned the same, so all the notes and chords are in the places where you left them. Butthe electric has lighter strings. Your sore fingertips are cooing with pleasure already.This makes string bending practicable and easier. Electric guitars tend to have betteractions (i.e. lower) than acoustic guitars, so cheap electrics are often easier to play thancheap acoustics. Electrics can be hollow-body (like the f-hole Gibson 335) or solid body.They can have a single cutaway (as on the Gibson Les Paul which is otherwise based onthe body shape of a classical guitar) or a double cutaway (as on the Gibson SG orFender Stratocaster).

They have two or three pick-ups, of the kind known as single and/or double-coil. Thepick-ups give an emphasised version of the sounds which naturally occur on anacoustic guitar when you play right over the soundhole at the edge of the fretboard,


10

just at the edge of the soundhole, or close to the bridge. A guitarwith three single-coil pick-ups provides five different tones fromits selector switch, and these can be further changed by turningthe tone controls. A guitar with two double-coil pick-upsprovides three basic tones from its toggle switch, which can befurther altered with the tone controls.

Some electric guitars are equipped with avibrato bar (or tremolo arm) – which lets youwiggle it to bend the pitch of the notes. ThinkHank Marvin/The Shadows/‘Apache’ for mildwigglification; think Hendrix/Woodstock/‘Star-Spangled Banner’ for extreme wigglification.

PLUGGING IN: THE BIG BOX THINGY(AND THE GOOD NEWSTHEREOF)

Traditionally, electricguitars require anamplifier to be heard.However, an amp isnot strictly necessary.

If you’re not bothered about other peoplehearing you, or you want to play late atnight, invest first in a suitable effectsprocessor. It lets you hear your electricguitar on headphones with effects such asoverdrive, echo and reverb. Your partner

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Try playing through a song

and just play the root notes

of the chords on the bass

strings. An electric guitar part

doesn’t have to mean playing

chords. On tracks like The

Beatles’ ‘Help’, T.Rex’s ‘Metal

Guru’, Oasis’ ‘Live Forever’,

Catatonia’s ‘I Am The Mob’,

and Queen’s ‘Bohemian

Rhapsody’, some of the guitar

parts are single-note phrases,

accentuating the root notes of

the chords. This is great for

beginners because it sidesteps

the initial challenge of holding

complete chords but allows

you to play along with CDs.

Later you can switch to full

chords.


11

can be watching TV in the next room and have no clue that thevague tinkling noise they hear as you strike the strings sounds toyou like 300 watts of insane valve amplification drowning outpassing jumbo jets. Some effects units can also feed in sound froma CD so you can play along.

Now, here’s a special message to my female readers. There is no law in the musiversewhich states that female guitarists are destined only to thrum cheap nylon-strungguitars or struggle with steel-string acoustics. Lots of blokes play electric guitar, andlots of blokes sell them in music shops. Women, do not let this stop you investigatingelectric guitars. Electrics offer much less resistance when it comes tophysically managing the fretboard (lighter strings, lower action) – andyou can make it sound however you want. This can make all thedifference when you’re starting out.

Versatility. That, in one word, is what the electric guitar excels at. Youcan play just about any style of music you want to on an electric,from smooth, clean, mellow jazz lines to acoustic simulations, tophased funk, to screaming, clanky heavy metal.

This versatility has increased exponentially since the advent of digital‘modelling’ techniques in the 1990s. It is now possible to buy an electric guitarthat approximates a dozen famous guitar sounds.

Idea 3 – Tune up, plug in, turn on

Defining idea...‘I want every girl in the world

to pick up a guitar and start

screaming.’ Courtney Love


12

Q People say learn on an acoustic first before you buy an electric. Is this true?

A If you really want to play electric guitar styles then get one from the start.Techniques like string bending or high soloing can’t be done on an acoustic,plus you won’t have the initial satisfaction of playing simple riffs. But if youhave to learn for a time on acoustic there are benefits in terms of handstrength. Cope with the physical challenge of holding chords on an acousticwith its higher action, and when you do go to electric it will seem so mucheasier.

Q What are ‘copy’ guitars and are they as good as the originals?A ‘Copy’ guitars resemble certain famous (usually) American brands and models.

Thirty years ago they were cheap but of dubious quality. In the mid-1970scompanies like Tokai started making better quality imitations for a third of theprice of the originals. Not long after, companies like Fender and Gibsondeveloped budget versions of their own models under names like Squier andEpiphone. Copy guitars can offer good value for money, and the chance toown something that looks like the real thing. The originals use superiormaterials, have better pick-ups, are finished to a higher standard and haveThat Name on the headstock. Whether they are better by the proportionimplied by the multiples of the copy’s price they cost is open to debate.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


13

4

Cop a capoThink of Paul Weller’s ‘Wild Wood’, Oasis’ ‘Wonderwall’ andTravis’ ‘Why Does It Always Rain On Me’ … you’ll never getany of them to sound right on guitar without one of these.

Ah, the capo. What a fabulous gadget. To use itproperly is to love it. No batteries, no recharging, no mains,and it fits in your pocket.

For the guitarist a capodastro (or ‘capo’ for short) is a very flexible friend, and more user-friendly than that other flexible ‘friend’ … your credit card. The former helps you playin difficult keys; the other keys you into difficulty … every time you enter a musicshop or visit guitars-r-us.com. A capo will make sure your rendition of many songs isright on the money; a credit card will make sure guitars-r-us.com are on your money.By the way, for those of you planning foreign holidays, ‘capo tasto’ is Italian, ‘capo’meaning head, ‘tasto’ meaning tie, fret, or key. (This should serve to get you arrested ifyou use it when speaking to a member of the Italian police who isn’t a guitar player.)

CAPOS DOWN THE AGES (OR AT LEAST SINCE ELVIS)

The capo was invented to solve practical problems caused by wanting to play frettedinstruments in other keys than the ones with easy fingering. The capo became popularin the early 1960s when singer-songwriters associated with the folk and protestmovements, such as Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, used capoed acoustic guitars. So did thesinger-songwriters who followed them – Simon and Garfunkel, Donovan, Cat Stevens,James Taylor and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. Varying the key of songs is important,


14

especially if your knowledge of chords is limited. Since the 1960sthe capo has been a permanent fixture of guitar technique inmany styles.

A capo reduces the number of barré chords in a song. It can alsoincrease the playability of a guitar by lowering the action a little.If the string tension is tight, try tuning a semitone below concertpitch and put a capo at the first fret, or even tune a tone downwith the capo at the second fret. Also, once the capo reaches thesixth or seventh fret the guitar sounds different, because of theloss of low bass notes and the addition of more high notes. Youcan even make new chord shapes that involve stretchesimpossible lower down the neck.

If you work with another guitarist, or multi-track guitar parts, acapo can be employed to double a chord sequence in differentpositions, so the two guitars play contrasting shapes on eachchord. This gives a fuller musical texture and can evenapproximate a 12-string even if you don’t have one. If a chordsequence in A major in open position is also played as if in Cmajor with a capo at the ninth fret, the overall span of sound isricher.

PUTTING IT ON RIGHT

Capos come in many designs, and since the 1970s capo design has improved greatly.Putting a capo on a guitar often causes the need to retune. This is because for the capoto not muffle the strings it must exert pressure. This pressure may cause the thickerstrings to go slightly sharp. The heavier the gauge of strings the more noticeable thisis. You can put it on with your left hand, but many people get their right hand to helpput it on as part of their music-making.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...A capo is the easiest way to

change the key of a song to

suit your voice. Imagine a

song in G major with the

progression G–C–D–Em. The

chords are simple but let’s say

the key is too low for you to

sing. By fixing the capo at the

third fret you can play the

same open-string shapes but

are now singing a minor third

higher in Bb major (the true

pitch of the chords now being

Bb–Eb–F–Gm). A capo can also

bring a key down if the

highest notes of the melody

are too high.


15

Idea 4 – Cop a capo

To get a clean sound and better intonation the capo needs to beplaced close to the fret, but not too close otherwise the capointerferes with the fingering of chords and notes on the firstadjacent fret. If the capo is placed away from the fret to give yourhand more room to move it can increase the amount of tuningproblem. Capo positioning means ensuring the capo is alignedvertically, so the strings are not pulled up or down from theirusual position.

Q My friend says that capos are a cheat.A Well, silly them. Playing an instrument is about making music. Technique and

technology serve that end. A capo allows you to play fluently in difficult keys.Try playing Simon and Garfunkel’s ‘America’ or T.Rex’s ‘Ride A White Swan’without a capo! Even if you had the strength to play in a key with many barréchords, such as Ab (as with ‘Swan’), it makes a different sound and preventsthe embellishments typical of fingerpicking styles because you won’t have anyfree fingers. A capo lets you get more out of a single open tuning (see Idea35) by raising its pitch to different keys.

Q Does it matter what sort of capo I get?A Most capos fit most necks but a curved neck will mean a straight capo won’t

make good contact with the top and bottom Es at the same time. If you wantto capo a 12-string or nylon-strung guitar, check the capo copes with thewider neck. Second, how quick a change do you need to make and how criticalis tuning stability? If you need a capo for live performance then it is worthspending extra on a quick-release model.

Q I’ve heard there are capos that let you set individual strings?A True – but they’re like exotic pets. You can live without one – unless you know

exactly what you want it for!

Defining idea...‘‘Drowned’ is in the key of C. I

use a capo on my guitar at

the fifth fret then I play the

song in the “G” shape, it gives

a nice ring to the chords.’

Pete Townshend, The Who

How didit go?


16

Play great guitar

‘I 'm not good enough tobe playin' much acousticguitar onstage. Man, yougotta get it so right; I mean, the tones, thefeel, the sound. Plus,acoustic blues guitar isjust that much harderon the fingers. I really

appreciate whensomeone can blow me

away with live acousticblues.’

Johnny Winter


17

5

A rule of thumbThey may be digitally challenged in the finger-length stakes – but hey! Equal rights for thumbsnow! Your music might occasionally need a frettingthumb.

The thumb has its place in holding down strings. It makessome chords easier, some sound better, it can mute notesyou don’t want and free up fingers for other things.

A THUMBS UP FOR THUMBS UP

Most of the time the fretting thumb perches behind the neck while the fingers do thework. A good rule of thumb …er … with the thumb is to allow it its natural curve;don’t bend it at the knuckle, nor press too hard on the back of the neck. Theadvantage of a low thumb position is that it allows the hand to open and stretch. Tofeel the difference, put all four fingers on the bottom string, first finger at the fifthfret, second finger at the sixth, third finger at the seventh, fourth finger at the eighth.If you keep your thumb over the top of the neck this will be difficult. Drop it halfwaydown the back and voila! Your fingers open out and you can get them all on at once.But there are good reasons for allowing some leeway with thumb position when itcomes to playing a range of guitar music. Over the page are twelve of them – chordsthat require it.


18

With the Gmaj7, if you play only the top four strings it’s a Bmchord. But it actually changes into a Gmaj7 if the thumb adds a Gin the bass. Since all four fingers are occupied fretting notes,without the thumb there is no other way to achieve this. You canplay Gmaj7 other ways, but not with this sound. In the case ofthe Dm/F, this is an awkward chord to hold down without usingthe thumb.

The F and Fm are especially tricky for beginners. They’re a littleeasier if the thumb takes the root note on the 6th string, thusremoving the barré from both. Played this way they ease tensionin your hand in a song where there are many barré chords. TheFmaj7 is normally played as the top four strings only, but puttingthe thumb on the root note gives a deeper voicing and allows the5th string note to be played. The inverted D (D/F#) can be playedjust with the fingers but in reality many players use this formwith the thumb. F#m7add11 is a great sounding chord butunfortunately if you only use fingers it is impossible to get adecent root note F# under it. This can be remedied if you useyour thumb.

Play great guitar

1

2T

43

Gmaj7 Fm

1 1

2

T

43

F

1

2

T

4

Dm/F

1 1T

43

Here’s an idea for you...You can use your thumb to

clean up your strumming by

muting unwanted bass notes.

These are low open strings

that either don’t fit in the

chord or are not the root

note. Just rest the end half of

it on the top of the neck and

squeeze – mild pressure

squashes your thumb onto

the offending bottom E string

if it is ringing under an open

A, C, D, Am or Dm shape. The

thumb can also do this muting

job at the same time as

holding down a bass note.


T

Gm

T

Octaves

1 1

19

Gm is normally a barré chord at the third fret. But one of itsnotes is a D, so a barré Gm fails to take advantage of the open Dstring. But you can achieve it with the thumb holding G in thebass as in both of these. A small change – but even one openstring can make a difference to the resonance of a chord. Thereare G7 shapes that don’t need the thumb, so why this? Well, theadvantage is with one finger for Gm7 and two for G7, this leavesthe other two fingers free to add decorative notes when jamming on these chords. Thesame thing applies to this version of the major chord. The little finger is free to addnotes to the chord and then take them off. The thumb is holding the root note on the6th string and damping the 5th.

Idea 5 – A rule of thumb

1

2

T

43

Fmaj7

1T

43

F#m7add11

1 2T

3

D/F#

Gm7

T

G7

2

T

G

T 1 1 1 1

2

3

1 1 1

Defining idea...‘I don’t believe in getting too

technical. If it works and

sounds good – then that’s it

for me.’ Brian May, Queen


20

Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q Why have I always been told to keep my thumb below the neck?A If you’ve studied classical guitar you’re probably used to keeping your thumb

low. There’s a good reason for it: a low thumb makes it easier to hold downbarré chords. But there’s no need to stick rigidly to this. It’s not because yourthumb might be at risk of functioning as a TV aerial, or because it once had tostay low in trenches to avoid snipers.

Q Is it possible to play a double octavewith the thumb helping out?A Yes it is. Have a look at the last chord box,marked ‘Octaves’. The thumb holds the bassnote and mutes the 5th string. The third fingerholds a note and mutes the 3rd and 2ndstrings, and the first finger takes the topstring. This gives you three notes ringing andthree muted. You strum all the strings andshould only get three notes. This is quite anadvanced technique, which Jimi Hendrixdeployed in his jazzier moments.

Q Is it true Richie Havens plays mostly with his thumb?A Yes. Odd things happen to people’s technique when they are self-taught.

Richie Havens opened the 1969 Woodstock Festival armed only with anacoustic guitar and his idiosyncratic thumb-fretting technique. But it onlyworks because his guitar is in an open tuning (see Ideas 38 and 47). Formore, visit his website, www.richiehavens.com.


21


22


23

6

Going offbeat Here’s a quick way to make your guitar playing take off. Theclue to playing many songs in folk and blues fingerstyles isthe offbeat (syncopated) pattern.

Learning this rhythmically freer finger style givesyour playing more melodic interest and rhythmic sparkle.Apply this pattern to any simple chord sequence you knowand you’re halfway toward an instrumental.

WHY FINGERPICK?

The human hand has been digitally arranged (pun alert, folks!), like a pre-sliced pizza,to have fingers that can do things independent of each other. In a way, strumming theguitar is like a pianist playing the piano with a glove on one hand. Playing with thefingers allows you to separate out the basic elements of harmonic music: bass lineunderneath, melody on top, and harmony in between.

When you first learn fingerstyle the patterns are rhythmically simple. Standard easypatterns hit one string at a time, either in 3/4 or 4/4. In the former a bass note isplayed first, then strings 3–2–1–2–3 using the index (i), middle (m), and ring finger (a),(i–m–a–m–i) on the plucking hand. A typical pattern in 4/4 would be:thumb–3–2–1–2–3–2–3. To get a more interesting effect with these change the order ofstrings played after the bass note, so they don’t go predictably up and down in pitch.


24

THE OVER-HANG THANG

Fingerstyle guitar really takes off when you learn to syncopate.The thumb is the crucial agent. It alternates from the bass rootnote of a chord to another note in that chord. These thumbnotes mark the beat. Plucking fingers supply upper notes,sometimes on the beat with the thumb, but often in between,i.e. on offbeats. These offbeat notes over-hang the next beat. Thisis syncopation – not to be confused with appearing in manynewspapers at once (that’s syndication!).

Try this short piece, which has an 8-bar phrase, repeated, and asecond 4-bar phrase. The thumb notes are easy to see becausethey have tails that go down. The first 8 bars use the chords of G,C and D11 – which sounds difficult but actually is played bymoving the C shape up two frets. Hold all the notes you need forthat bar at the start of each bar; don’t put them on one at a time.The finger pattern itself lasts two bars, there being one change inthe second bar of each pair, where the third finger strikes the topstring. In bars 9–12 small variations make things more

interesting. Watch out for the double hammer-on on the first beat of bar 16.

Do you keep losing the beat? Don’t worry – that’s anormal first experience. The trick is to keep thethumb steady on the beats and make your fingersplay to it, not the other way round. Every note playedby the thumb is on the beat. Tap the beat with yourfoot. Take this slow at first, slow enough to thinkabout each note. When you feel you have the pattern,speed up gradually. Eventually you’ll play it without consciously thinking. You canthen experiment, adding more syncopated notes with your fingers.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...To train fingers and thumb to

work separately, you can

break down the given task.

Tell your thumb to play the

open D string four times in a

bar, at a slow tempo, once on

each beat. Then use your first

or second finger to play a

tune on the top two strings,

one note at a time, with some

of the notes falling in

between those played by the

thumb. If you can keep your

thumb steady during this you

will have taken a first step

toward being able to do the

whole thing.

Defining idea...‘If you want sustain on

acoustic, you have to pull it

out of your fingers more.’

Andy Summers, The Police


= 1202 3 4 5

3

00

3

00

0

3

3

0

3

00

03

02

3

10

2

6 7 8 9

3

0

23

10

25

04

5

30

45

0

45

30

47

0

57

00

5

10 11 12 13

5

04

5

30

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10

20 2

0 2

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25

Idea 6 – Going offbeat

GOING OFFBEAT


26

Q How do I know which bass strings to pick on any given chord?A The thumb generally starts a bar by hitting the root note, so whatever chord

you hold you need to know where the lowest root note is. With the eightmaster shapes, the root note is on the 6th string in E, Em and G; it’s the 5thstring in A, Am and C; and the 4th string in D and Dm. For beats 2 and 4 thethumb usually plays the ‘fifth’ of the chord, which is on the 5th string in D,Dm, E and Em; the 4th string in A, Am and G; and the 3rd string in C.Occasionally, you can alternate between the root note and the ‘third’ of thechord. This is possible on a C chord if the thumb plays the 5th string and thenthe 4th string.

Q Do I have to play this fingerstyle idea on an acoustic guitar?A No, you can play an electric with your fingers, including this type of

syncopated playing, if mindful of potential drawbacks. On an electric thestrings are slightly closer together, making it harder for the plucking fingers.Second, getting a comfortable hand position sitting down with a small-bodyelectric may be tricky. Third, the electric’s sustain makes notes last longer andthat causes some patterns to sound messy at quicker tempos because thenotes ring for too long.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


27

7

Flatpicking – best of both worlds You know about playing guitar with a pick or playing withyour fingers. But why not do both at once? Think you can’t doboth at once? Read on.

Here’s a versatile approach to playing that lets you changewithin a beat from fingerstyle to strumming to single notemelodies and lead fil ls. It’s the best of both worlds.

This style of playing is known as ‘flatpicking’. Fingerstyle players might say, ‘why do Ineed to do this? I can strum with my thumb.’ Playing with a pick gives volume, clarityand evenness to strummed chords, and rhythm and emphasis to bass notes. The pickis a sort of substitute thumb but has an edgier tone, more defined compared to thewoolly ‘thrum’ sound a thumb gives. Any pattern of fingerpicking that has thumb andtwo plucking fingers can be copied with the pick. It feels slightly awkward at first butyou get used to it. Divide the work between pick and fingers.

PICK THE GOOD PICK

To get the most out of flatpicking have a suitable pick for the job. Surprising as it mayseem, the thickness of a plectrum makes a considerable difference to the sound of anote on the guitar, as well as how easy it is to play. The thick/thin plectrum contrast islike the guitar equivalent of drummers going from sticks to wire brushes. Soexperiment with plectrums, which come in gauges from thin to thick.


28

Thick picks suit when you want to play fast and produce a loudtone, but don’t feel so good when you’re strumming. Thin pickswobble too much for fast playing but sound great for strumming,producing a softer, airier tone. Thin picks are also good forpractising upstrokes since they offer less resistance. If I’mflatpicking a song that involves any heavy riff or fast lead I’ll startwith a medium-to-thick plectrum. If it involves soft strumming,then I’ll grab a thin pick.

PLAYING THE PIECE

The aim of this piece is to give a taste of the variety of musicalfigures the flatpicking technique facilitates. The pick plays anynote with a tail going down plus the second note in the bar ifthere is an arpeggio pattern – as in bars 1–2. The upper notesshould be played by the second and third fingers. Notice in bar 3a change – the fingers pluck two notes together (you could havea whole piece with that approach alone). Watch out for singlenote runs with hammer-on/pull-off figures in bars 4 and 8, andthe decoration in bar 10. Bars 10 and 12 include chords playedonly with the pick. On the fretting hand, chord shapes occupyeither half or a whole bar, so look ahead and work out what’s

needed so you can put down all the notes to be used in a given shape. This allowsthem to sustain, so the full colour of the chord is heard. The basic chords are namedabove the bars, but you don’t need all the fingers onthat you would if you were strumming them, just theones that are played.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Try playing fast triplets to get

the flatpicking action smooth.

Set a medium tempo, hold

down a chord on the top

three strings – play three

notes on each beat, the

lowest note with your pick

and the other two notes with

second and third fingers.

Initially, each is a conscious

movement, but gradually it

becomes a single movement,

and then you can speed it up

to give a classical fast-rolling

arpeggio. There’s a great

song by The Police called

‘Bring On The Night’ which is

a fine example of how this

can be applied.

Defining idea...‘No guitar player can go

wrong if they play acoustic

guitar steadily, if they’d keep

their hand in on the acoustic.’

Keith Richards,

The Rolling Stones


29

Idea 7 – Flatpicking – best of both worlds

BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

= 742 3 4

3 2

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0

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02

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20

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4 2 0 000

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5 6 7 8

3 2

1

20

1

0

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0

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43

03

53

0

1

20

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0

3

20

32

2 0 2 03 0

02 4

34 2

9 10 11 12

3 2

00

00

0

20

23

22000

00

3

02 4

3

2

0

00

0

3

3

02

0

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0

20

003


30

Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q My hand feels slightly awkward trying flatpicking. Is this normal?A Yes, whether you usually play with a pick or fingerstyle. The main cause is the

fact that the first finger is not available for plucking duty because it grips thepick. This means your middle finger becomes a substitute index finger. As themiddle and ring fingers pluck the strings you’re conscious of the tendonspulling. The more you play like this the more this sense of stiffness fades. Thebasic pick action from the thumb is not affected, because you use thumb andfirst finger to hold a pick normally.

Q Does this technique work for electric guitar?A Yes, and advantageously. Most electric players use a pick anyway, so it’s not

such a huge step. Pick and fingers gives flexibility. If you write riffs it maymake you come up with something different. If the song you’re playing has afingerstyle passage you can avoid that business of putting the pick in yourmouth – which always risks being a bit of a choker! You can pull at the stringswith your fingers to get a snapping effect. This gives lead phrases moretexture. Listen to Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits who mostly plays electric with athumb and two fingers. His solos on ‘Sultans of Swing’ are full of the colourthat comes from playing with the fingers.


31

8

The art of strummingAs famed French hot-jazz guitarist Des Cartes once said, Istrum, therefore I am. Strum well and the whole worldstrums with you (in an air guitar kind of way).

Strumming is so basic that guitarists take it forgranted and do it instinctively. But learn some new patternsand you can improve the sound of the songs you play.

IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE STRUM

The popular ‘chord songbook’ format acknowledges that many people never take theirguitar playing much beyond strumming. Open a chord songbook by a famous bandand you find lyrics with chord names above the words, but no music or tab. The ideais to strum the chords and sing the tune from memory. Chord songbooks assumeinexperienced players can bash their way through a chord sequence. The relativesimplicity of strumming technique means you concentrate on what your fretting handdoes as it goes from one chord to another, and don’t have to worry about yourplucking hand.

A strummed guitar performs two musical tasks: one is harmonic, the other rhythmic.Melodies are supported by harmony, i.e. chords, that give the melody a context.Different chords colour the notes in contrasting ways. A strummed guitar supplies a‘wash’ of harmony. Acoustic guitars have limited sustain; within a short space of timethe notes fade away, so you hit the chord again. Strumming sustains the chord’spresence and keeps the harmonic ‘wash’ under the melody. Second, strumming


32

creates rhythm through the frequency with which chords arestruck, and by percussive noises. Both are important for soloperformers with guitar, whereas guitarists playing with a rhythmsection don’t have to carry the rhythm with their strumming andadjust accordingly.

STRUMMING PATTERNS

In this exercise there are 16 patterns using an A chord. If youlisten to the audio file you’ll hear that each bar is repeated, witha one-bar gap between each pattern (where you will only hearthe click). The first three patterns relate to the three basicrhythmic ‘levels’ of strumming: quarter-note (4 strums in a bar of4/4); eighth-note (on and off the beat, 8 strums in a bar of 4/4);and sixteenth-note (twice on and off the beat, 16 strums in a barof 4/4). Most strumming patterns mix the first two ‘levels’. Startby strumming downward on a slow-to-medium beat, counting 1... 2... 3... 4... (bar 1), then strum eighths down and up on eachbeat, counting 1-and 2-and 3-and 4-and (bar 2).

The remaining patterns demonstrate how to make strummingmore interesting, either by choosing an eighth-note strum as the

basis but removing some of the strokes and letting the chord ring (see bars 10–15), orby syncopating (as with the tied notes in bars 7 and 9), or by squeezing in the odd pairof sixteenths (as in bar 7). The cross-head notes in bars 15–16 are a useful percussiveeffect. Just before the pick hits the strings the edge of the strumming hand touchesthe strings, muting them. As the pick strikes the damped strings it gives off apercussive sound that has little or no harmonic content. Also, the edge of the handpushes the strings inward as it makes contact, causingthem to bang against the frets, adding to thepercussive effect.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you are recording a song or

instrumental, close-miking will

capture the clicking noise a

soft pick makes and adds to

the percussive side of a track.

In a heavily arranged mix

(with keyboards and/or

strings) the sound of the

guitar chords is often less

apparent than this clicking.

This noise can also be had

from an electric guitar

recorded direct into a

portastudio or other recording

device. The direct signal can

be overdriven to blazes while

a mike records the acoustic

sound of the strummed

electric straight off the

strings. Two sounds from one!

Defining idea...‘I play guitar like I’m playing

the drums.’ Bo Diddley


33

Idea 8 – The art of strumming

STRUMMING PATTERNS

2 3

4 5 6

7 8 9 10

11 12 13

14 15 16


34

Q Does it matter what kind of pick I use, and do I have to use one?A Strumming is easier with a light, flexible pick. Hard picks resist the strings,

which is fine when playing fast down-and-up strokes, as then you don’t wantany ‘give’ in the pick which will slow you up. But strumming with a hard pickfeels clunky. Light picks allow you to brush the strings and control the volume.As for whether you should use one, players strum with or without a pick. Itgives a more even sound, especially when recording, and strumming with apick you can always switch straight into single-note riffs or lead.

Q I only have a nylon-string guitar at present. Does that mean Ishouldn’t strum?

A Steel-string acoustics definitely sound better strummed than nylon-strungguitars. Played with a pick, ‘Spanish’ guitars sound a bit muddy.

Q How do I know how often I need to strum during a song?A Good strumming patterns balance tempo against sustain. At a slow tempo, you

hit the strings more frequently because the chords die away. At faster tempos,you don’t need to hit them so often, unless doing so is part of the musicalstyle – as it is in funk guitar. If you’re playing a song and the chords die awaytoo quickly leaving the melody unsupported then you need to strum moreoften in each bar.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


35

9

Learn some new chordsIf harmony is a continent of sound and emotion, each chordis a village. So why not go travelling occasionally and findother places to make your own.

We all have times when it seems as though wecan’t think of anything new to play. One of the fastestways to address this is to learn some new chords.

One reason for the guitar’s popularity is that you can get music out of it with minimaltechnique. The simplest way is to strum chords. When people first get a guitar theylearn a few shapes from a book like Chord Master, or from a guitar-playing friend. It’s aseasy as having a chord in your fretting hand and then hitting the strings all at once tomake it sound. Most people soon pick up the eight master shapes (A, C, D, E, G, Am,Dm, Em), a smattering of open-string chords, and then the odd barré shape. The goodnews is you don’t actually need tons of chords to play most rock/pop/soul/folk. So,let’s forget about quantity, and pose a different question.

Have you ever worked out how many chords you actually know? Make a list and seehow many you remember. Write the names down. Since there are 12 notes you shouldhave 12 shapes for every type of chord (major, minor, seventh, etc.). How many did youget? If you haven’t been playing that long I bet your list had these: A, C, D, E, G, Am,Dm, Em, A7, D7, G7, B7, Cmaj7, Fmaj7, Am7, Em7, Dsus4 and Asus2. And I would bet itdidn’t have Ab, Bb, Db, Eb, Bbm, Bm, Cm, Fm or Gm. Well, not to worry about thesharp/flat chords – we’ll meet them in Idea 10.


36

WHAT WE HEARD ON OUR TRAVELS

Here are twelve exotic shapes which you have probably neverencountered, drawn from right across the continent of harmony.The Am7add11 is a spacey variation on the popular Am7 chord;this sounds lovely picked, with echo and chorus effects. TheAmaj7 is a rare fingering of an otherwise common chord. If themajor 7 is something of a chocolate gateau (to change metaphorfrom geography to food), this voicing is an extra topping of cream.The E6 shape is fun if you strum it and lift your little finger on andoff – which lends itself to rock ’n’ roll.

The F6/9 is a sixth chord with an additional note. The Gsus2 isanother spacey chord (any chord which is a ‘sus’ is neither majornor minor). The Dm7 is an easy shape which dilutes straight Dm,and by putting your little finger on G on the bottom string we getthe next chord, the sophisticated G11. If you take a major chordand raise its fifth by a semitone it turns into an augmented chord,as here with F+. Those of you who like jazz will enjoy the A9b13.Some chords come with extra spice, in the form of milddissonance. Try the F#7add11, the tragic Cmadd9, and the ‘who

am I?’ diminished seventh, the chord with no less than six names! This one is D#/Ebo

dim7, but it could equally be called A, C, F# or Gb dim7.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...The quick way to never get

caught out needing a chord is

to learn two barré shapes per

chord category. One should

have the root note on the

sixth string and the other on

the fifth or fourth. Why two

shapes? Because they will be

located in different areas of

the fretboard – low, middle or

high – so you can create a

sequence with the minimum

amount of hand movement.

These barré shapes are the

chord equivalent of an

InterRail ticket that lets you

travel between many places in

a short period of time.

Defining idea...‘I always think, “There’s got

to be another chord change

that’s not so obvious.”’

Andy Summers, The Police


37

Idea 9 – Learn some new chords

F6/9

1 1

43

Am7add11

1

2 3 4 1

E6

1

2 3 4

2

Amaj7

F+

1

3 42

Gsus2 G11

1 2

3

1 12

3 2 3

Dm7

D#/Ebo

1

2 3 43

4

A9b13

3 4

Cmadd9

3 4

1

2

F#7add11

3 4

4 4

1 1 25


38

Q These new chords are great. But what types should I learn first?A There are roughly twelve chord types that feature in pop, folk and rock songs.

They are, with how they’re written if the root note were to be C in brackets:major (C), minor (Cm), seventh (C7), major seventh (Cmaj7), minor seventh(Cm7), suspended fourth (Csus4), suspended second (Csus2), major sixth (C6),added ninth (Cadd9), ninth (C9) and minor added ninth (Cmadd9). Rememberthat some can be found in open string shapes, but if you have a barré shapefor each type that one shape will generate a chord for all twelve pitches. Tryto learn a shape for each type, so you can find it on any of the twelve notes.

Q Why are some chords given varying shapes in song books?A This can be for several reasons. It arises because you only need three notes to

make a complete simple chord – a triad (the subject of Idea 14). On the guitarthese three notes can be doubled or tripled to get a fuller voicing and thisallows for variations. So an open string G chord is often played 320003(GBDGBG). But it could also be 3x0003 (GxDGBG) which only needs twofingers, or 320033 (GBDGDG), or with a third fret barré 355433 (GDGBDG).They are all perfectly valid G chords, each with its own particular sound.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


39


40


41

10

Get flat – stay sharpThink of a piano keyboard. It has two colours, white andblack. Chords are that way too, on piano or guitar. So comeand meet the five flats and sharps.

Learn how to deal with those sharp/flat critters –just simple major and minor forms – and you will find thereare many more songs you can play.

SEVEN AND FIVE

The seven ‘white’ (because of the piano keys) or ‘natural’ notes are A, B, C, D, E, F andG. Five of these – A, C, D, E and G – are among the eight open master shapes on theguitar. The remaining five notes – sometimes called ‘black’ notes (they are the blackkeys on a piano) are A#/Bb, C#/Db, D#/Eb, F#/Gb, G#/Ab. Notice that every black notehas two names, one a sharp (#), the other a flat (b). Which name is cited depends onmusical context, which is too variable to generalise much about. It is common forpeople who play a little guitar not to know these black-note chords. As full barréshapes they aren’t that easy, but I’m providing handy chord boxes with easier versions.Hopefully, in a song you won’t stay too long on the chord anyway.

Incidentally, don’t confuse the concept of ‘sharp’ or ‘flat’ with a term like major orminor. The name of the chord C# minor gives you two pieces of information, notthree. It is based on the note C# and it’s a minor chord. If you try and find it bystarting with a C chord on the basis that there’s a ‘C’ in the name you’re barking upthe wrong tree. C# minor has nothing to do with the note C and everything to dowith the note C#.


42

TWELVE QUICK CHORD SHAPES

The first three chord boxes articulate A#/Bb. The first avoids abarré; the second has a full barré, giving a deeper sound; thethird involves a barré with the little finger but is well-balanced,and popular on electric guitar. If you move these shapes up threefrets they give C#/Db – boxes iv and v give shapes for (another)C#/Db and for D#/Eb. Both are derived from an open D chord,moved back one or forward one – which is easy to remember.

Boxes vi and vii provide for F#/Gb and G#/Ab with just a half-barré on the top two strings. These are technically inversions (seeIdea 12) but they can be substituted for a root position version ofthese chords to make things more comfortable. Boxes viii and ixcan be grabbed without a barré at all – you have to mute the topand bottom strings – but they’re useful and give your hand a restfrom playing barrés. The last three boxes offer ways of generatingthe sharp/flat minor chords, using the Am and Em shapes. It mayseem odd but D#m doesn’t occur in an effective shape below thesixth fret. This is because if you move a standard Dm shape(xx0231) up to get D#m it becomes awkward; no one uses it.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you write songs you can

take creative advantage of

the fact that the guitar

doesn’t really like sharp/flat

chords. For your intro or verse

put together a chord

sequence with a number of

sharp/flat chords, for example,

Bb–Ab–Fm–Eb. These will be

barré chords. Then change key

for your chorus and go into a

key where open string shapes

are available. The darker tone

of the barré chords will be

suddenly replaced by the

brighter resonance of a D

major sequence like

D–Em–G–A. Listen to the

Beatles ‘If I Fell’.

Defining idea...‘Sometimes you want to give

up the guitar, you’ll hate the

guitar. But if you stick with it,

you’re gonna be rewarded.’

Jimi Hendrix


43

Idea 10 – Get flat – stay sharp

C#/Db

432

A#/Bb

1 1 21

3

A#/Bb

4

A#/Bb

F#/Gb

1 2

3

4

D#/Eb G#/Ab

1 1

1

1

1

2

43

2

F#/Gb

F#m/G#m

1

2

43

1

3

1

G#/Ab

3 4

A#m/Bbm

2 2

43

A#m/Bbm

3

1 11

4 4 432

11

2

3

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)


44

Q Do I really need to learn sharp and flat chords?A Yes, you do really. It’s true that you can transfer a song into an easier bunch

of shapes with a capo (see Idea 4) but if a song changes key, or has a mildlyadventurous progression, it won’t be long before you come to a sharp/flatchord. For example, it is not uncommon to find the chord of C# in a song in Amajor, or F# in E major, or Eb in F major. And this can happen even with acapo.

Q Sharp and flat chords don’t sound as good to me as the others. Whyis that?

A First, they usually don’t have open strings, so they don’t resonate as much.Second, even as held chords they don’t resonate so well on the guitar. Theway round this is either to use a capo or, if you’re writing a song and want agenuine sharp or flat key, retune the guitar in such a manner as to generatesome ‘black’ chords with open strings in them. Sometimes a sharp/flat chordsounds better when a fourth note is added – like a seventh or add ninth.

Q Are sharp/flat chords always barré chords?A If they have a full complement of notes and a root note in the bass the

answer is probably yes. Unless you have been reading ahead and fiddled withthe tuning!

Play great guitar

How didit go?


45

11

Seventh heavenIt only takes one extra note to move from the vanilla worldof major and minor chords to the chocolate chip tub of thesevenths … and in four flavours too!

Seventh chords are everywhere in songs and takeyou closer to specific styles like blues, MOR cool orsinger-songwriter balladry. The bonus is they’re often easyto hold down.

THE ONE-STEP/TWO-STEP DOWN

The recipe for sevenths is straightforward. Take a major chord and think of its rootnote. Now select a half-step (a semitone) down from that note. Whatever this newnote is, add it to the major chord and you have a major seventh chord. (Yum! Yes, youmay lick your fingers.) The recipe cooks best if you avoid placing this extra note at thebottom of the shape; introduce it in the middle or at the top.

Here’s an example. Hold down a C chord (x32010). What note is a half-step below C?Answer: a B. Do we have a B available without losing one of the three notes that makeC major (C E G)? Yes: the second (open) string is a B. Lift your first finger off that andyou get x32000 (x CEGBE) – the lovely, white chocolate taste of Cmaj7. That’s one ofthe four flavours.

Try another. Repeat the process but go down a whole step (a tone). What note is awhole step below C? Answer: a Bb. Do we have a Bb available without losing one of the


46

three notes that make C major (C E G)? Not in this position, butthere is a Bb in reach: the third fret of the second string. The littlefinger can take this and you get x32310 (x CEBbCE) – the darkchocolate of the seventh chord of C7. We’ve lost the note G, butthat’s expendable without damaging the identity of the chord.

Repeat this process with a minor chord like Am (x02210 –xAEACE) to get the common minor seventh (Am7 = x02010 –xAEGCE), and the rarer minor/major seventh (Am/maj7 = x02110– xAEG#CE). The former is a pleasing milk chocolate chip; thelatter, chocolate with rum and raisins!

A FLAVOUR FOR EVERY OCCASION

The four types of seventh chord are given in boxes i-iv: two majorand two minor. You won’t often hear the minor/major seventh(iv), which conjures up dark alleys and spies dialling distantnumbers in phone boxes. Next, compare the A7 in ii with theexample in v. Same chord, but a markedly different sound. It is

all to do with where the seventh – the extra note – is placed in the chord. Lowerdown it tends not to stick out; higher up, it’s prominent. To turn C7 (box vii) into Cmaj7 lift your little finger and take your first finger off the B string. To turn D7 (boxviii) into Dmaj7 play a barré on the top three strings at the second fret. The majorseven chords have a romantic character; the sevenths sound assertive and bluesy. Withthe D shapes you can see that there is only one note difference between them. The E7in box ix can have its seventh doubled if you liftthe finger off the fourth string. The G7 in box xiwill turn into Gmaj7 if you move your first fingerup one fret. The Bm7 barré shape gives all theminor sevenths as you move it up the neck.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you....Some seventh chords can

change the key. Decide your

destination key note and

count five notes up to find

the chord which is its seventh.

We’re in C major and want to

change to A. Five notes up

from A is E. After you’ve

played a C chord sequence

like C–F–G7, change to an E

chord, then E7, then A and

you’ve changed key. Or say

we’re in C major and want to

go to Bb major. Five notes up

from Bb is F. So an F7 tacked

onto your sequence will lead

to a Bb chord and a new key.

Defining idea...‘It’s got to be emotional. If I’d

wanted to get into science, I would

have been a mathematician.’

Allan Holdsworth


G7

B7

Am/maj7Am7A7

47

Idea 11 – Seventh heaven

2 3

Amaj7

1 1 21

3

D7

3

A7 C7

3 4

111

22211 3

Bm7

1

32 1

3

1

E7

3 2

2 2

4 3

Fmaj7

3 4

11

2 23

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)


48

Q What’s the difference in playing a minor seven chord instead of astraight minor?

A The seventh in a minor chord has the effect of diluting it so it doesn’t soundas sad and gloomy. If you’re writing a song that has a number of minor chordsthis is a good way to lighten them up. To the uninitiated, in an uptempo rocksong minor sevenths will sound like ‘jazz’ chords. Thin Lizzy’s hard rock classic‘The Boys Are Back In Town’ owes something of its sassy atmosphere to thepresence of several minor seventh chords in the verses, which was unusual forhard rock.

Q Is it true that you can play B7 instead of B, and Fmaj7 instead of F,in most songs?

A Yes, you can do this and most of the time get away with it. This is a goodtrick for beginners, especially as everyone gets hand ache initially trying tohold down F and B. (Oh no, here’s another song with an F and B in it, theyexclaim!) How effective the substitution might sound will vary. The B7 canmake a B passage sound less sure of its identity; the Fmaj7 can sounddreamier than you want. (Try changing the Fs in Springsteen’s ‘Thunder Road’into Fmaj7s and you’ll hear what I mean.) Other examples include C#7 – easierto play than C#, and F#7 – easier than F#.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


49

12

Be diverted – get inverted!Strum any major or minor chord. It’s a familiar sound. But didyou know there are two more shades of the same colourcontained in what you’ve just heard?

Inversions are an excellent method for extending thecolour of your chord playing and a time-honoured means forlinking your chords more effectively, so they flow better.

BLUE, DEEP BLUE, PALE BLUE

Understanding inversions is easy if you think of shades of colour. Blue includes green-blue, deep blue and pale blue. You could go to a party with an item of clothing of anyof those three shades – it would still be you and still blue. Likewise, with chords. Themajority of chords in guitar music are in root position. This means the lowest note isthe one that gives the chord its name. In a simple major or minor chord there arethree notes. D major is D F# A. With D at the bottom we have a root position chord. Ifthe middle note (the ‘third’) is lowest – here an F# – we have a first inversion. If thetop note (the ‘fifth’) is lowest – here an A – we have a second inversion. You can alsoinvert minor chords. If D minor is D F A, it becomes a first inversion by having F as thelowest note, and a second inversion if A is lowest.

Compared to root chords, a first inversion has a moving energy, as though the bassnote wants to either rise or fall a step. For this reason, the most frequent use of firstinversion chords is in descending chord progressions, linking the root chords, such asG–D/F#–Em–D–C–G/B–Am–D/F#. Singer-songwriter material is full of them. Second


50

inversion chords don’t have this energy but can also besubstituted into descending or ascending progressions. Thesecond inversion chord has a dreamier effect, less focused.Surprisingly, it occurs in some of Nirvana’s grungier numberssuch as ‘On A Plain’. A progression with no root chords wouldsound as not really anchored. A few inversions between the rootchords can make for more colourful music.

TWELVE NEW SHADES

The A/C# is slightly awkward and plays only the middle fourstrings, but it is a movable shape. The C/E is easy and wants torise to F. The C/G second inversion can be used to give a fullersound where you would normally play a root C chord. Thesecond C/G shape, transposed to Eb, was played by Hendrix in‘The Wind Cries Mary’. The D/F# chord we first met in Idea 5;here it is held by the fingers. It is commonly placed between Gand Em. The second inversion D/A can be found in riff-basedsongs like The Darkness’ ‘Out Of My Hands’. F/A is another easyinversion because of the open 5th string. It wants to rise to Bb orG/B which is the next box. Along with D/F#, G/B is thecommonest inversion on the guitar; two fingerings are given. It is

found between C and Am, as in the verses of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Stairway To Heaven’.Inverted minor chords are rarer. The Bm/F# is heard in the Beatles’ ‘Help’ and theAm/C can be moved up the fretboard if the top stringis not played.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...You can make a very pleasing

chord sequence out of a

series of inverted chords. Try

C/E–D/F#–C/G–D/A–G/B as an

example. As it proceeds

upward we expect any

moment to land on a root

chord, but it doesn’t happen.

This makes the sequence

dramatic and it can increase

tension and interest. It also

lends a chord sequence

mobility, one of the features

of first inversion chords. A

related trick is to oscillate

between two chords which are

first inversions. Have a listen

to Judy Tzuke’s hit ‘Stay With

Me Till Dawn’.

Defining idea...‘A lot of people think we’re

using electric 12-strings, but

‘American Girl’ is actually two

6-strings playing different

inversions of D major in

unison.’ Tom Petty


51

Idea 12 – Be diverted – get inverted!

Bm/F#

D/A

C/GC/GC/E

1 1

A/C#

1

1 1

G/B

3

D/F# F/A

3

1

1 22

2

21

4

Am/C

3

1 3

1

G/B

2

2

1

1

4

3

G/D

3

1

2

2 2

1

3

3 3 4

4 4

4

1

3 4

4


52

Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q Does it make any difference if I ignore inversions and just play therelevant root position chord?

A The chord won’t sound wrong, because all the notes match. However,removing inversions from a chord sequence may make it less interesting. It willcertainly change the bass line, which may be an important element in theprogression. Sequences with descending bass lines often have inversions.Procul Harum’s Summer of Love classic ‘Whiter Shade of Pale’ or The Beatles’‘All You Need Is Love’ wouldn’t be the same without their inversions.

Q I’m a guitarist in a band. If I play an inversion what note does thebass play?

A The task of playing inversions can be wholly given over to the bass guitar,because even if the guitar reverts to root position chords the right notes inthe bass line will make those guitar chords sound like they’re inversionsanyway. Those low bass register notes are the ones the ear uses to determinethe harmony. That’s an easier method than changing the guitar chords. In asong based around an A–D–E progression, you could get the bass to play C#under A, F# under D, and G# under E. That gives the progression a differentquality which might suit an intro, or bridge. Otherwise, matching guitarinversions with the right bass notes – so the bass plays C# under the guitar’sA/C# – enhances the inversions.


53

13

Exotic stacksIf Idea 11 was seventh heaven, then step up now for cloudnine. Here are some ninths and elevenths – chords that areseriously stacked.

With these shapes you can get further into theblues, go rock and rolling, blow smooth jazz or get thefunk out, and take your guitar sound into new territory.

THE MUSIC OCEAN’S NINE AND ELEVEN

Chord dictionaries can be intimidating things. They start happily enough – nice plainmajors and minors with open strings, and hardly a barré in sight. But how soon, turningthe pages, they turn to horror: a parade of eye-watering shapes that look like someterrible form of finger-torture, with squiffy names like Abmaj13+5 (no 3rd). Eek! Haveanother teacake, vicar, and excuse me while I pass out! Some of these books even havephotos of hands doing these contorted shapes, suggesting seven joints per finger. Arethese photos faked? Are these the hands of aliens?! (Cue X-Files theme.) We should betold! But actually, on closer inspection, maybe things aren’t as bad as they seem.

We’ve looked at sevenths, so let’s take the next step: ninths. A ninth chord is formedwhen you add a note on top of a seventh. By the way, the numbers 9, 11 and 13 comefrom extending a scale, say of C major C D E F G A B (numbered 1–7) into a second octavewith 8 as C, 9 as D, and so on. For reasons that there isn’t time to go into here, the onlyvalid numbers in that second octave, as far as harmony is concerned, are 9, 11 and 13 (the


54

ear doesn’t recognise any of the other numbers above 7). Eachninth is a variation on the types of seventh we looked at in Idea 11.

Ninth and eleventh chords are tricky to find on the guitar inacceptable fingerings, and a full thirteenth chord is in factimpossible because it requires seven notes (and a guitar only hassix strings … usually!). For this reason it is necessary and allowableto omit notes from these extended chords. Sometimes that has theunwanted effect of making them ambiguous.

The first five boxes (Cadd9, C9, Cmaj9, Cmadd9 and C7#9)demonstrate the contrast between these types of ninth. The add9is open and breezy, the 9 is harder, the maj9 is dreamy, theminoradd9 is tragic (notice the slightly different fingering to theone in Idea 9), and the 7#9 is jaggedly assertive (this has come tobe known as the Hendrix chord because of his inclusion of it insongs like ‘Purple Haze’). All except the Cmadd9 are movableshapes. From these we go to the vague-sounding C11. As it is oftenhard to find the correct six notes in an effective, playablegrouping, both eleventh and thirteenth chords on guitar arecompromises which don’t always have the full complement ofnotes.

The second six chords are based on the note G on thesixth string. You can try G9, Gm9, G11, two Gm11s andG7add13. Notice how the full minor ninth (Gm9)doesn’t sound as tragic as the Cmadd9 chord.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you want to intensify and

deepen the minor sound of a

song in a minor key or with

minor chords, try substituting

the minor add ninth chord. If

you add F# to an Em (making

a chord with E G B F#) you

have the type of minor add

ninth often used in minor key

blues (check out early

Fleetwood Mac tunes or

Stevie Ray Vaughan’s ‘Dirty

Pool’ on the album Texas

Flood). This chord is especially

effective on Amadd9, Dmadd9

and Emadd9 shapes as these

are easy to find on guitar.

Defining idea...‘Many people think that if

they know technical stuff they

won’t be sensitive, emotional,

heartfelt players anymore …

It’s a cop-out, because it

takes a lot of time, energy

and devotion to learn music.’

Steve Vai


55

Idea 13 – Exotic stacks

Gm11

C11

Cmadd9Cmaj9C9

1

3

Cadd9

1

1

2 3

Gm9

3

C7#9 G9

1

3

12

1

4

G7add13

1

3

2

1

3

1

G11

2

2

4 3

Gm11

1

1

222 4 4 4 3

4

4

4

11

2

3 4

11

1

4 1 1

4 4


56

Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q Can you explain the difference between a ninth and an add ninth?A The add ninth is a major or minor chord with an extra note a tone above the

root note (D add ninth is D F# A E). These chords are relatively easy to playand are common in songs. They can spice up an otherwise straightmajor–major change like C–F (try Cadd9–Fadd9) or G–C (try Gadd9–Cadd9).The add ninth creates a bracing, mildly unresolved tension. It has more ‘air’ init than the crowded full ninth in which there are five different notes (D9 is DF# A C E). The full ninth has a seventh in it; the add ninth does not.

Q In what musical styles can I use a ninth chord?A Played in a quick sixteenth-note strum with intermittent damping, the five-note

ninth chord typifies funk classics like James Brown’s ‘Sex Machine’. For extrafunk slide the chord either back a fret or forward a fret every now and then.Before Brown, it featured in 1950s rock ’n’ roll, blues and jazz. Try playing awhole 12-bar sequence in A, but instead of playing A, D and E, or theirsevenths, use A9, D9 and E9. You can further modify this ninth by flatteningor sharpening the fifth, though this can mean rearranging the fingers. Formore, see my book, Chord Master.


57

14

Triads you can trustWhen it comes to chords, size isn’t everything. Three-stringfriends to beginner and experienced player alike, here arethe triads – the harmony gang that’s on your side.

Triads are bite-sized chords – they pack all themusical information and meaning of a standard chord reducedto just three strings which are comfortable to play andchain together.

GANG OF THREE

Many guitarists just pass the triad by, but triads are worth knowing about. By contrast,on other instruments (like the piano) they’re encountered early on. People learningthe piano aren’t expected to play chords that involve holding down four, five or sixpiano keys at once, which is effectively what confronts beginners on the guitartackling chord shapes like G and C.

The idea behind a triad is simple: it only takes three notes to make a simple major orminor chord. Chords are constructed by stacking notes either by four semitones (amajor third) or three semitones (a minor third). The major chord has the formula 4+3for its intervals, and the minor chord the opposite, 3+4. It works like this. Let’s make achord of A major. The root is A and the next note must be a major third above it (4+3).Four semitones above A is C#; then we need the note three semitones above that,which is an E. Therefore, the chord of A major consists of A C# E. Try the same thingfor A minor. The note above the root needs to be a minor third away (3+4). Three


58

semitones above A is C; then we need the note four semitonesabove that, which is an E. Therefore the chord of A minorconsists of A C E. If we only play three notes and don’t double ortreble any of them we have a triad.

TRIAD BOX-OUT

I’ve chosen what I think are the twelve most useful triad shapes,in four groups of three. There are three majors and three minorson the top three strings, plus three majors and three minors onstrings 2, 3 and 4. On the chord boxes the root note is marked byan ‘R’. This note tells you what the pitch of the chord is,depending on where you put these shapes on the fretboard.Notice that in each group of three the root is first lowest, then inthe middle, and then on the top. Every shape can produce twelvechords – one for each pitch. If you can remember them all theyprovide 144 chords from just twelve shapes! Six shapes for everyminor chord and six for every major.

All the shapes are easy to play and only two require a half barré(although several could be played with a barré, which wouldleave your other fingers free to do other things). Experiment

finding the ones that fit together. Play i at the first fret then iv at the third and fifthfrets, then ii at the third and fifth frets, and then vi at the third. Those are the six mainchords in the key of Bb major. Notice how they couldbe played without moving too far up the neck. Youcan arrange similar sequences starting from any of thetriad shapes.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...When improvising a guitar

solo you are probably thinking

in scales; why not take some

of these triads shapes on the

top three strings and play

them instead? You have three

major triad shapes and three

minors. Look at the sequence

you’re playing over and insert

an arpeggio – i.e. playing up

and down the chord shape –

on the triad shape which

matches the chord. So if it’s

an A chord you’re soloing over

you can use the ‘D’ triad

shape at the ninth fret, the ‘A’

shape at the twelfth fret, and

the ‘E’ shape at the fifth fret.

Defining idea...‘If you learn something new

everyday, which I like to do,

then you’re going towards

something that’ll serve you

later on.’ Ry Cooder


Idea 14 – Triads you can trust

majormajor

3 4

major

11

1

2

2

R

3

R

3

R

i) ii) iii)

minorminor

1

2

3

minor

11

R RR

2

4

1

iv) v) vi)

majormajor

11 2

2

3 1

3

2

major

3

R R R

vii) viii) ix)

minor minor

1

33 22

3

minor

111

R R R

x) xi) xii)

59


60

Q I found these easy to play. Why don’t these replace barré chords andsuch like?

A As they only use three strings, triads don’t lend themselves to beingstrummed. You can strum them, but it requires a careful and foreshortenedstroke. The idea of full chord shapes with four, five and six strings is that theycreate more sound and volume. Triads are good for decorations andaccompanying figures but not so good for the main chordal part – unlessplayed through overdrive on electric. But if you want your song to have morespace in it, along the lines of the arrangement style of bands like The Policeor Siouxsie and the Banshees, then you could use triads instead of full chords.

Q Why are these shapes only on the top four strings?A That’s because almost all the triad shapes you’re likely to encounter will either

be on the top three strings or strings 2, 3 and 4. It is possible to form triadson the lower strings but they sound murkier and less effective. The higher inpitch the triad, the brighter it sounds. Occasionally a triad might bearpeggiated into a riff by playing the notes one at a time, not all together. Itmight then resemble a Nirvana riff such as ‘Come As You Are’ or Bryan Adams’‘Run To You’, although both of those riffs have open strings.

52 Brilliant Ideas – Play great guitar

How didit go?


61


62


63

15

New light on ‘power-chords’Did you know that music harmony has its own neutral zone?It’s true – a strange dank realm of drooling zombie flesh-eating chords that emerge as neither major nor minor.

You’ve probably heard people talk about ‘power-chords’.Well, now you can try some of these shapes that underpinso much rock guitar, especially at the heavy end of things.

INTO THE NEUTRAL ZONE

Okay, I was exaggerating about the drooling. Erm … and the zombies. Oh alright, yes,and the flesh-eating thing. But it’s true there is a group of chords which exist in a sortof harmonic neutral zone, because they’re neither major nor minor. This is sort of odd,because much of the emotion of music is expressed through the major/minorcontrast. To most ears majors sound happy when set beside minors, and minors soundsad when put against majors. Most music you hear oscillates between them constantly.There are three kinds of neutral chords you’re likely to come across: the suspendedsecond and suspended fourth (Asus2, Dsus4, etc.), which usually involve adding ortaking off a finger (see Idea 16), and the ‘power-chord’ or fifth.

Power-chords are labelled as C5, D5, E5, etc. Look at any rock sheet music and you’llsee loads of them. Like the sus2 and sus4, a fifth is neither major nor minor because itlacks a third (a G# or G in the key of E or E minor). It is the third that defines major orminor. This neutrality of the open fifth makes it suitable for hard rock. Power-chordscome in two fingerings. The heavy rock/punk fifth (E5 made of the notes E and B) isusually played on two of the lower guitar strings. You finger it by choosing a note on


64

the 6th, 5th or 4th string, and then adding on the next string upthe note two frets higher (G5 = 35xxxx). This fifth is for aggressivemusic, be it punk/grunge/hard rock/ heavy metal. No matterhow different their politics, their lyrics or their haircuts, GreenDay, Nirvana, Queen, Guns ‘n’ Roses and Metallica share onething: they all use fifths.

DOUBLING UP A POWER-CHORD

These chord boxes show how the two-note fifth can have eithernote doubled or trebled so you can play most or all of the stringsand get a strummable and resonant chord. The lower A5 isfavoured by Pete Townshend of The Who; take the little fingeroff the 2nd string to turn it back into an A major. The A5 at theseventh fret is one Paul Kossoff of Free would have played, as isthe E5 at the same position. The first B5 might remind you ofSpringsteen’s ‘Born in the USA’; the second B5 is deeper. The C5is one I devised some years ago. Both the D5s can be folk-ish,especially with a capo, higher up the fretboard. There’s a low E5which has a droning sound. The F5 requires the muting of thethird string, except at the third fret as in the first G5 box. Thesecond G5 is favoured by Oasis, Green Day and many others.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you are accustomed to

playing two-note fifth chords,

give them extra resonance by

adding a third string that has

the root note an octave

higher. The two common

shapes would be on strings

6-5-4 or 5-4-3. A G5 would

be 355xxx and a C5 would be

x355xx. You get this extra

root note on these shapes by

flattening your little finger so

it frets the higher two strings,

the ones at the fifth fret in

this case. You have to also

adjust your pick action to

ensure you strike the extra

string at the top.

Defining idea...‘The guitar is a much more

efficient machine than a

computer. More responsive.’

Colin Greenwood, Radiohead


65

Idea 15 – New light on ‘power-chords’

G5

D5

B5B5A5

1 1

A5

1 1

3

E5

3

C5 D5

1

1

1 2

2

1

4

G5

1

3 3

E5

3

24 3

F5

4 4

1

1

4 3

3

4 4

1

4 4

4

4

7

7

71

1 4


66

Q Can I use a fifth-chord and the major or minor chord on the sameroot note in synchronised guitar parts?

A Yes. The fifth in Guitar II adds strength to a full chord played by Guitar I. Thisis true whether they are electric or acoustic, major or minor.

Q Are these power-chords just for electric guitarists?A Not at all. The chord box shapes sound perfectly good on an acoustic steel-

string. In fact, create an interesting effect bysubstituting one chord in a sequence from amajor or minor to a fifth. Its neutrality contrastswith the others. (The two-note fifths workbetter on electric, especially if they’redistorted. Such power-chords can standa lot of distortion/overdrive!)

Q What about improvising lead over asequence of fifths?

A As long as the root notes of the fifthsbelong to the same scale that you’re usingto play the lead; the two will work together.The flexibility is such that I could play the Enatural minor scale (EF#GABCD) or an Emixolydian (EF#G#ABC#D – E major with theseventh note lowered a semitone)over the fifth sequence E5, A5,B5 and D5. Both will work. Ofcourse, they sound different. Youcan solo over a progression of fifthswith several scales and therewon’t be a clash. Possibly TheClash, but not a clash.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


67

16

Lift a finger/add a fingerThere’s one reliable fall-back for finding new sounds andideas on the guitar. Sometimes all that is required is‘adjusted original digital technology’. In other words, move a finger!

Many players and songwriters have found distinctiveand inspiring chords by this artless device of seeing whichfingers could be moved or added to make a new chord.

CHORD WITH NO NAME

Remember that song by the group America, ‘Horse With No Name’? Sing the chorus butsubstitute the word ‘chord’ for horse and you’ll evoke the right sense of adventure forthis section. Usually chord shapes are provided for us by books like this one, sheet musicand chord dictionaries such as Chord Master. However, there’s nothing to stop you findingshapes of your own. You may not know what they’re called, but the names may notmatter. Many songwriters choose an unusual-sounding chord as a way of sparking theirinspiration.

Let’s experiment with this technique by trying it out on a common chord, A major(x02220). Hold this in the usual manner with your first three fingers. Since we’re notusing the little finger we’ll start with that and see what it can do. Chord box i showswhat happens when you put the little finger on the 2nd string: a ‘neutral zone’ chord ofAsus4 with its distinctive tension. Play this chord, then take the little finger off and playthe straight A – notice the release of tension. If we add the little finger to the 3rd string


68

we add a Bb note to the A chord, which is very dissonant. As itwould be hard to find a use for such a chord (unless you’re in adeath metal/jazz fusion band!) we’ll pass quickly on. Chord box iishows what happens when the little finger goes on the 4th string– an A+ (augmented), if the open E string is muted. To make thechord sound disturbing add that open E string.

When the little finger is on the top string, as in chord box iii, an A7is created. This would normally be fretted with a barré holding thenotes at the second fret and the third finger taking the place of thelittle finger. If the little finger fits on the second fret of the topstring we get an A6 (chord box iv) which again is easier as a singlefirst finger barré. If you can stretch that far, the little finger canhold down a G on the bottom string (chord box v) which results inan inverted A7, A/G. This chord sounds great changing to a D/F#or F# m. That’s about as much as can be done with the little fingerto mess with an A shape. Time for another tactic: lift a finger off.

We take a finger off the 2nd string as in chord box vi, we getanother neutral zone chord, Asus2. If the finger comes off themiddle note of A it results in another A7 (box vii), and if the finger

comes off the 4th string the result is a D9 (box viii).Finally, boxes ix–xii apply the same experiment to anEm chord, creating with the little finger a tragicEmadd9, the tense Em6, the neutral Esus4 and thedissonant Emaddb9.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...There is only a one note

difference between a major

and a minor chord. So if you

locate this note (the third),

raising it one semitone in a

minor chord will turn that

chord into a major, and

lowering it by a semitone in a

major turns that chord to a

minor. As an example, hold

down an A chord with your

second, third and fourth

fingers; then place your first

finger at the first fret on the

second string. Simply lifting

your little finger now changes

an A chord into an Am.

Defining idea...‘Marc Bolan’s idea of an A7

was just lifting a finger off a

string so that it was an A

major with a foreign note in

it, which was charming. It

worked several times.’

Tony Visconti, Producer


69

Idea 16 – Lift a finger/add a finger

Esus4

Asus2

A6A7A+

2

4

Asus4

31

D9A/G A7

3 222 3

Emaddb9

32

4

Emadd9

3 22 24 3

Em6

3

2 23

4

1

4

321 4

321

4

4 4

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)


70

Q Can I do this with any of the fingers?A Yes, any, and more than one if you like. It comes down to what is physically

possible and in reach.

Q Can I predict what type of chord I’ll get by doing a certainmovement?

A There is no formula that allows you to automatically assume that lifting finger‘x’ will create a certain type of chord. There are many other factors involved,such as what shape you’re holding and where on the neck. The position of thechord on the fretboard changes the relationship it has with the open strings.This technique of lifting a finger is about adding an open string (unless thechord you start with is a barré chord). One thing to bear in mind is that if youadd a note lower than any of the others, or that changes the root, this maychange the nature of the chord fundamentally.

Q What do I do with some of these exotic chords?A If you’re a songwriter or composer listen to the chord. Ask yourself whether

there is a chord that it is similar to, or wants to change to. That may give aclue as to the keys it fits into, and also the start of a chord progression suchas could make a verse or chorus.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


71

17

No holds barred, or no barrés held?Here’s your free upgrade to the ‘adjusted originaldigital technology’ of the previous section, called‘digital removal software’ … otherwise known as liftinga first finger that’s holding a barré!

Barre chords are a necessary evil of the guitar and atsome time or other drive us all crazy. Why not takeadvantage of their undoing and turn them into new chords?

HOUSTON, WE HAVE A LIFT-OFF

This is an excellent way to discover exotic chords, some of which you won’t findanywhere else. You can apply this technique to any chord where the first finger holds abarré over most of the strings. The standard barré chords for F (133211), B (x24442), Fm(133111) and Bm (x24432) are a good place to start. The chord boxes begin with the F.Lift the barré off the top two strings but keep it on the root note F on the 6th string.That makes Fmaj7add11 (box i), which has a Spanish/flamenco sound. Move it to thethird fret (box ii) and it produces a resonant G6 – notice the two Bs at the same pitchon the 3rd and 2nd strings. Move it to the fifth fret and get Aadd9 (box iii), and at theseventh fret it turns into Badd4.

In both these chords something occurs which you might miss just strumming. Playeach string from the 6th upwards in pitch. When you reach the 2nd string you’ll hear


72

it is actually lower than the previous. The notes no longer go inpitch order low-to-high. That discrepancy happens in many ofthese chords once you reach the middle of the fretboard. It ispart of what gives them their distinctive character. Maximise thisby fingerpicking them with the syncopated pattern from Idea 6.

Box v is an expressively resonant Cmaj7 chord in which the 3rdand 1st strings sound the same note (compare the Cmaj7 which isx32000), and could launch a romantic ballad. In box vi, instead oftaking the barré from a straight D major chord(10–12–12–11–10–10), I’ve imagined starting with a D7(10–12–10–11–10–10). To do this keep the barré on the lower threestrings but make sure it doesn’t touch the top two. This createsan unusual D13 with two open strings.

Can this technique work with a minor barré chord? Yes it can.Boxes vii–x are based on an F#m barré chord (244222). In box viithe barré is replaced by the thumb fretting the root note to giveF#m7add11. Move this up two frets and it produces G#m6 (boxviii). If the thumb is too awkward remove it and avoid the sixthstring. At the fifth fret this shape results in Amadd9 (box ix) and

at the seventh Bmadd4 (box x) – a shape that DavidGray included in ‘Sail Away’. Compare this with box xiwhere the barré has been taken off a standard Bmchord (x24432), which moved up to the fifth fret givesa Dmadd9 (box xii). The extra notes created by theopen strings have been marked so you can see howthey change.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Lift a barré chord momentarily,

strike the strings to get a

percussive click, then squeeze

the chord back on. You can

actually make your strumming

more rhythmic by doing this,

and the other advantage is

that it momentarily gives your

hand a rest. Learn to squeeze

on and off in rhythm. Barré

chords create much tension in

the hand and it can be good

to let go of that, even for a

few instants. This way you turn

a problem into an opportunity,

and it might even make the

difference between getting

through a song and not.

Defining idea...‘I write all my songs on

acoustic guitar, which I can

just about play ten chords on.

I do them all on an E shape,

and put a finger on the

bottom E, so I’ve always got a

E and B drone, whatever

chord I do.’

Damon Albarn, Blur


73

Idea 17 – No holds barred...

Bmadd4

D13

Badd4Aadd9G6

2

3

Fmaj7add11

1 1

2

1

3

G#m6

3

Cmaj7 F#m7add11

3

1

1

1

3

22

1

4

Dmadd9

1

3

1

3

Amadd9

3

21

4 3

Bmadd4

3 4

2

1

2

2

3

4 1

4

5

3 4

7

4

11th 7th 6th 9th 4th

8

4

110

7th 13th 9th

T

11th 7th

T

6th

5 7

9th

4

4th

4

4th 9th

5

4

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)


74

Q Why do we have barré chords on the guitar anyway?A It’s because we don’t have enough fingers to assign one to each note – and if

we did maybe they would get tangled in a high wind and we’d spend endlesstime unplaiting them! With only four fingers to hold notes (five if you countthe thumb on the 6th string), it is inevitable that sometimes one finger mustpress down more than one string. This is possible because standard tuningputs enough of these notes in a line at one fret (you can’t barré in a diagonalline).

Q I notice on boxes i–vi that the chord type kept changing. Whydoesn’t the same shape give the same type of chord at each fret?

A This is because the notes you fret retain their identity as a chord amongthemselves. If you began with a major chord you’re probably still fretting amajor chord when you remove the barré. But the open strings form an alteredrelationship to the fretted notes each time you move along the fretboard.

Q Why does my guitar suddenly sound much ringier when I play these chords?

A This is the contrast between the fretted notes and the open strings. Itbecomes more strident as you go up the fretboard, with unison notes forming(two of the same pitch) which amplify each other, or the pitch order changingamong the strings.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


75

18

Move on up, move on backOne way to find new sounds on the guitar is to take an openstring chord and move it up or down. Get ready for hideous,kinky, startling and terrific.

Memorable chords are be made with a little shift(literally) of lateral thought. Open string chords behaveunpredictably when you do this – so you never know whatyou’l l get.

SLEIGHTS AND SLIDES OF HAND

Making music is sometimes about happy accidents. Inspiring sounds on the guitarsometimes appear purely through experiment with the physical act of holding chords.In this instance the technique is to select an open-string shape. (You can’t do this witha movable barré chord. Those are not attached to any specific fret and when moved,although the pitch changes, the type of chord you’re getting does not.) The pointabout open-string chords is that they are wedded to one position. If moved, you notonly change the pitch but undermine the nature of that chord. Sometimes this resultsin uninspiring dissonant chords not suitable for use. On other occasions it leads toeffective and often exotic chords, because the open strings match the fretted notes interms of a major or minor scale to which that chord belonged. Crudely put, the notessound ‘in key’.


76

Use such found chords in three ways. First, the jangle of frettedto open strings can suggest melody. Second, this could be aninteresting chord for a progression. Third, make rhythmic use ofthis by sliding a dissonant found chord into a normal one. Thedissonance is only a colouration of the destination chord. Try itby taking a D chord, slide it back one fret to Db/D, and then slideforward (box i). This is an idea T. Rex used in the riff of ‘BabyStrange’.

More examples: take a C chord (strictly a C/G) and move it uptwo frets to get a D11 (box ii). Here’s Bill Berry of R.E.M. on ‘Manon the Moon’: ‘We were sitting around in our rehearsal studioand I hit that C chord on the guitar and then turned around tograb my beer, and my hand and the chord slid up to the thirdfret … and everybody went “Oh, that sounds great! Let’s use thatfor the verse bit.”’ A C shape is the basis for box iii, which givesFadd9 if moved to the sixth fret. Take an A chord and move it upa fret and you get a chord which David Bowie put on the intro of‘Starman’ (box iv). Move D up two frets and it gives an E7/D and

at the fifth fret a different way of playing Dm7 (boxes vi and vii). This triad shapefeatures with others in The Who’s instrumental ‘Sparks’ from Tommy.

Move a D7 up one fret and you get a dissonant chord played by John McGeoch withSiouxsie and the Banshees (box viii). Move an Fmaj7 up one fret and you get F#7 (boxix), up one more and you get G6. An E chord movedup one fret creates a very Spanish sounding chord(box x). A B7 moved up makes C#7 at the third fret(box xi), a D7add13 at the fourth fret, and E7 at thesixth fret (box xii).

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...A good way to use some of

the wilder chords you discover

by shifting open strings is to

save them for the conclusion

of a sequence or the end of a

song. In such a position they

can be highly dramatic.

Sounds that are too jarring to

pause over can be heard for a

moment before being resolved

into a normal chord. R.E.M.

memorably did this at the end

of ‘The One I Love’, where an

Em shape is moved down to

the first fret before the song

finishes on Em itself.

Defining idea...‘I like to sit and watch TV

while noodling on the guitar,

because sometimes your

fingers just discover things by

themselves.’ Richard Thompson


77

Idea 18 – Move on up, move on back

C#7

E7/D

Bbmaj7add#11/AFadd9D11

2

3

Db/D

1

2 3

1

1

Eb7/DAm/maj7#11 Dm7

3

1

1

2

2

3

E7

1

3

2

1

3

F#7

3

2

2

2

3

Fmaj7add#11/E

1

1

2

2

1

3 4

6

3 4

2 31

3

1 2

4

46

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)


78

Q Can I really put these weird-sounding chords in a song?A You can. The trick is how you change to them in a sequence and how you

leave them. In other words, imagine you’ve found a weird chord by thistechnique. Look for a common note between it and the previous chord, or achord that it resembles. If your first chord is a C and the weird one has a B init, how does it sound if you make the C a Cmaj7 (x32000) which has a B. Thenperhaps you could find a chord after the weird one which also has a B in it, ormaybe one of the other notes to carry over. That way you create some links bycommon notes.

Q Why are these chords not used more often?A That’s because they are rarely simple major or minors, or recognisable chords

like sevenths. They tend to be dissonant – to contain sounds that are notimmediately smooth or sweet, but instead are tense to varying amounts. Aslisteners we don’t as readily attach emotions to such chords – but we can witha little prompting from a lyric and an arrangement. If you have some wordswhich are concerned with an unusual or dark feeling then one of these chordsmay work better than predictable majors or minors. But I would use themsparingly – one or two is quite enough in most progressions!

Play great guitar

How didit go?


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19

The one-note shiftAltering one note at a time in a chord leads you down newmusical paths. Let your fingers reshape themselves into newchords and go places you haven’t been before.

Maybe you feel that you tend to go round the samechords and you can’t find an unexpected change. Thisapproach looks inside the chord for the possibility of change.

GO BY ANOTHER ROUTE

There are familiar ways of changing chord that guitarists play all the time. But you canuncover some fascinating progressions if you reflect on a single-note change andwhere it could musically lead. Every change then potentially leads to another multi-option position. Every chord has potential to mutate into many others. It’s obvious ona piano because there the notes are laid out in front of you. The guitar asks for moreeffort to find playable shapes.

The boxes offer two six-chord sequences. The first is constructed by moving notes upthe 3rd string; the second works on the principle of any note in the chord beingavailable for change. We start on an ordinary D chord (box i). The note A on the 3rdstring shifts up one fret to create D augmented (D+, box ii). Augmented chords are anoddity of the musiverse. Remember a major chord has three notes separated by a 4+3formula (in semitones). Well, an augmented chord results when a major third goes ona major third (4+4). It’s neither major nor minor. No one spends many beats on one ofthese, but they do happen precisely in situations like this, passing between two otherchords.


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From the D+ we go to D6 (iii), as the A# moves to a B. Strictlyspeaking this is a Bm/D (a Bm first inversion) but with thepersistent open string D under chords i–iv it is likely to be heardas D6. One more change takes B to C and D7 (iv). Boxes v and vigo to a Gsus4/D chord which resolves downwards into G/D.From there you could begin the sequence again. Experimentwith how many bars you can spend on each chord. One bar toeach chord would result in a six-bar sequence, but it could besqueezed into four bars if several chords had two beats.

The second sequence (boxes vii–xii) commences with a four-string E chord. This lends itself to arpeggio playing rather thanstrumming. From the E in box vii, G# on the 3rd string rises to Aand an Esus4 (viii). If the note A continued one more fret itwouldn’t be pleasant, so instead, why not move another note? Ifthe 2nd string B rises to C we get a (second inversion) Am/E (ix).This can be changed by one move to Fmaj7 if the E on the Dstring goes up one step to F (x). Adding the little finger to thesecond string raises the C to a D and thus Dmadd9/F (xi). Finallythis chord can turn into Dadd9/F# if the F on the 4th string risesto an F#. This last change requires a shift of fingers.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Single-fret changes work with

whole barré chords. Take Am7

at the fifth fret (575555) and

imagine you’re playing a song

in G major. A typical chord

change would be Am7 up two

frets to Bm7 (797777). But

you could insert an A#m7

(676666) between by sliding

the shape up one fret at a

time. This works with any

chords that are a tone apart.

The inserted chord is called a

‘chromatic’ (from the word for

‘colour’) because it does not

belong in the key. Listen to

the verse-end of Bill Withers’

‘Ain’t No Sunshine’.

Defining idea...‘What I try to do is put myself

into a state of mind where I

empty myself of all ideas and

let something develop. It’s like

rolling the dice. You don’t

know what will happen.’

Eric Clapton


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Idea 19 – The one-note shift

Dmadd9/F

G/D

D7D6D+

2

3

D

1 1

2

1

4

Esus4Gsus4/D E

1

22

11

3

Dadd9/F#

1

32 1

3

Am/E

3 2

2 2

3

Fmaj7

1

2 23

1

3

11

2

4

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)

3


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Q The first four chords reminded me of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Kashmir’. Arethey the same?

A Yes … and no. The main riff of Zep’s full-of-Eastern-promise epic can beloosely described as D–D+–D6–D7. They weren’t the first to write a song withit, though I doubt if any other songwriter got such titanic power with it.However, ‘Kashmir’ needs an altered tuning on the guitar (DADGAD). JimmyPage plays different shapes which add extra notes to this progression. If youdon’t want to go the whole hog with retuning, just lower your E string to Dwhen you play these shapes. ‘Drop D’ tuning – as it’s known – is featured inIdeas 33 and 34. The same sequence occurs transposed down into A in a tracktitled ‘Get It On’ by 1980s hard rock group Kingdom Come.

Q I like the sound of the D+ chord. Can I get inversions out of it, likethe ones featured in Idea 12?

A Strange as this seems, I’m afraid you can’t. The augmented chord is one ofthose chord types that enters your musical life like a humanoid figure in asilver spacesuit striding down a ramp from a flying saucer and saying,‘Greeting earthlings’. Believe it or not, each of its three notes can serve as theroot note (muffled scream!). If you try to invert an augmented chordwhichever note you put lowest becomes the next root note. So D+ is also F#+and Bb+.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


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84


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20

Instant bluesBlues is like a universal language. Everybody recognises it,everybody can follow where a blues is going, and for decadesthe guitar has been its main mouthpiece.

With one scale of five notes it is possible to playsurprisingly effective blues lead guitar. Here are the notesand the pattern that lie at the ultramarine core of theblues.

ONE NOTE AT A TIME

Strumming is great, but there’s much more to the guitar than just strumming chords.A whole new world of guitar is revealed when you decide to have a go at playing singlenote ideas. It could be a famous melody on the top strings, or a riff on the lowerstrings, or a lead guitar phrase. Playing single notes also helps your chord changingbecause it gives your fingers more exercise than simply moving between familiarshapes. So you win every way.

In blues and rock the most popular scale is the pentatonic minor. ‘Penta’ for ‘five’ and‘tonic’ for ‘note’. It’s the scale which people often first learn on the guitar. Start on A andthe notes are A C D E and G. It has a distinctive tough quality when played over a 12-barsequence of major chords (in blues) or a sequence where each of these notes is representedby a major chord (in rock). It will also work, though with a different character, in most Aminor progressions. But if the progression is in a major key with major and minor chordsexercise caution, as the pentatonic minor may clash with the minors.


86

Have a look at the music/tab. The key signature of three sharps atthe start tells you that this is in A major. This key’s notes are A BC# D E F# G#. Compare that with the pentatonic minor for A: AC D E G. Notice there are three notes in common: A, D and E.Two notes (B and F#) are omitted. What’s interesting is theremaining two notes. We have C# and G# in the major scaleversus C and G in the pentatonic minor. In this context these are‘blue’ notes. They deliberately clash with the harmony of thebacking, because chord of A has a C# and the chord of E has aG#. Whether played by an instrument like guitar or sung by avocalist, ‘blue’ notes have a big role in making blues music soundlike the blues. They are easy to spot in the music notationbecause they wear a natural sign (♮).

Bars 1–2 of ‘Instant Blues’ trace out the A pentatonic minor scaleover two octaves, from A at the fifth fret on the 6th string to theA two octaves higher at the fifth fret on the 1st string. Therhythm has the expected ‘dum-di dum-di’ swing of a slow blues.Notice how phrases rise and fall in pitch, and how certainrhythms are repeated. Use alternate down and up strokes in bar11 to play the 9–8–7 triplet figure – they make it easier to strike.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...In bar 9 of ‘Instant Blues’ the

pentatonic minor occurs in a

‘box’ of frets 9-8-10-8-10.

Try playing through a 12-bar

with only this position. By

focusing on not playing too

many notes (which you can’t

here because your pattern is

deliberately limited), you can

practise timing them to land

effectively with each chord

change. Each root note of the

three chords A, D and E is

within this five-fret pattern. If

you can play imaginatively

with only these notes you are

nearer to doing it with a full

two-octave pattern like that

one laid out in bars 1–2.

Defining idea...‘Don’t try to sound like me.

You can love me but don’t try

to sound like me. Play the

blues your way.’

John Lee Hooker


87

Idea 20 – Instant blues

= 602 3

53 5 7

5 75 7 7

5 85 5

5 8 5 8

4 5 6

5 8 58 5

7 5 7 5 7 7 7 57

full

7 8 9

77

57

5 75 7 7 7

8 8 8 810 8

109 7

full full

10 11 12

7

58 5 8

7 57

full

9

9

9 8

8

8

0567

70

INSTANT BLUES


88

Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q If I improvise with these notes my phrases tend to sound like ascale. Why is this?

A If your phrases remind you too much of a scale, it means that you’re probablytravelling up and down the strings and playing in too even a rhythm. A scale isonly the raw material for a musical statement, just as letters of the alphabetare the raw material of words and sentences. To make a good phrase you haveto select notes, shape them melodically and play them in an interestingrhythm. This makes them sound more like a solo. Don’t forget to leave gaps –don’t play continuously. Think of a singer’s melody – there have to be pausesto take breath if nothing else.

Q How important is it for me to bend notes?A Very important in blues and blues-influenced rock. However, since this is a

book aimed at acoustic and electric players, I have been restrained aboutputting in too many or too wide bends. String bending requires the light-gauge strings of an electric. On an acoustic it is hard to bend a note morethan a semitone, a half-step. If you have an electric try bending the notesthat occur in the piece and see which ones sound good bent, or are easy tofinger. Whether a note sounds good bent is also influenced by the chord overwhich you bend.


89

21

Sweet bluesWoke up this morning … Dang! You know, my lover she ain’tgone! Must be celebration time, and to celebrate on guitaryou need another set of five notes.

Here’s a five-note scale that will lift your leadplaying and give it a joyful, upbeat, positive vibe – and it’sjust as easy to finger as the previous one.

FIVE STEPS TO HEAVEN

The pentatonic minor isn’t the only five-note scale guitarists play. It has an essentialsister scale called the pentatonic major, whose notes in A are A B C# E F#. Incomparison to a pentatonic minor, the pentatonic major seems happy, bright andupbeat. This scale sounds great not only in a 12-bar blues or rock ’n’ roll progressionbut in any major key song. The pentatonic major fits over any of the six primarychords of A major, namely A, Bm, C#m, D, E and F#m (for more information aboutchord progressions and keys see the books How To Write Songs On Guitar and TheSongwriting Sourcebook). It is a very forgiving scale – played in the right context mostphrases come out sounding reasonably musical. Unlike the pentatonic minor, if theprogression is in a major key, with its major and minor chords, you don’t have toworry as the notes of the pentatonic major blend with both.

Blues and rock players have their own personal bias in terms of how much of thesetwo scales they use. Some lean towards the pentatonic minor, and some to the major.There’s a lot of pentatonic minor lead in Jimi Hendrix’s blues songs, whereas in


90

B.B. King you will hear many more pentatonic major phrases. Youcan find your own mixture.

The key signature of three sharps at the start of ‘Sweet Blues’ tellsyou that, like ‘Instant Blues’, this piece is in A major. Rememberthat this key’s notes are A B C#D E F# G#. Compare that withthe pentatonic major for A: A B C# E F#. Two notes notes (D andG#) are omitted, but otherwise the scales have five notes incommon. There are no ‘blue’ notes, which is visually clear fromthe fact that there are no natural signs on the music notation. Allthe notes of this pentatonic major scale agree with the harmonyover which they’re played.

The first three bars demonstrate what can be played on a scaleposition at the second fret. This pattern culminates in the note A,which is the first of bar 4. If you wanted to go higher you have tofind a higher position for the scale – i.e. to go to another patternon the fretboard. Bar 4 brings the music all the way down thescale but instead of ending on an open string A, it ends on afretted A. This connects to the next four bars which lead acrossand up the fretboard on the A pentatonic major scale. Look out

for the hammer-ons in bars 5–6 which help smooth the movement. Bars 10–12 use abox pattern around the fifth fret. See how far you can play just using those frets.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Take the five notes of the

pentatonic major and play

them starting from any root

note on the 5th string. Take

the D at the fifth fret. Pretend

it’s a riff, not a scale. Now

play it from the bottom string

two frets lower, at the third

fret. Then play the first riff

again. Then play it from the

bottom string at the fifth fret.

You’ve made a new riff

sequence which can carry

through a 12-bar sequence

rather than playing whole

chords. You can hear

something similar on the

Temptations’ famous ‘My Girl’.

Defining idea...‘As a guitar player, you can

gravitate to the blues because

you can play it easily. It’s not

a style that’s difficult to pick

up. It’s purely emotive and

dead easy to get a start with.’

Boz Scaggs


91

= 902 3

0 42 4

22 4 2 4

2 42

42 5

25 2

4 5 6

5 25 2

4 24 2

4 25 7 7 9

7 7 97

9 7 7 97 7 9 11

7 8 9

911

9 9 1110 12 10

11

12 912

912 10 5

57 5

65

10 11 12

7 9 7 57 5 7

77 5

6 4 65 7

5

0

SWEET BLUES

Idea 21 – Sweet blues


92

Q Can I play both the pentatonic major and minor of these scales in asingle piece of music?

A It depends on the harmony and character of the music. The answer is yes, ifyou’re playing a 12-bar or similar progression in a blues/rock style. You canuse both in a major key song, but watch for any minor chords that come inbecause the pentatonic minor of the key won’t blend with them. For example:take a song in A major whose chords are A Bm C#m D E and F#m. The threeminor chords are saved for the bridge/solo. If you play A pentatonic minor (A CD E G) C will clash with the C# in C#m and F#m, and G will clash with the G# inC#m.

Q Can I play the pentatonic major scale in a minor key?A You can’t play the pentatonic major in a minor key because it clashes with the

key. Although we hear flattened notes – ‘blue’ notes – as expressive in amajor key, the reverse – hearing sharpened notes against a minor key backing– doesn’t work in the same way. The key of A minor has the notes A B C D E Fand G (or G#). The scale of A pentatonic major (A B C# E F#]) has three notesin common with it but more importantly a C# that clashes with C and an F#that clashes with F.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


93

22

You hexy thingYou’ve heard of that old black magic so many blues guitaristsclaim to know? Well, put aside that shredded bat wing andthe voodoo doll, and grab some musical magic.

Transform the pentatonic scales from the previoussections by adding a note that gives them a dark twist.These six-note ideas will gild your blues/rock playing.

PUT A SPELL ON YOU

You’ve all heard of a ‘hex’, right? Another word for a spell. Well, add one note to apentatonic scale and it becomes a hexatonic scale. This gives you two new musical spellsto work with. If you do this to the pentatonic minor the result is what is known as the‘blues scale’. The extra note is the flattened 5th, which if we’re taking A as our startnote produces the scale A C D Eb E G. You can get this extra note either by fretting it,or bending the note a fret lower up a half-step (easily done if you’re playing anelectric, but possible on acoustic too). Depending on which you choose, there’s a slightdifference to the musical effect. Either way this note adds a dark edge to phrases.

Likewise, you get a major version of the ‘blues scale’ by adding a flattened third note tothe pentatonic major: A B C C# E F#. This adds an unexpected ‘spice’ to thepentatonic major. As with the previous blues scale, this lowered third is obtained bybending and other times by fretting. The same restrictions about key apply to thisscale as the pentatonic major in the previous section. Now let’s try them out.


94

Play great guitar

2 3

0

8 7 57

58 7 5

7 56 5 3 0 0

30

0 1 03

4 5 6

0 03

0 0 3 40 3 4

2 43

5 4 2 4 23 4

7 8 9

7 76 5 3 5 3 0

7 75

7 75 7 8 9

89

8 910

10 11 12

8 99

1210

1211 10 8 10 8

10 89

88 7 5 7 5

7

5

YOU HEXY THING


95

‘You Hexy Thing’ exhibits several characteristics associated withthese extra notes. It begins with a riff-like phrase on the A bluesscale. Listen for the effect of putting the normal fifth (E) next tothe flattened fifth (Eb) going into bar 2. Contrast the sound of thelast three notes in bar 2 (which are fretted) with the last threenotes in bar 3 which develop round an open D string. In bar 4the last three notes (A C C#) imply the A pentatonic major withthe additional flattened third. In bar 5 you play the same scalestarting on a D (D E F F# A B), but in bar 6 a C unexpectedlyappears, giving a bluesier edge to this descending phrase. Watchout for the fingering at the end of bar 8, which helps you makethe movement up the fretboard for the higher phrases.

As a general point, listen for phrases which echo each other, orrepeat at different octaves and positions. This is an importantpart of playing interesting lead lines. They should have somemelodic shape so as not to resemble undigested scales, andrepetition is a goodmeans to allowyour audience toget the phrases intheir minds.

Idea 22 – You hexy thing

Defining idea...‘I find a blue note whenever

I can. I try to find the

poignancy in any kind of lick.’

Johnny Marr, The Smiths

Here’s an idea for you...If you want these new notes

to stand out, and have light

gauge strings, you can bend

the previous note to them by

a tone or a semitone. Bending

to them gives them extra

colour and drama. Try striking

them repeatedly and letting

them down slowly, or pre-

bending them – where the

string is bent before you strike

it and the note is first heard

at the top of the bend and

then descending. You’ll need

an electric guitar for this, as

acoustic strings are too hard

to bend this far.


96

Q Some of the phrases in ‘You Hexy Thing’ sound slightly jazzy. Why isthis?

A Glance at the music notation and you can see many additional sharp, flat andnatural signs being added to the music. If a piece stays firmly in key and onlyuses the notes of its main scale these additional signs would be unnecessary.The fact that they are there makes it plain that the melodic line is stretchingthe key a little. These off-key notes are termed ‘chromatic’ notes. They oftenfeature as half-step movements between notes, and this is one of the reasons(along with the rhythmic swing) that you might be reminded of a jazz stylehere.

Q Are there other notes that can be added occasionally?A If a guitarist has the imagination there are a number of extra notes that might

be fitted in. Stevie Ray Vaughan’s solo on ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb’ (from thealbum Texas Flood) is in E major and is mostly E pentatonic minor; (E G A B D).There are many phrases based on the E minor blues scale (E G A Bb B D), buthe also fits in an F# (the second/ninth of the scale) and D#. The main point isnot to spend too long on these additional notes. That way they won’t seem toconflict with the chords over which you’re soloing.

Play great guitar

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97

23

The not so famous five There are five-note scales that don’t get played as often asthose used in blues and rock. Here’s a chance to explore some of these not-so-famous five.

The scales we’ve looked at so far are played bymost guitarists, so why not give your solos character byexperimenting with less well-known five-note scales.

STEPPING STONES

It is possible to take a major scale and choose a different row of five notes to the onesthat make the pentatonic major featured in Idea 21. Such ‘alternate’ pentatonic scalesappear in folk music across the world and through time. They sound more exotic toour ears because we don’t hear them as frequently as the pentatonic major and minor.If a seven-note scale is like a continuous bridge across a stream, these scales resemblestepping stones thrown down in various gap-sizes into the water.

‘The Not So Famous Five’ gives three examples of alternate pentatonics, and each is ina different key. The first leads off with a 4-bar phrase in C major. It uses the notes C DF G A, which is 1–2–4–5–6 on the major scale, compared to 1–2–3–5–6 when you playthe pentatonic major. If these notes were re-sequenced (D F G A C) the result wouldbe D pentatonic minor. However, since many of the phrases start on C or emphasise C,and because the chords emphasise C major, it functions differently to what it would ifthe music were in D minor or D major. Bar 2 repeats part of bar 1’s pitch and rhythm


= 1102 3 4

3 53

35 7

5 5 76 8

8 58

10 810 8 6

7 5 57 5

3 53

0

5 6 7 8

30 2

0 40

4 0 42

02

0 42 4

32 5 3 2 3

9 10 11 12

5 25 2

4 2 42

4 24

2 4 24 2 2 4

2 4 24 2

22

2

2

98

Play great guitar

THE NOT SO FAMOUS FIVE


99

Idea 23 – The not so famous five

but has a variant ending, going down in pitch rather than up. Ashift of position in bar 3 brings the music back to the fifth fret.

After the repeat, the music changes key to G major for bars 5–8and we get our second example. This pentatonic scale is G A B DF# (1–2–3–5–7), again compared to G A B D E (1–2–3–5–6) on theusual pentatonic major. This scale strongly implies a Gmaj7 chord(see Idea 11 for seventh chords) and therefore has a dreamy,romantic feeling. Notice how bar 7 imitates bar 5 in phrasing andrhythm, and the strong chordal feel of bar 8, where the notes ofa Bm7 chord (B D F# A) are played one after the other.

For the last four bars the music changes key into D major. Thelead uses a third scale of E F# A B C#, which is 2–3–5–6–7 of thescale of D major. What’s unusual about this is that if you stickrigidly to it you never actually hit the key note D. Normally inlead guitar that would never happen – after all, the key note isthe safest of all notes! This evasion of the key note creates apeculiar tension, as of an expectation forever thwarted. At thesame time the frequent occurrence of C#, the seventh, also givesit a gentle and dreamy character.

Here’s an idea for you...One way to approach this

creatively is instead of

constructing a new finger

pattern for the scale on the

key note, adapt a pattern you

already know. For example,

the scale used in bars 9–12 (E

F# A B C#) if rearranged as F#

A B C# E, is actually F#

pentatonic minor. In which

case, if you move any

pentatonic minor scale to the

right place, so it starts on an

F#, you are playing the right

notes for this D major chord

sequence anyway. You won’t

have had to construct the

right finger pattern starting

from the note E.

Defining idea...‘The most mundane licks can

turn into something

completely different with the

right effect.’ Billy Corgan,

Smashing Pumpkins


100

Q Is this the same thing as changing the pentatonic scale to fit thethree chords of a 12-bar?

A No. In that instance you mean playing A pentatonic major or minor when thechord is A (i.e. in bars 1–4, 7–8, and 11 of a 12-bar progression), Dpentatonic major or minor when the chord is D (i.e. in bars 5–6, and 10), andplaying E pentatonic major or minor when the chord is E (i.e. in bars 9 and12). This, in fact, is a common misconception – that every new chord in asequence requires a change of scale. You can play through a 12-bar with onlyone scale and much of the time this is what players do. If you choose to addanother of these scales, that’s fine, but try bringing in only one or two.Changing scale too often can be unsettling to the listener, can make youconfused about where you are on the fretboard, and spoil the phrases thatcould have been played had you stayed in one place.

Q The phrases I got from these scales sounded unpredictable.A That’s to be expected. The reason for this is that the missing notes are ones

that you might usually hear. With them gone, there is a sense that somethingis not quite right. How much of a factor this is depends on how well you canfit your phrases over the chord sequence.

Play great guitar

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102


103

24

Seven up (and down)Is there life beyond pentatonics? Does everything go infives? Will our caped guitarists escape the hex and find themissing two notes? Tune in to this section’s exciting episode!

Most of the music you hear is based on the fullmajor scale. Draw on it for melodies a-plenty and exercisefor the fingers, whatever style you play. Holy seven steps,Batman!

DOH! RAY? ME!

To adapt the lyric of a song by the Four Tops, just seven numbers could straighten outyour musical life. The major scale is indeed a thing of beauty and the basis for mostWestern music, whether popular or ‘classical’. It consists of seven notes arranged in asequence of intervals (the gaps between them): tone, tone, semitone, tone, tone, tone,semitone. In frets this would be 2–2–1–2–2–2–1. You can test this by fretting any noteon any string below the eighth fret (to ensure you don’t run out of them). Play thatnote, then move up that string according to the 2–2–1–2–2–2–1 pattern, hitting eachnote as you go. The result, wherever you started, will be a major scale. This is the scaleyou once knew in school by the doh-ray-mi-fa-so-la-te-doh sounds (before HomerSimpson made ‘doh’ mean something else!).

If we take C as our starting note, the notes for a scale of C major would be C D E F G AB C. In that scale the two half steps happen to line up with the pairs of note (E–F, B–C)which are a semitone apart anyway. This is why the scale needs no accidentals (sharps


104

or flats). But if you begin on any other note you must addaccidentals to some notes to make them express the2–2–1–2–2–2–1 pattern. In the major keys sharps and flats nevermix. So a major scale that requires a sharp never needs a flat(though it might need more than one sharp, up to a maximum ofseven), and vice versa with flats (up to a maximum of seven flats).

The piece that’s included in this section is once again in the keyof A major. Bars 1–2 use all the notes of the scale of A major,starting with the leap of an octave. Bars 3–4 play an almostidentical phrase one octave lower. This means that in the firstfour bars you have played the A major scale over two octaves. Atbar 5 the melody moves upward, still at the second fret, withsome open strings to make the fingering easier. Bars 5, 6 and 7are variations on a single phrase. Halfway through bar 7 youchange position, heading up to around the fifth fret. One moreshift – in bar 8 – takes you to the high E at the start of bar 9.After this the melody gently phrases its way back to the low A atthe end. There are no bends in this piece but there are plenty ofopportunities for slides, hammer-ons and pull-offs (the subject ofIdea 41).

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Learn a scale pattern that

starts on the 6th string and

goes straight across over two

octaves to the top string and

back. Then play a pattern that

starts on the 5th string and

goes up and down for two

octaves. Then move your first

pattern up one fret and repeat

the process, with the 5th

string pattern also

commencing one fret higher.

Don’t attempt to play too fast.

Use down and up strokes of

the pick, or alternate fingers.

See how long you can play

before your hand gets tired.

It’s a good stamina builder.

Defining idea...‘What is a chord, if not the

notes of a scale hooked

together? Scales will unlock

the neck for you.’

John Mclaughlin


105

Idea 24 – Seven up (and down)

= 1002 3

2

5 4 2 03 2 3 2

4 22

2 14 2 0

4 5 6

40

20

0 2 40 2 4 0 2 4

1 20

7 8 9 10

2 42 3

07

75 7 9

7 1210

10 912 10 9 7

9 7 5 47 5

11 12 13

69 9 7

9 6 4 6 47

7

4 6 7 2 04 0

SEVEN UP AND DOWN


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Q Why do these scales not sound very ‘rocky’?A Most rock music is influenced by the musical idioms of the blues – which

means the chords found in a 12-bar and the pentatonic scales that accompanythem. You associate the clash between the lowered ‘blue’ notes and theharmony as the identifying sound of rock, complete with string bending anddistortion. The major scale doesn’t create this effect. Its notes blend into theharmony. Some still sound slightly tense against the chords but that’s anotherkind of tension. However, rock solos do draw on major scales from time totime.

Q Why do I find these scales harder to play than the pentatonic scales?A This is down to the fact that they have seven notes instead of five. As a

consequence they require all four fingers of the fretting hand to play themproperly. But therein lies part of their usefulness. One of the ways ofincreasing your speed and dexterity on the guitar is to regularly practise scalesthat need all four fingers. That way you exercise all of them. If you only playpentatonic scales it is easy to neglect the development of the little finger. Ifyou have a metronome, or something similar that can give you a ‘click’,establish what speed it is set to and try playing in time. When you can do itslowly, gradually increase the speed.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


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25

Magic numbers, magic changesWith a three and a four and a twelve and a … You might have heard people say that music has a mathematicalelement. Well, maths was never this much fun.

Certain numbers can unlock the fretboard. If moved about bysuch numbers, phrases or chords can flower in a newposition, so you get more from applying what you know.

COUNT ME IN

Whenever you come up with a good musical idea on the guitar you have the chance todevelop it by transposing. It thus retains its identity but sounds higher or lower inpitch. As the number 12 means the number of notes there are, anything moved up ordown 12 frets goes up or down an octave, whether a lead phrase, riff, scale or chord(that’s why most guitar fretboards mark the twelfth fret with an extra dot). Moveanything across from one string to the next one adjacent without changing fret and itgoes up a fourth. The single exception is going from the third string to the second,where it goes up a third, as those two strings are closer together.

‘Magic Numbers’ demonstrates what is possible applying numbers to a riff. This is acommon songwriting technique in riff-based songs. After all, if you come up with agood riff you want to make the most of it. Bars 1–4 are a typical hard rock riff createdwith notes mostly from the scale of A pentatonic minor (see Idea 20 to refresh on this).


= 1002 3 4

53

55 3

5 37 5 3 5

53

55 3

5 3 2 3 2 3

5 6 7 8

31

33 1

3 15 3 1 3

86

88 6

8 6 5 6 5 6

9 10 11 12

53

55 3

5 75

77 5

713

13

35

35

35

35

57

57

5 75

7

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Play great guitar

MAGIC NUMBERS


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Notice that bars 1 and 3 are identical – we’ll call this phrase ‘x’ –but bars 2 and 4 offer alternate ways of ending it – call them ‘y’and ‘z’. This gives you a formula for writing riffs: x+y+x+z.

Having played the riff on the pitch of A we want to play it againbut higher. With no open strings in bars 1–4 the riff can bemoved (i.e. transposed) up a tone to B by moving up thefretboard by two frets. You can hear a tone-up transposition of ariff at the start of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Heartbreaker’ and in the lastchorus of Kingdom Come’s ‘Living Out Of Touch’. Alternatively,we could transpose by three semitones. In hard rock this soundsappropriate because it evokes the interval that starts thepentatonic minor scale (in A, A–C–D–E–G where A–C is a minorthird). To transpose a riff from the 6th string in this way youmove across a string and down two frets – this is shown in bars5–6; or move up three frets on the 6th string. This is shown inbars 7–8. They have a slightly contrasted tone because of thedifference in string thickness, but otherwise either is valid andthe choice depends partly on where you go next.

Bar 9 gives the ‘x’ phrase transposed onto D and bar 10transposed to E. We could have passed straight to either from theoriginal riff, in which case transposing up a fourth meanscrossing from the 6th string to the 5th or the 5th to the 4th, or4th to 3rd. To finish off, bars 11–12 feature fifths at differentoctaves. Notice the pattern of going up two strings and two frets.

Idea 25 – Magic numbers, magic changes

Here’s an idea for you...Take the pentatonic minor

scale featured in Idea 20. If

you move any pentatonic

minor pattern down three

frets it automatically turns

into the pentatonic major

notes for the same key. (The

pentatonic major is discussed

in Idea 21). This is great for

making your blues lead sound

more professional because the

shift down provides a firm

contrast of mood – the minor

scale being less positive and

the major one more upbeat.

Eventually you learn how to

create this contrast without

even shifting position. But the

three-frets-down shift is a

great trick.

Defining idea...‘There’s only six strings and

12 frets, man. But the more

you play it, the more things

come out of it.’

Keith Richards, The Rolling Stones


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Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q What about shifting a chord sequence up to change key?A This is straightforward if all the chords are barré chords because the shapes

remain the same, but not if some of the shapes use open strings. Move achord sequence of barré chords up a semitone and although you haven’tmoved far physically, in musical terms you are now in a key which is distantfrom your first one. Play G–C–D in barré chords at the third and fifth frets,then one fret higher gives Ab–Db–Eb. Counter-intuitively, move up a tone (fromG) and your new key A is not so far musically. The dizzy effect of rapidtranspositions can be heard in the verse of Queen’s ‘Now I’m Here’.

Q So if I take the riff in bars 1–4 and shift it onto the 5th string I willhave the riff on D instead of A?

A Yes. This could have happened in bar 5 or in bar 9. In bars 9–10 the firstphrase of the riff – which we labelled ‘x’ – is used on its own. In other words,the original four-bar riff is edited to a single-bar phrase. Why? Because havingplayed the full riff several times it makes sense to do something new with it.Since the listener has heard it all the way through before, you can cut it downand imply further transpositions on D and E – which is more dramatic.


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112


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26

It’s the reel thingHere’s a new musical avenue to explore that may see you infuture years in the corner of a boisterous pub playing folktunes with others, your fingers a blur.

Speed is an overrated musical technique … but byheavens it’s fun! One way of getting more of it is to learnsome fast melodies, such as can be found in folk music.

FROM 0–60 BARS IN A SECOND

Sometimes guitar players ponder speed – the dream of moving your fingers in such ablur of notes that the laws of physics themselves bend and collapse and a wormhole inspace opens up, leading you back billions of years in time to before the solar system hadevolved, and then zip! billions of years into the future when the sun is dying, and thenzip! billions of years back to end up … in a folk club?

In sensible moments we know speed isn’t everything. There are many pleasurableactivities in life where speed is not the point at all, as I’m sure you know. Quite. Haveanother bun, vicar. Certainly, in music, speed quickly evokes the law of diminishingreturns. The first few seconds of a fast phrase can be amazing, and then everything getsblurred and … well, a bit dull. After all, what’s the point of playing notes that can’t beproperly heard and appreciated? Since there are only twelve notes you can get throughall of them in just a couple of seconds. Then what? I remember Carlos Santana oncetalking about players who ran up and down scales as though they couldn’t find the rightnote. So frankly, I’m sure as mature readers and players we’re agreed that wanting to


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play fast is just silly and infantile (makes dismissive gesture as ofbrushing crumbs off jacket) and we are Above All That. Well, mostly …Oh, go on then …

There are moments when speed gets the blood coursing throughour veins, and I feel one coming on right now. Moments when theletters ‘bpm’ (beats per minute) start to look like ‘bhp’ (brakehorse power). One method for getting faster is to learn to play folkdance tunes, especially those known as jigs and reels. SteeleyeSpan’s electric folk albums – The Lark in the Morning, Please To See TheKing, Ten Man Mop – and early albums by Breton musician AlanStivell – are good places to start for examples of this type of tune,as is Mike Oldfield’s arrangement of ‘In Dulce Jubilo’, often heardon the radio at Christmas.

These tunes were traditionally played on fiddles rather than guitar,so their fingering is different to what you might expect in a guitarmelody. Nevertheless, you can lay them out on the fingerboardpretty easily. There is rarely any need to bend notes – slides andpull-off/hammer-ons can be useful though for smoothing outphrases. ‘It’s the Reel Thing’ is based around the fifth fret until bar

9 where it re-locates to the second. If you divide the notes properly between all fourfretting fingers and alternate picking you should be able to make this work. The audioplays once through slowly and then much faster.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you hear a folk tune you

want to play on guitar, but

which doesn’t originate on

guitar, give some

consideration to which key

you play it in. It is much

easier to play if it is in a key

whose scale contains the

open strings of the guitar. For

melody purposes this means

the top three or four strings –

E B G D. Good keys for this

purpose are C, G, D, A and E.

Not only do these offer

relevant bass notes on open

strings, the higher open

strings can cover some of the

melody notes.

Defining idea...‘I’m probably best known for

zooming around the neck, but I

have just as much, if not more,

love and appreciation for great

melodies and harmonies.’

Paul Gilbert, Mr Big


Idea 26 – It’s the reel thing

= 862 3

75 7 5 8 7 5

75

7 6 4 6 47

75 7 5 8 7 5

75

7 6 7 75 7 5 8 7 5

77 5

7 6 4 67

4 5 6

75 7 5

7 58 7 5

7 6 7

7 58 7 5

77 5

7 6 47

7 5

6 75 7 8 7 5

77

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42 3

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4 24

2

10 11 12

4

5 23 5

25 3 2

4 2 42 3

25 3 2 3

4 24

2 4

5 3 25 3 5

25 3

42 5

IT’S THE REEL THING

115


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Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q How do I stop getting my fingers in a tangle?A It is important with guitar music of any technical difficulty to ensure you get

the fingering right. A good fingering enables you to play more easily thanwould otherwise be the case. It keeps the notes in one area of the fretboardas far as possible, and hand-shifting to a minimum. The work is dividedbetween all four fingers. The little finger – often neglected in pentatonic rocklead – comes into its own in this type of dance-tune material. At the sametime a good alternate picking technique is important to get speed in the handwhich is creating the notes.

Q How do I get faster on the guitar?A Playing scales with a metronome is useful because that gives you an exact

figure in beats per minute. Set a metronome or click at about quarter noteequals 100 (100 bpm). Play a note on each click, then two notes on each(effectively 200bpm) then three notes (effectively 300bpm), then slow themetronome and see if you can put four notes on a single click. The mostinstantly rewarding thing you can do is to play along with CDs – whether thisis strumming chords or playing single notes. It forces you to play quicker tokeep up. Playing on your own, it is easy to take as long as you like over achord change.


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27

The twang’s the thang Before Hendrix and Clapton, the guitar came to the forefrontof popular music by doing what singers do: it carried amelody – but in its own twangy way.

Get into an early 60s vibe by playing melodies onthe lower strings. These are much easier than playing leadguitar solos and bring out the resonance of the low notes.

WHEN TWANG WAS KING

It was the Cold War and the start of the doctrine of M.A.D. (Mutually AssuredDeafness), with generals plotting how to use this new-fangled weapon, the electricguitar. The Russians attempted to put a Fender electric into orbit when one defectedfrom the US in 1956. This didn’t work, so they built a metal ball called Sputnik andlaunched that into space instead. It happily orbited, bleeping in a threatening we’re-up-here-first kinda way. Happily, electric guitars did a lot more than bleep – theytwanged.

The first solid-body electric guitars commercially available in the mid-1950s were soonassociated with youth. They came in bright car-paint colours designed to appeal toteenagers, unlike earlier electrics that were hollow and resembled classical instrumentswith their cello f-holes and subdued wood finishes. Initially the electric guitar’s musicalrole continued that of earlier guitars, providing a chordal accompaniment, as on BuddyHolly hits. But coupled with an amplifier, the electric guitar could hold its own as a soloinstrument playing single-note melodies. At the same time, because it was new, thesound of an electric guitar melody was arresting, cool and modern.


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Play great guitar

By 1958 American guitarist Duane Eddy was hitting the chartsplaying melodies on the lower strings. The thicker strings had afuller tone than the upper strings. Their twang was accentuatedwhen played with a pick and made bigger still with echo andstudio reverb. This was space-age music, daddio! On Eddy’s ‘PeterGunn’ the grinding guitar phrase duelled with a snortingsaxophone. There’s something of the same guitar style on EddieCochran’s hits.

Twang soon proliferated. Within a couple of years guitarinstrumental bands sprang up all over. NATO smuggled anumber of guitar combos into West Berlin hoping to encouragean outbreak of teenage rebellion behind the Iron Curtain. Thisled to the Cuban Heel Crisis, when the groups’ cover was blownby their stylish footwear. In the UK the Shadows dominatedBritish pop until the advent of the Beatles with instrumentalslike ‘Apache’ and ‘Wonderful Land’. When a theme tune wasneeded for the James Bond films, commencing with Dr No (1962),it was given to the instrument of the moment – the electricguitar – which is how that theme (dang da-da dang dang, da dada dang da-da dang dang!) became the most widely heard electric

guitar tune ever. Twang also created ‘surf guitar’, instrumentals such as the Ventures’‘Walk Don’t Run’, and features on early Beach Boys records. Bruce Springsteen paidhomage to twang on Born To Run, saying, ‘I wanted tomake a record that would sound like Phil Spector. Iwanted to write words like Dylan. I wanted my guitarto sound like Duane Eddy.’

The tune for this section is typical of a twang low-string melody and works on acoustic or electric. It usesall the notes of the E natural minor scale (EFGABCD).

Here’s an idea for you...Something else you can do

with low strings is to try

playing the bass notes of a

chord, one at a time, turning

them into arpeggios. Just play

the lower three strings for

this effect. Depending on the

type of chord – this works

best with chords that have

open strings in them – you

can discover some unusual

patterns. You can even play

easy versions of chords that

are normally awkward to

finger. Two famous examples

of such low-string figures

occur in Bryan Adams’ ‘Run To

You’ and Nirvana’s ‘Come As

You Are’.

Defining idea...‘We had the idea of putting

the guitar low down … That

was [John] Barry’s idea – to

put [the James Bond theme]

on guitar. We were aware of

Duane Eddy.’ Vic Flick


= 1002 3 4

0 2 30 2

3 2 0 2 33

03 2

5 6 7 8

0 2 30

3 22

32

02 0

33

2 02

9 10 11 12

00 2 3 2

00

0 00 2 3

22

00

21 4

13 14 15 16

024

2

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0

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024

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0 31

2022

119

Idea 27 – The twang’s the thang

THE TWANG’S THE THANG


120

Q Is there a special technique for bending the lower strings?A Being thicker, the lower strings can be harder to bend than the upper ones.

The trick is to pull them downwards rather than push them upwards. Thenotes at the fourth fret on the lower strings, if bent, raise their pitch to thenext open string above. With a strong hand you can bend the notes at thethird fret up a tone to the next upper open string. This is an importantcomponent of the twang style.

Q How can I increase the twang and get a really authentic early 60ssound?

A The essential bits of gear (and we’re talking about electric guitar) wouldinvolve a Fender Stratocaster with medium gauge strings (not light), i.e.010–011 gauge. The heavier string has much to do with tone, and in the early1960s it wasn’t possible to get light strings. The tremolo arm on the guitargenerates Hank Marvin-type vibrato. Then you want a valve amp (or replicatingdigital effect) and an echo unit which emulates analogue tape echo.

Q How do I turn a melody like this into a full composition?A All you need is a second guitar to strum chords, a bass player and a drummer.

That’s the basis of the guitar band sound, although as the Shadows got moresuccessful their records added orchestral parts from strings and horns andextra percussion.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


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28

Two notes from oneIt’s 3 a.m. In the lounge bar the barman sets you up anotherdrink. There’s no sign of her. You sigh, grab your guitar andplay … octaves!

This is the fastest route to a little jazzsophistication. Take a tune, or just improvise, but play octavesinstead of single notes. Result? Cool sounds and firmerfretting.

A MUSICAL SPAN

An octave is the note twelve semitones or six tones above or below the note you startwith. It is the next ‘version’ of any given note once you have played or gone over allthe other eleven. When people sing they naturally divide into octaves according towhether they can pitch a tune high or low. Octaves are fundamental to music. It wasdividing that span that produced our scales and the harmony derived from them.

So how do you find octaves on the guitar? With one of two shapes: the first has the notestwo strings apart, and is held by the first and third fingers. The second is when they arethree strings apart and fretted by the first finger and the fourth finger. The former iseasier to move about. There are also non-movable octaves involving the open strings,where only one note in the octave is fretted, the open string giving the other. This workswith the notes E, A, D, G and B. Octaves naturally form part of guitar chords as notes aredoubled up. If you take an ordinary E chord it contains two octaves on E and one on B;an A chord has one octave on A and one on E; a D chord has one octave on D.


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= 92Sec o 8

2 3

10

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7

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TWO NOTES FROM ONE


123

Next question: how do you pick octaves if they’re not onadjacent strings? If you’re plucking with your fingers then it isn’ta problem: simply select thumb and finger. With a pick yourfretting fingers mute the unwanted string in the middle as youstrike both notes. If the octave is three strings apart the mutingtechnique is more demanding, in which case the answer may beto use a pick and finger, with the flatpicking technique describedin Idea 7.

So, what is the role of octaves on guitar? Traditionally, jazz playerssuch as Wes Montgomery used them to add weight to a tunewithout complicating or distracting from it. This was sometimesbecause they needed the guitar line to cut through more or to fillspace. Octaves have been often neglected by rock players, thoughJimi Hendrix reached for them more than most, especiallyplaying live in the three-piece Experience, where the octavedoubling made for a bigger guitar sound. Later songs like ‘DollyDagger’, where the riff is in octaves, and his filmed Woodstocklive performance are good examples. The air of sophisticationoctaves bring to a solo is typified by Scott Gorham’s insertion ofthem into Thin Lizzy’s ‘Dancing In The Moonlight’. A staticoctave guitar figure runs almost all through Isaac Hayes’ ‘Shaft’.Alternatively, an octave can be played as successive notes, in riffssuch as Led Zeppelin’s ‘Wanton Song’ and ‘Immigrant Song’, orThe Knack’s ‘My Sharona’.

Idea 28 – Two notes from one

Here’s an idea for you...Here’s a good way to practise

octaves and turn them into a

finger workout, and at the

same time learn about the

fretboard. Find some simple

first position scale patterns

which stretch over one octave

and have some open strings.

Try an E major scale starting

on the 6th string or an A

major scale starting on the

open 5th string. Work out

how to add an octave above

every note and play the scale

in octaves. Some of the

octaves are fretted, others a

combination of fretted notes

and open strings.

Defining idea...‘When you get tired and run

out of ideas, you’ll find

freshness and comfort in

octaves.’ George Benson


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Q I find it difficult to keep my fingers in the right shape. When I move,one or the other goes wrong, and I forget which fret I’m supposed tobe at.

A People often find this when they initially try octaves. The trick is to select onefinger or the other as a guide finger, and watch it. Decide which finger is yourreference point. If you play something with one octave shape, then you canuse one finger (usually the top one) to keep your sense of position. If thatfinger moves to the right fret each time, and if the other stays the correctdistance away, then the lower note will also end up in the right place.

The other important thing is to work out a sequence of octaves that doesn’tinvolve many changes of hand shape/string. Going up and down with octaveson the 1st and 4th string is easier than playing them roughly in one positionon the fretboard. This is the opposite to most scales, which are easier playedin one position going across the fretboard, and nonsensical going up anddown one string!

Q Actually, I’m no good at these and I want to cheat. Is there a way?A With an electric guitar you can cheat with effects such as an octave-splitter or

a harmoniser. This will automatically put an octave (or any other interval)above or below your original note.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


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29

Two voices, two fingers With only two notes you can create the illusion of two voicesand even whole chords. Do what two singers do when theyharmonise, but lay it on the fretboard.

Thirds are an essential component of guitar lead,lending warmth and sweetness to chord decorationand fil ls. Whatever style of music you play, you’l l find there’sa place for them.

Thirds crop up all over guitar music. Think of the introduction to Van Morrison’s‘Brown-Eyed Girl’ and you have a sequence of thirds. Think of the twin lead guitar inbands like Thin Lizzy, Wishbone Ash, Queen and Muse, and you have thirds. Think ofthe long ascending figure in Led Zeppelin’s ‘Achilles’ Last Stand’; that’s also in thirds,or the soul music guitar fills by Steve Cropper with Otis Redding. In bands with twoguitarists, players can take one note apiece and the combination will be a third. Butthirds are also played by a single player in many ways. They can quickly fill out theharmony if you don’t have time, or fingers, to play whole chords.

Before you start ‘Two Voices, Two Fingers’, get in position. Hold a standard open Dchord (xx0232). This shape contains the notes for the first two beats of bar 1. On thethird beat push your third finger up to the fifth fret and let your first finger fret thenote on the top string. The third finger is the guide here. Move them up two frets toget the last beat of this bar. Then in bar 2 notice how the shape foreshortens, with thesecond finger taking the top note. That is typical of a sequence of thirds – theycomprise a ‘wide’ shape (the minor third) and a ‘narrow’ shape (the major third). (The


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Play great guitar

= 1002 3 4

023 3

253

75

87

87

75

53

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5

TWO VOICES, TWO FINGERS


129

exact shapes depend on which two guitar strings you’re playing.)Use the same fingering to come back down in bar 2.

Bar 3 is a variation on bar 1. Climbing back up to bar 4,something happens. The thirds turn into sixths. Now you areplaying strings 1 and 3, instead of 1 and 2. Listen for thedifference in the sound. The sixths have a hollow but gracefulquality compared to the closer warmth of thirds. A sixth is whatyou get if you turn a third upside down.

Bars 5–8 transpose the ideas of bars 1–4 onto an A chord. Noticehow the ‘wide’ and ‘narrow’ shapes in the ascending figure inbars 4–5 have a different fingering. Here, the thirds are either onthe same fret or only one fret apart. This happens because of theasymmetry of the guitar strings – strings 2 and 3 are closertogether in pitch than any other pair. They are, in fact, a majorthird apart. Major thirds on these two strings can also be playedwith a single finger half-barré. As in bar 4, in bar 8 the thirdschange into sixths. Bars 9 and 11 show how thirds can be mixedup with sixths. Bar 10 has three examples of a third combiningwith a bass note to give a particular chord voicing which workswell in fingerstyle pieces.

Idea 29 – Two voices, two fingers

Here’s an idea for you...If you have a sequence of

thirds in a key whose scale

includes an open string note,

you can experiment by pulling

off either the upper or lower

note onto the open string. For

example, plan out a sequence

of thirds in G major and play

them on the 2nd and 3rd

strings. If you pull off the

higher finger you add the

open B and if you pull off the

lower finger you add an open

G. This creates some striking

musical phrases. Then you can

select an effective rhythm for

them.

Defining idea...‘My guitar is not a thing. It is

an extension of myself. It is

who I am.’ Joan Jett


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Q How do I know how to harmonise a tune with the right thirds?A Write out the notes of the major scale for the desired key. Take D major – D E

F# G A B C#. The correct third above any note is always two notes on alongthe scale. A third above D is F#, a third above E is G, a third above F# is A,etc. until you reach a third above C# which is E. Starting with the root note,there is a fixed sequence of thirds which can be formularised as 4334433,where 4 is a major third and 3 a minor one. On the fretboard, assuming youstart with the first note of the scale D on the lower of the pair of strings, thiscould be memorised as NWWNNWW, where N = the ‘narrow’ shape and W the‘wide’ shape.

Q Can I play thirds low down on the guitar?A You can, but they’re not as effective. Play GB (32xxxx) and compare it with an

octave higher (xx54xx) or an octave above that (xxxx87). The difference isconsiderable. The low GB sounds muddy compared to the other two. So yourarely find sequences of thirds on the lower strings. The exception is in riffs,where they sometimes appear, especially over the open E string. There are lowthirds in the songs ‘It’s Too Bad’, ‘The Place I Love’ and ‘The ButterflyCollector’, by the Jam.

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30

Riffing outHeard of ‘carbon neutral’? Heavy rock wants to be tonalneutral. There are no major or minor chords in the lost, darkdimensions, just a two-finger fifth.

But even this simplest of guitar figures – the two-fingered fifth or ‘power-chord’ – can be proddedand pushed and expanded into shapes for riffs with moreimagination.

THE DEVIL RIFFS ABOUT A BIT

Back in Idea 15 we looked at so-called ‘power-chords’. Easy to move around in theirtwo-note version, they characterise the heavier styles of rock guitar, from 1970s blues-rock and hard rock to heavy metal and 1980s thrash, and also new wave/punk likeGreen Day. Almost any chord sequence can be turned into a sequence of fifths.

Given this is such a popular shape, it is natural to consider what else you can do withit. First, taken as objects in their own right, try playing one note in a fifth and then theother, not both together. Try this with D5 played as x57xxx. If you do that with a fifthon the top two strings and add some echo you’ll get a guitar figure that resembles‘With Or Without You’ by U2. If you do it with a low fifth you’ll get a riff like LedZeppelin’s ‘No Quarter’ or Dire Straits’ ‘Money For Nothing’.

A second option is to fret a fifth on the lower strings and lift either finger off to anopen string. How it sounds relates to the musical relationship between the fifth you’re


132

holding and the open string. The Cult’s ‘Wild Flower’ begins witha B5 on strings 5 and 4 (x24xxx), and the first finger lifts off the Astring. That note A is a flattened seventh in relation to B5, so itgives a tough sound. Same thing works with an F#5 at the secondfret on the bottom two strings (24xxxx). The effect would bedifferent if you played a C#5 on strings 5 and 4 at the 4th fret(x46xxx) and lifted the first finger off the A string. You wouldthen have a G# on the sixth fret of the 4th string and an open Aon the 5th. Eric Clapton’s riff in ‘Layla’ is another example oflifting a first finger off a fifth, on Bb5 and C5 successively. Thisidea can be developed by adding notes to the fifth as well asgoing to an open string, as in Dire Straits’ ‘Expresso Love’ and theDarkness’ ‘I Believe In A Thing Called Love’.

Fifths slide effectively from one to the other. A semitone slidefrom the previous fret gives an Eddie Cochran/Sex Pistolsdelinquent riff. In a few places you can play a fifth and match anopen string above it or below it to one of the two notes, creatingeither an octave support or a unison. For example, play C5(x35xxx) and then add a unison G by using the 3rd string open(x350xx), or play an E5 (x79xxx) and add the open E underneathfor a more resonant effect (079xxx). For an in-depth look at riffssee my book Riffs.

Many of the above ideas are incorporated into ‘Riffing Out’.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you have fast tempo fifths

it makes sense to change the

fingering. Hold E5 (02xxxx)

with the first finger on the

second fret of the 5th string.

Then play F#5 (24xxxx) with

the second finger on the bass

note and the little finger on

the fourth fret note. Push the

second and fourth fingers up

one fret to get G5 (35xxxx).

The first finger stays still,

awaiting the next E5. This is

handy when going from open

to fretted fifths and back

again. It was used by

Metallica’s James Hetfield to

play the chorus riff of ‘Enter

Sandman’.

Defining idea...‘… live your life; don’t lock

yourself in your room eight

hours a day and think of

nothing but guitar. Learn how

to live well, how to appreciate

flowers. You have to have a

human side.’

Vernon Reid, Living Colour


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Idea 30 – Riffing out

RIFFING OUT


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Play great guitar

How didit go?

Q Is it better to use my third finger or my little finger when playingfifths?

A I feel the little finger is better since it is less of a stretch, it can barré the nextstring up to add the root note an octave higher to make a three-note fifth (G5= 355xxx), and your third finger is free to add an additional note.

Q Can I put the same fifth under a major or a minor chord?A Yes. Since a fifth contains only two notes, the root note and the fifth, it

doesn’t have a third, and the third is the note that makes a chord major orminor. So an A5 (AE) can be played under an A chord (AC#E) or an Am (ACE).An E5 (EB) will support an E (E.G.#B) or an Em chord (EGB). One non-metalway of using fifths is to play them with a clean tone under an acousticstrummed guitar, to which they lend strength. They are also used with mutingin quieter parts of songs, thus making a contrast with those sections wherefull chords are played.

Q Is it true that there are congealed backward satanic messages in this book?

A You mean ‘concealed’, and the answer is, no. Infinite Ideas only believes inbooks that are read forwards. Nor do our heads revolve, whether after dark orat any other time.


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136


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31

A hand full of weather The sky changes, the land stays still. Make a low open stringyour land and let your fingers make weather. Here is thedramatic foundation of the pedal note.

One of the most pleasing of musical devices is tochange chords over a static bass note, so that thechords form new colours with a bass note that may notbelong to them.

NO BATTERIES REQUIRED

First, let’s be clear that the word ‘pedal’ here has nothing to do with the good old‘stomp-box’ – the guitar effect circuit housed in a little metal box that you tread on toget echo or raging amounts of distortion. The ‘pedal’ we’re concerned with here is apurely musical concept, not a piece of musical equipment. And look on the bright side… you don’t have to ever unscrew it and change the battery!

How easy it is to get a pedal note on the guitar is a question of what’s technicallypossible. If you fret a pedal note you may find it difficult to form chords around thatnote, since you can’t lift the finger that frets the pedal note. It can be done, but itmakes your hand look like it has taken up a strange form of yoga or been injected withgenetically modified octopus. This is why most pedal notes on guitar occur as one ofthe three lowest open strings, E, A or D. (Use a capo for pedal notes in other keys or gofor an altered tuning). That way none of your fingers are tied up fretting it.


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0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0423

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A HAND FULL OF WEATHER


139

The most common type of pedal is the key note or the fifth ofthe scale, since they are the two defining notes of the key and itsharmony. Interesting tension can be had by making the pedalnote a different note of the scale than that. You can even play agame whereby the chords and pedal are at war and the pedalonly turns out to be the true key note some time later.

‘A Hand Full of Weather’ is in the key of A major but with a bluesinfluence. It can be played with a pick or with fingers. For bars1–8 the pedal note is the key note A, the open 5th string. Above ita series of triads are struck and allowed to sustain. The eagle-eyedamong you may notice that the C/A chord in bar 3 is what isusually known as Am7. So why the change of name? Well,sometimes chord names depend on context, and in music theear has priority over the eye (or chord book). The musical contextmakes us hear these chords over a static note, so we hear this oneas a C triad over an A, rather than an Am7. We hear an element oftension we don’t normally associate with Am7. Bars 5–8 offer avariation on bars 1–4. From bar 9 the pedal changes to a D abovewhich triads move on the top three strings. The ideas in thisexercise occur in many hard rock songs.

Idea 31 – A hand full of weather

Here’s an idea for you...Here’s a songwriting tip. A

pedal note is a good way to

get more from a single

sequence of chords when

you’re putting together music.

If you have chords that sound

well together try them over a

pedal note. If you are

recording or playing with

someone else the pedal can

be a bass guitar or keyboard

part; if you’re on solo guitar

reduce the chord sequence to

triads – which will leave the E,

A or D strings available to be

a pedal. Later in the song you

play the sequence without the

pedal.

Defining idea...‘… the idea is not to get as

complicated as you can, but

to get as much of yourself

into it as you can.’

Jimi Hendrix


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Q Who should I listen to for good pedal notes?A In rock, most bands eventually get around to writing a number with a pedal

note riff or progression. If I had to name one band for this it has to be TheWho. Pedals are a central feature of the way Pete Townshend composes. Recallthe part pedal notes play in ‘Substitute’, ‘Sparks’, ‘Bell-Boy’, the intro of‘5.15’, or the F# pedal on the intro of ‘Pinball Wizard’ (which, unusually, is afretted note not an open string).

Q I notice in the example that the chords are often struck on the lastoffbeat of the bar. Why? Wouldn’t it be neater to play them on thefirst beat of the next bar?

A Neater, perhaps, but nowhere near as effective or interesting. Hitting themjust before the bar-line seems to pull the music forward. This effect is anotherinstance of syncopation. It is crucial to the rhythmic effect of rock music. Itmakes the chords form an interesting tension with the steady rhythm of thepedal note which clearly marks the beat. Another interesting point about themusic in this example is how clearly signalled the syncopations are by thestandard notation. Even if you can’t read music fully you can see the tieswhich link the sounded chord at the end of the bars to the sustain of thosenotes (not struck) in the next bar.

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32

When a note stays the same Imagine music where one note stays the same regardless.Where one note stays the same regardless. Where one note …Let’s hear it for the drone … drone … drone.

As can be heard in world music, a drone is like astrand sewn through a piece of music on which other notesand chords can be threaded and changed.

Drone notes are an antique musical device found throughout the music of the world.What could be simpler than playing a note over and over? It is the simplest way tosupport a melody. Drone notes are static – they don’t change and one of theirfunctions is related to the use of music for trance/hypnotic effects in religious ritual.For example, they are an important part of Indian music, and feature in the ground-breaking 1966 song ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ by the Beatles, from where they passedinto wider use in popular music. Wherever people use the word ‘trance’ a drone is notfar off. Alternatively, think of Scottish bagpipes, where a drone is established beforethe melody starts, and continues throughout the melody. A drone doesn’t change inthe way that a chord sequence changes the harmony under the notes. The effect iseasy to achieve with keyboard and synthesisers, because of their powers of sustain (asyou can hear in German synth band Tangerine Dream).

The drone note is usually the key note, with a melody above or around it. On theguitar an easy way to experiment with a drone is to put it in the middle of some fifthsand move them around. The fretted notes form interesting combinations with thedrone note. Drones are a way to make a piece of music sound old or ‘folkish’. One of


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the heads of the many-headed hydra beast that is heavy rockeven has ‘drone doom’ written in black felt-tip on its furrowedforehead, a style which employs detuned electric guitars. Droneshave also influenced instrument design. Some stringedinstruments down the ages have had extra strings that resonatedeven if they weren’t actually struck to give a supporting drone tothe main parts.

To get a taste of a drone, try ‘When A Note Remains The Same’.This can be played fingerstyle or with a pick and fingers. It beginswith a fretted fifth and the open G string in the middle. In bars2–4 the bass note drops a semitone at a time, but the open Gdrone continues throughout forming different harmonicrelationships with the notes around it. In bars 5–8 the initialsequence is repeated but with a variation. Watch for the way thelittle finger adds notes on the 2nd string. At bar 9 there’s achange of rhythm and direction. The initial fifth from bar 1 nowmoves up to the sixth, eighth and eleventh frets, the open G stillsounding in the middle. The idea in bars 9–10 is repeated in bars11–12. The last four bars move onto the top three strings. The Bstring becomes the new drone. Around it descend a sequence ofsixths, repeated, all on the beat,with two fifths to end with onthe original string combination.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...A note can function as a

drone in more than one key.

Take the B string, which we

might associate with playing

in G. Strike it and the top E

string together. Fret any of

the following positions on the

top string: 2 (F#), 4 (G#), 5

(A), 7 (B), 9 (C#),

11 (D#), 12 (E), 14 (F#), 16

(G#), 17 (A), 19 (B). These

notes make a scale known as

the B mixolydian. It sounds

like a disease rabbits might

get, I know, but actually it’s

the major scale on B with the

seventh lowered by a

semitone. It suits this kind of

drone playing.

Defining idea...‘[Stephen] Stills and I …

discovered this D modal

tuning at around the same

time in ’66 I think … This was

when “ragas” were happening

and D modal made it possible

to have that “droning” sound

going on all the time.’

Neil Young


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Idea 32 – When a note stays the same

WHEN A NOTE STAYS THE SAME


144

Q What’s the difference between a pedal and a drone?A The distinction is not clear-cut in theory. Remember that a pedal note remains

the same, like a drone, but is the lowest note in the harmony. It could beargued that true pedal notes only come into being when there is a set ofchords changing above them rather than a single note melody.

Q In what other ways could I get an effective drone on the guitar?A The easiest way to get drones on the guitar is to enter the world of altered

tuning. Generally, if you find a means of fretting an octave and moving it upthe neck whilst strumming all or most of the strings you will get a droneeffect. Open major tunings like open G (in Idea 38) or open D (in Idea 47)work reasonably well. However, the effect is strengthened in a tuning whichdoesn’t make a simple chord. If you take open G (DGDGBD) and lower the 2ndstring a tone to A (DGDGAD), or take open D (DADF#AD) and raise the 3rdstring to G (DADGAD), you may find it easier to get this type of sound whereordinary chords are not created. Another direction to go is to create a tuningonly made of roots and fifths. Listen to Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young’s earlyalbums, or the Page/Plant track ‘Wonderful One’.

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33

A touch of retuningLet’s twist again … with those tuning pegs. They can do morethan just keep things in tune. With a turn of even one peg,new music beckons in ‘drop D’.

Not all guitar music is played in standard tuning. Somealters the tuning for special effects. The simplest route intothis brave new world of tuning is to change one string.

WOKE UP IN THE HOTEL DROP D

Here’s a story for you. I once took an acoustic guitar into a music shop to have someadjustments made. At that time I was writing songs in a variety of altered tunings, andI had left the guitar in open D. I was curtly informed by one of the Minions of theNarrow-Minded who worked in this shop that the guitar was meant to be played inEADGBE. Clearly in his narrow little world, the 11th Commandment was not Let ItRock but Thou Shalt Not Retune. So much for the music of Joni Mitchell, Neil Young,Nick Drake and hundreds of others.

Standard tuning (EADGBE) is an effective compromise for tuning, insofar as it allowsyou to play with relative ease in most keys and to change key. But there are othermusical effects and chords which standard tuning does not facilitate. The final arbiterof the validity of technique is music. It is the music that matters, and everything else issecondary. Enter the concept of altered tunings. The simplest form of altered tuning isone in which only a single string is changed. This might not seem on face value to be a


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A PIECE OF DROP D


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promising move. But even a single string retuned can result indelightful new chords and a fresh stream of inspiration on theguitar.

Probably the most popular single string alteration of the guitar’stuning is what is known as ‘drop D’. This name is slightlymisleading, because it isn’t a D that has been dropped but an E –the 6th string – which has been detuned a tone to a low D. Withthis change, the guitar is retuned DADGBE. To carry this out,either keep playing the 6th string and detune it until it soundsan octave below the open fourth string, or tune down until theseventh fret on the 6th string is the same note as the open 5thstring. Welcome to ‘drop D’. The management hope you willenjoy your stay …

So, now what? You can explore this new tuning by playingthrough any chord shapes you know from standard tuning andlistening for the results. If the bass note is obviously not correctbecause it is one tone out try re-fingering the chord, thuscreating a new shape (you have to do this with G, for example).But listen also for the way the altered bass note might cast afresh light on the chord shape. Notice the fabulous deepresonance the tuning gives to standard D and Dm chords,because you can now strum all six strings. ‘Drop D’ tuning ispopular for fingerstyle because it allows for an alternate thumboctave bass with open strings, so the rest of the hand can move.The picking pattern is adapted from Idea 6.

Idea 33 – A touch of retuning

Here’s an idea for you...The point of a drop tuning is

to play in a key that most

exploits that new open note.

So ‘Drop D’ is ideal for D

major – but also for D minor,

though players tend to forget

that. Play a standard Dm

chord (xx0231). With the

lowered 6th string it should

now be all six strings

(000231) which is far more

resonant. Then play Dm

shapes at the fifth fret

(000765) and the tenth fret

(00010–10–10), or an

expressive Dm9 (003210).

Apply a simple fingerpicking

pattern for impressive results.

Defining idea...‘Altered tunings are wonderful

– they’re a different logic.’

John Doan


148

Q Does messing about with tunings damage my guitar?A It does not, but follow one simple rule: avoid tuning strings up in pitch. They

might break and it puts more strain on the neck. Construct your tunings bygoing down in pitch. Strings can also break tuning down, surprisingly enough,especially if old or if you slacken off too fast. Take care with the top E string –if any is going to snap, it’s that one. A small drawback is that changingtunings in a short space of time can cause temporary tuning instability,because of the way tensions change on the whole neck during the process. Soyou have to check the tuning of the whole guitar, not only the strings youaltered. Altered tunings sound better when they have had a chance to settlein. Professional players have extra guitars left permanently in their favouritealtered tunings. (Pssst! Good excuse to buy another guitar!)

Q How do I get back to normal tuning from drop D?A You play E on the second fret of the 4th string, and tune the open 6th string

up until it is an octave below this E. Otherwise: play the open 5th string (A)and then the note at the fifth fret on the lowest string (G). This note will be atone below what it should, so tune up the bottom string until that fifth fretnote once more matches the open A string. Then you are back in standardtuning.

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34

A sneaky rocker‘Drop D’ tuning is not just for folk-style fingerpicking andgentle acoustic singer-songwriters. It’s a motherlode of heavyguitar riffs. GrrrROWWLL!

Here’s an easy method for creating grungy sequencesin power-chord fifths that you can play with onefinger, or deep swampy single-note riffs.

WOKE UP IN THE BASEMENT OF THE HOTEL DROP D

Having a lowered 6th string means you can play riffs in single notes that takeadvantage of it. A famous example is Led Zeppelin’s ‘Moby Dick’, and a less famousone the Move’s 1969 single ‘Brontosaurus’. The reduced string tension on the 6th in‘drop D’ also means you can do wild, lugubrious bends on it and work these into theriff itself. In some respects the application of the ‘drop D’ tuning to electric guitarfrom folk guitar in the late 1960s led to a rediscovery of the enthusiasm for themetallic lower tones of the guitar that had originally been a part of the late 50s ‘twang’style (see Idea 27). It was as though Duane Eddy had a love-child with Morticia Adamsunder a full moon to the squeaking of bats and the ‘Monster Mash’ …

This tuning provides an easy way to play the kind of power-chords/fifths described inIdea 30. For this, the giveaway information is in the lowest three strings of the tuning:DADGBE. The notes D and A make D5; adding a D above the low one simply makes theD5 sound fatter. These are open strings, which means you can hold down this fifthchord on the bottom three strings with only a single finger barré. That means you can


150

move them around very quickly – which is how all those thrashmetal bands manage to play riffs at that velocity. The next thingto work out is which fret positions fit together. The simplest hardrock formula is to take a D pentatonic minor scale (D F G A C)and play fifths on each of those notes going up the fretboard.The frets needed are 0–3–5–7–10–12 to give D5, F5, G5, A5, C5 andthen D5 an octave higher than the open string version.

‘A Sneaky Rocker’ shows what you can do with ‘drop D’ tuning ina heavy rock/riff context. It features three contrasting approachesto ‘drop D’ tuning. Bars 1–4 are a riff that uses fifths with a fewsingle accented notes at the end of bar 2 and a variation to endbar 4. This riff fits the formula x+y+x+z first mentioned in Idea25. In bars 5–8 a new riff comes in, written in single notes. Thisriff also uses the x+y+x+z formula. Bars 9–12 show how to play astandard rock rhythm figure on G and A in a much easierfingering than happens in standard tuning. The otherwisedifficult stretches are removed. To find out more about thisfigure see Idea 43. These ideas work as effectively on acousticguitar as electric, but have a different character on eachinstrument.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...These riffs in fifths lend

themselves to serious Spawn-

of-Satan-Slavering-At-The-

Gates metal. If you want a

darker sound – for example,

to emulate the kind of riff

that Metallica create –

combine the pentatonic minor

positions given above

(0–3–5–7–10–12) with fifths

at the first and sixth frets.

The first fret is Eb5 and the

sixth fret is Ab5. Extend this

to the Locrian mode. Play

fifths at

0–1–3–5–6–8–10–12–14.

Stress the 1 and the 6

positions, especially going

onto the open strings, with

plenty of distortion and hand

muting.

Defining idea...‘You just turn a few pegs and

get a different tuning and

suddenly you get almost like a

different instrument.’

Keith Richards, The Rolling Stones


Idea 34 – A sneaky rocker

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A SNEAKY ROCKER

151


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Q Why do some of the notes I play on the 6th string sound out oftune?

A This may be the result of your fretting technique not having adjusted to thereduced tension of the detuned string. The reduced tension means too muchfinger pressure sharpens the note. Experiment with this by fretting a note onthe 6th string and squeezing it harder – you should hear it go out of tune. Sodon’t use any more pressure than is needed. This applies more on an electricthan acoustic, because of the former’s light-gauge strings. Otherwise, are youinadvertently pulling the string downwards? That is easier to do with reducedtension – and it will sharpen the note.

Guitarists who play a lot in tunings where string tension is decreasedsometimes move to a heavier string gauge. This increases the tone – heavierstrings have more metal to vibrate – and returns the tension to what a lightergauge would be in standard tuning.

Q Could the sixth be tuned down further?A Yes, though problems with intonation will increase. Each retuning is a

challenge to figure out how to make the new 6th string fit with chords. Themost direct route is to take it as the key note and find the chords in that key.So a 6th string tuned to C# would suggest a song in C# major or minor. (Formore on this type of tuning see the next Idea).

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35

Voyage to the bottom of the CTake the 6th string down even further but add a newdimension to the result by putting on a capo. Result: deepbass, and new sounds from common chords.

If you don’t want to play in exactly the same tuning, a singlestring alteration, along with the capo change, will make thedifference.

We’ve explored ‘drop D’ and lowering the 6th string as a way into the world of alteredtuning. But it need not stop there. There’s nothing to stop you lowering other stringsfrom standard tuning (as we’ll see in Idea 36). But before we do that, there’s one moretrick we can do with the lowered 6th string. Let’s put a capo on the fourth fret andthen take the 6th string down one more tone from ‘drop D’ so it is two tones lower thanit should be.

Ignoring the pitch change caused by the capo, we’ll think of the 6th string as being a C(it’s actually an E). To get there hold an open C chord and tune the sixth so it soundsone octave below the note fretted on the fifth string. We now have chord box i – a Cchord with an octave C bass note. This is an attractive and characterful sound. Some ofBob Dylan’s early songs use this detuning approach. You can strum this C for apowerful droning bass, or fingerpick with the thumb alternating between the 6th and5th strings.


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The chord boxes show the kind of preliminary research that goesinto exploring a new tuning for the purposes of writing a song.We take the detuned 6th string as the key note. With the capoon the fourth fret, think of it as C (although pitch wise it isactually E). Boxes i-v in themselves provide a lovely sequencewhich could easily be a chorus for a song. Listen for the way thedetuned 6th string deepens the ordinary C shape and thencolours the Am, F and Dm shapes. The Am/C and F/C areexamples of the inversions discussed in Idea 12.

Boxes viii and ix are exotic substitutes for the F/C when thesequence wants to return to C. The remaining boxes vi, vii, x andxi are handy chords for the key of C but heard in unfamiliarvoicings. Notice that in all of them the open 6th doesn’t sound.This is actually important, because you don’t necessarily want itto sound all the way through a song; that would be monotonous.In any altered tuning you need some chord shapes that willtemporarily remove the changed note(s), to refresh it, so whenthe detuned 6th returns we feel anew its power. Box xii suggestsanother way of building from the detuned 6th string, treating itas the key note of C minor rather than C major.

Finally, take the capo off, check the tuning tocompensate for the capo having gone (capos affecttuning) and play with this tuning in first position.This is much lower in pitch – do you think it soundsbetter with or without the capo?

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Use a capo to avoid getting

trapped in one key’s open

tuning when gigging, and to

reduce retuning on stage. Plan

your material when you write

it by composing several songs

in the same tuning and

contrast them with a capo.

Thus, you get several songs

from one tuning without

playing in the same key, and

without slowing proceedings

by constant retuning. For

example, a capo at the

second fret in open G gives

open A, and at the fourth fret

open B (as with the Rolling

Stones’ song ‘Tumbling Dice’).

Defining idea...‘Usually I put on a thicker

string when I tune down.’

Michael Hedges


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Idea 35 – Voyage to the bottom of the C

Em7

G

Dm/CF/CAm/C

2

3

C

1 1

2

1

4

F6/C

3

Fmaj7 G/D

1

1

1

1

2

11 3

Cm

1

43

3

1

Fm/maj7add#11/C

3

2

F9/#11

3 4

1

1

2 23

1 1

3 4

4 3 4

4

4

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)

43

Note: Remember for all of these chords the 6th string has been detuned to C.


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Q I’m learning a song but I can’t pitch the notes. How do I remedy this?A Transpose the melody up or down so it’s comfortable for your range. The

chords must be transposed into the new key. If you’ve exchanged a key withopen string chords for one with barré chords, a capo is the answer. Thisapplies even more to altered tunings because of the unique sound producedby particular shapes. If you change the shape when transposing it might ruinthe effect or even make a progression unplayable. Imagine a song in open D(DADF#AD). The new vocalist who joins your band wants to sing it in G, afourth higher. The song could be moved into open G (DGDGBD). You try thisand find the best chord shapes are lost. Instead, the solution might be toreturn to open D and capo at the fifth fret.

Q What do people mean by ‘detuned standard tuning’? What is that for?A Detuned standard tuning – Eb Ab Db Gb Bb Eb – means that everything you play

in standard tuning comes out a semitone lower. It means you can play songswith the shapes of favourite guitar keys like E and A major but the singer hassome of the high notes brought down. String tension decreases, makingbending easier and/or a shift to a heavier gauge string. The guitar’s tonesounds different a semitone lower. Led Zeppelin availed themselves of thistechnique for vocal reasons during their now legendary reunion gig at the O2arena in London in December 2007. A number of the songs, including'Stairway to Heaven', 'Good Times, Bad Times', ‘Rock and Roll' and 'BlackDog', were played detuned by a whole tone.

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36

Top down a notchGuitar retrieved from baggage hold yields new music afterlong flight? Can it be true? Yes it can. Find some new chordswith this one easy tuning change.

If you write music on the guitar and you suffer acreative block, messing about with tunings is a goodway round it. And they don’t have to be complex.

HIGH ALTITUDE HIJINKS

As guitarists, we all have periods when it feels as though we’ve heard all the chords andplayed all the scales and nothing is inspiring. Getting out of that mindset is what thisbook is for. An altered tuning can make a shape you already know sound exciting. Oneodd note introduced into a chord that is usually predictable brings out a new colour.

You can devise new tunings in many ways, as we’ve seen in the last couple of Ideas,but serendipity can be the mother of new tunings, as the great English folk guitaristJohn Renbourn once told me. John was describing something that happens toguitarists on tour: ‘If you’ve just been on an airplane with a guitar and all the stringsare tuned down [to avoid damage] you get to your hotel room and check to see if it’salright. You’ve got jet lag and you want to go to sleep, but it’s in some ridiculoustuning. You’ve no idea what it is and it’s irresistible. That’s fun as well.’ The other timewhen tuning opportunities naturally arise is when you change the strings and are inthe middle of tuning them up. When they’re nearly at the right pitch keep an ear forthe sounds they make. Out of that you might make a new tuning.


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In the previous three Ideas (33–35) we’ve been retuning the 6thstring. Let’s now try the opposite approach and mess about withthe top string. If we detune by a tone we get the tuningEADGBD. This tuning is a mirror-image of ‘drop D’. To get themost from it we have to think along a different tack. This notechange happens at the top, not the bottom, so it is not aboutbass effects, root notes and pedals. Instead, it’s about chorddecoration and possible drones. Coldplay used this tuning fortheir song ‘Trouble’.

Try out these chord boxes. Rule 1 with an altered tuning – playshapes you know and see what happens, so box i is a standardopen A shape, but the altered top string introduces a D. Box ii isthe expressive minor version. Box iii is a nice ringing Bm (trymoving it up the fretboard) and iv is an open-string version ofthe so-called Hendrix chord mentioned in Idea 13. Box v is a richmajor ninth with all five notes, vi is a fifth chord lent extra ringby the unison on the top two strings. Boxes xi and xii show thateffective chords are sometimes also easy to play.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Once you get the hang of this

tuning, why not combine it

with ‘drop D’ to create another

tuning? This is DADGBD, where

both the 6th string and the

top string are down a tone. It

is ‘double drop D’, which

sounds like a medical

condition, but is the guitar

equivalent of two shots of

espresso in your coffee. Poised

roughly halfway between open

D, open G, and DADGAD, it

suits the keys of D and G. To

hear what it’s capable of listen

to a song by Neil Young called

‘Cinnamon Girl’.

Defining idea...‘You make a traditional chord

shape and any finger that

doesn’t work, you just lift it

up and let the string just ring.

I’ve used that tuning

throughout my career right up

to today.’ Neil Young


161

Idea 36 – Top down a notch

Am11

D5

B7#9BmAmadd4

2 3

Aadd4

1

1

21 3

Bb6

3

Cmaj9 Dmaj7add11

3

11

1

4

2

3

Em7

1

3

2 3

F6/#11

3

22

2

4 3

F6

3 4

1

2

3

3

1

4

2

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)

5 1

Note: In all chords in this section the top string is detuned to D.


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Q Why is chord box i called Aadd4 and not Asus4?A For a chord to be a suspended fourth the third of the chord must be removed

(i.e. suspended). In the chord of A the third is C#. The notes are A E A C# D,so the third is still present. Therefore it cannot be Asus4, which is A E A D E instandard tuning. This Aadd4 is what I think of as a ‘shimmer’ chord – one thathas a minor second. The C# and the D are on adjacent strings and a semitoneapart, creating the distinctive ‘shimmer’ of dissonance. It’s horrible if you playjust those two notes, yet beautiful within a chord. Box vii also has two stringsthat are only a semitone apart. This chord sounds better picked thanstrummed.

Q Three of the these chord boxes are sixths. Is that just coincidence?A Not really. Sixths are something of a casualty of standard tuning on the guitar.

They’re straightforward enough chords (C6 is C E G A) but not easy to find inplayable shapes in EADGBE. The reason for this is that there are two notes inthis type of chord – the fifth and the sixth – which are only a tone apart. Thatcauses fingering problems on the instrument. By tuning the top string down atone these problems are ameliorated. Hence it is suddenly easy to get aneffective sounding sixth.

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37

Through a harmonic riftRemember those nasty sharps and flats? Time to seek outnew musical ideas, and to boldly go into the harmonic riftand into the Kingdom of the Enharmonics!

Every sharp/flat note, chord or scale has a doubleidentity. Use your imagination to journey through itand suddenly find yourself in another part of the musiverse.

IT’S A KEY, JIM, BUT NOT AS WE KNOW IT

Some tuning alterations have more to them than meets the eye. Let’s develop the ideaof detuning the top string in some way. In the previous Idea we took it down a tone toget EADGBD. So if you’ve come here from Idea 36, tune your top string up a semitoneso that it is in tune with the note at the fourth fret on the 2nd string. If you’ve comefrom Ideas 33 and 34 please tune your 6th string back to E, and if from Idea 35 takethat fish out of the headstock, remove the capo, and tune the 6th string up two tonesto E. If you have arrived from some other point in space and time with a guitar instandard tuning, first, let me just say ‘Welcome to Earth. You have landed in Play GreatGuitar and we hope you enjoy your stay. Please refrain from singing any Aldebaran 17-bar blues as they contain toxic levels of despair which are injurious to humans. Joinwith us in this musical endeavour. You need to detune your top string by one semitone.’


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Play great guitar

Fm7

C#m9

F#m13/C#A9#11B7

2 3

Emaj7

1

1

3 4

Eb

2

3 4

F#13 G#m7

4 2 3 4 1

1

1

2

21

3

Gm6

1 1

3 4

2

Abmaj7

4 4323 4

Cmadd9

1 21

2 23

1

= Eb

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)

Note: In chords (i) to (vii) the first string is detuned to D#. In chords (viii) to (xii) thisnote is interpreted as Eb.


165

This new tuning is EADGBD#. An open D string and an open D#– hmmm – could spell trouble in a clashing sort of way. In whichkeys might we find D#? Well, the obvious one is E major, whereD# is the seventh note of the scale (E F# G# A B C# D#). So thistuning should create some effective chords in that key, as thefirst seven chord boxes reveal. They are variations on the primarychords of E major. Boxes i and ii are a more resonant Emaj7 andB7 than is possible in EADGBE. Boxes vi and vii show chords forC#m9 and G#m7 which would not have open strings in standardtuning. Many songs don’t have more than four or five chords, sothese would be enough to support most or even all of a song.

But wait, something is happening to the tuning! ‘There’s a riftopening in harmonic space, Captain.’ By rethinking that detunedstring, we make a jump into the musical harmonic rift andemerge somewhere else in the musiverse. Now, look what’shappened to our tuning [cue horror soundtrack chord]: it’s mutatedinto E A D G B Eb. Eb?!

Idea 37 – Through a harmonic rift

Here’s an idea for you...To develop this tuning into

either E major (as EADGBD#)

or Eb major (as EADGBEb) you

could detune one other string

so it belongs to either of

those keys. For example, tune

the G string down a semitone

to F# to have a note that

belongs to E major and B

major. Alternatively, tune the

B string down a semitone to

Bb and you have another note

that belongs to Eb major.

Either adjustment brings many

more suitable chords for that

key and you can be creative

with its potential.

Defining idea...‘It can make a chord sound a

hell of a lot better if you mess

the tuning up a bit just to get

the key you’re playing in, lots

of open strings and stuff.’

Jonny Buckland, Coldplay


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Q Hang on, so what is going on with this Eb mutation thing?A It’s all about the enharmonic principle – that sharp/flat notes can be seen as

either one or the other. Now you may think, what difference does that makepractically? It’s only a label. But if we think of D# as Eb we start looking forchord shapes in a key far distant from E major, namely Eb major. How mightthis help us in dealing with Eb major? That is a notoriously awkward key forthe guitar, and the primary chords in it are barré chords. This open top stringretuned as Eb might create some playable shapes in that key, as chord boxesviii–xii show. Eb, Fm, Gm and Cm in standard tuning usually don’t have an openstring.

Q I tried this retuning and my top string snapped. How else could Iplay a song in Eb major without all this detuning malarkey?

A If your top string snapped it may be that it was old (metal fatigue), that itsnagged at the machine head or the nut, and/or that you tuned too quickly.Don’t worry – it happens from time to time. The alternative to play songs in Eb

major is to put a capo at the first fret and pretend you’re in D major, or at thethird fret and pretend you’re in C major.

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38

Look Ma, no hands!Wouldn’t it be great if you could just play guitar with onefinger … no more struggling with four-finger chord shapes …but wait! There is a way …

Guitars can be tuned so the open strings make achord. It’s time to explore the open tuning and oneof the most popular, open G, blues riffs and shimmer chords.

GETTING THE FINGER OUT

Standard tuning is versatile and allows you to play in most keys effectively. But it isn’tthe final word in guitar tuning. We might approach tuning with the desire to makeone or two keys more resonant. This is done by tuning to a chord. Standard tuningEADGBE contains three notes of a G chord – D G B. So if we detune the top string by atone to D, the 5th string a tone to G, and the 6th string a tone to D, the result isDGDGBD – a 6-string G chord.

The first consequence of an open tuning is that a barré across the neck gives a majorchord if the tuning is major, and a minor one if the tuning is minor. A ‘three chordtrick’ song can be played with the open strings plus a single finger barré at the fifthand seventh. If you want a bluesier sound mix up the barré at the third and tenth fretswith these three chords.

One striking feature of open tunings is unison notes, i.e. two notes at the same pitch,one open and the other fretted. Chord box i may look like plain G, but it has two


168

unisons – the 6th and 5th strings are the same G, and so are the4th and 3rd strings. The Gm featured in box ii has a unison at thetop of the chord. Box iii is a Cadd9 with a unison G betweenstrings 4 and 3. Move it up to the eighth fret for Ebmaj7 (box iv)and to the tenth fret (box v, with an open 6th string) for aDm7add11. Any D chord, major or minor, can use the deep bassroot. Hear this in box vi, a D which only consists of the notes Dand F#, with both Ds doubled in unison, and box vii’s Dm7.

Open tunings also have more ‘shimmer’ chords, my term forchords with minor seconds/major sevenths. One note will befretted and the other open, and they ‘beat’ against each other,being dissonant. Chord box viii is an example of a Gmaj7 chordwith this effect. Strum it here, then at the sixth fret and first fretbefore returning to the third, for a Jeff Buckley-type progression.If you want a blues effect strum the open strings then go to boxix and x. Try the same shape at the fifth and seventh frets. Finally,the classic open G string riff is to take either box xi or xii and putthem on and off. You can do this also when your first finger isholding down a barré anywhere on the neck. Instant RollingStones!

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Open tunings are good for

bottleneck (slide) playing, for

fingerpicking, and for ‘raga’

effects, where the fretting

hand moves octave shapes up

and down with the open

strings strummed at the same

time. To do this in open G,

fret the 4th and 1st strings

(the two Ds) with your second

finger on the 4th string and

your third on the top string.

Try this shape at frets 2, 4, 5,

7, 9, 10, 12, 14 and 16,

strumming all the strings

except the 6th. You can also

do a similar thing with the

5th and 3rd strings.

Defining idea...‘I might make a mistake

tuning, or a string gets

knocked, or it’s drifted way

down. Then I don’t know what

tuning I’m in so I make it up

as I go along – which adds

different sounds.’

Peter Frampton


Idea 38 – Look Ma, no hands!

G9sus4

D(no5th)

Ebmaj7Cadd9Gm

2 3

G

2 3 42 3 4

Gmaj7(no3rd)Dm7add11 Dm7

12 3 4 2 3 4

2 3

C/G

2

Bb7

2

Bb6/#11

4

1 1

1

44

1

2 3

D G D G B D

85

10 7

1

44

1

i) ii) iii) iv)

v) vi) vii) viii)

ix) x) xi) xii)

Note: All chord boxes are detuned (see first chord box).

169

1

2

3


170

Q I find it hard to get a good minor chord sound in this tuning. Howcan I fix that? Is this normal?

A Often in open major tunings it is hard to find an effective minor chord,although there are usually exotic extended minors such as add ninths, addelevenths, etc. Abbreviating the minor so it only has four strings in it can help.Otherwise, see if dropping to a minor tuning might help. Detuning the third inan open major tuning converts it into an open minor. You have to locate whichstring is functioning as the third of the chord. In the case of open G the thirdis B, which is the open 2nd string. If open G major is DGDGBD, then open Gminor is DGDGBbD

Q What do I do if I want an open A tuning?A If you want an open A tuning don’t tune the strings up from EADGBE to

EAEAC#E but tune down to open G and then put a capo at the second fret.The open strings would then be open A. If you experiment with tunings,remember they should go down rather than up, to avoid increasing tension onthe neck and breaking strings. You can tune up to EAEAC#E on an electric (ason Led Zeppelin’s ‘In My Time Of Dying’) but I wouldn’t leave your guitar inthat overnight.

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39

Taking the leadHere’s a chance to try some lead guitar phrases over a chordsequence. Get to grips with some classic bends and scalepositions, then play your own.

Do you feel that you have neither the knowledgenor the technique to even attempt playing some lead guitar?Well, try this and it might change your mind.

There’s an example overleaf of how to fit some lead guitar phrases over a typical rockfour chord sequence of A–C–G–D. The sequence is nominally in A major but it has astrong blues influence. When soloing over a chord progression always have a goodlook at the chords because they give indications as to which scales will work andwhich won’t, and where you might have to change scale. Here, the obvious scale tostart with is the pentatonic minor featured in Idea 20. Let’s go through this solocarefully.

Bar 1 pitches low and moves up this scale to the note C, which happens to be thechord for bar 2. Herein lies an important technique. If you want your phrases to soundlike they truly fit with the chords over which you’re soloing, aim to make them beginand/or end on a note which is in that chord. This makes the note sit in with theharmony. The strongest effect in this regard is when you hit the root note over thematching chord. In ‘Taking the Lead’ this happens in bars 2, 3, 6, 9–11. Additionally,several of the remaining bars start with another note of the chord.


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Play great guitar

= 100 2 3 4

0 3 5 7 5 7

5 7 8 7 5 7 5 8 8 5

7 5

full

8 5 7 5

7 5 3 4 2

5 6 7 8

7 5

5 8 5

7 5

8 8 5 8

5

full

8 10

10 8 10 8 10 8 5 7

5 5 7

5 5 7

1/2 1/2

9 10 11 12

5 5

5 5

7 7

5 5

6 5

7

8 8

8 8

10 10

8 8

9 8

10

5 5

8 7 5 6

5

2 4 3 5 3 0

2 0 2

3 5

TAKING THE LEAD


173

Bar 2 features the extra note added to the pentatonic minor scalewhich makes it the blues scale, as discussed in Idea 22. In bar 2an Eb appears giving a bluesy quality to this classic phrase. Youcould solo all the way through this sequence using just the Apentatonic minor scale. But it is more interesting to work someother ideas in. This explains what happens in bar 4, where a Dpentatonic major phrase appears over the D chord. This makes amarked contrast in tone with what has gone before. Bars 3 and5–7 all contain bends, indicated by the vertical arrow. Bar 5features a famous blues lick back on the A blues scale. Bar 7introduces a hint of G pentatonic minor (G Bb C D F) over the Gchord before we get another famous major hammer-on phraseover the D chord in bar 8.

The third time around the sequence we have a classic rock ’n’roll figure in what are called ‘double-stops’ – where you hold twonotes down, often with one finger. Bar 10 is a transposition upthree semitones of bar 9 (for more on transposing and ‘magicnumbers’ see Idea 25). Bar 11 is a variation on bar 9 and thesequence finishes with another classic blues phrase over an Echord. To get this solo to sound its best remember to alwaysthink ahead, to where you’re going next, in order to makephrases flow into each other smoothly.

Idea 39 – Taking the lead

Here’s an idea for you...Next time you play over a

classic 12-bar blues sequence,

try taking the figures in this

solo from bars 9–11 and move

them around the neck. This

instantly produces a strong

good-time rock ’n’ roll feel,

such as you might associate

with an original 1950s rocker

like Chuck Berry or bands like

The Faces or The Rolling

Stones. For a 12-bar in A the

phrase in bar 9 of this

example is played at the fifth

fret, the tenth fret (for D) and

the twelfth fret (for E).

Defining idea...‘It can be easier to play a

complex, long solo than try to

fit one into 16 bars of a pop

record. You have to be really

careful to make it work;

you’ve got to be

complementary.’ Keith More


174

Q I’m trying to play this on an acoustic guitar and I find the bendsdifficult. Can you suggest a work-around?

A The work-around for bends is to fret the destination note. If the bend is asemitone up that means going up one fret, or two frets if a tone up. It canalso help if you slide up to the note. In bar 2, where a D is bent up to an Eb,try a slide of D to the Eb. In bar 3, where a G is bent up to A, you need a slideof two frets (as does the C up to D bend in bar 6). For the first note of bar 5,ignore the grace note D, which will remove the bend, and just play Eb.

Q If this sequence is in A major why can’t I play an A major scale?A A major’s six primary chords are A Bm C#m D E and F#m. In ‘Taking the Lead’,

there are no minor chords, though the A, D and E are present. However, ituses two chords which are based on flattened notes of the scale: C – the bIIIchord – and G – the bVII chord. Any A major scale has the notes C# and G#and these will clash with this A–C–G–D sequence. You can squeeze Apentatonic major phrases into the A or D bars – but your timing must begood!

Q Now I’m confused! What do the Roman numerals represent?A They describe the relationship between chords in any given key. It’s a simple

labelling system that is explained further in Idea 50.

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176


177

40

New wine from old bottles Get those favourite phrases out of the cupboard and dustthem down. If you’ve been playing for a while, you’ll haveplenty. You can do more with them.

Even the most familiar guitar ideas and phrases cantake on a new lease of life if played in a new musicalcontext. Good lead playing benefits from lateral thinking.

LET YOUR HARMONY DO THE WORK

It is easy to learn certain phrases (often drawn from pentatonic scales) and then playthem in the appropriate key. They work, they fit, and after a while you get used toplaying them that way. But they can yield more music. At one extreme this mightmean transferring them to another musical style to the one from which they come(think of the Hendrixy lead guitar on the Isley Brothers’ soul hit ‘That Lady’). It mightmean playing them with a changed guitar tone – say with chorus instead of overdrive.But even before you reach that point there’s another possibility: put them over chordswhere you wouldn’t expect to find them. Obviously this can’t be done randomly.What you have to do is choose a key where the phrase in question shares some notesin common with that key or a chord, and then the placing of the phrase will make itsound different. In other words, let your harmony do the work.

‘New Wine From Old Bottles’ is an example of this approach. It takes some phrasesfrom the solo in Idea 39 and puts a new slant on them. Although a guitar phrase mayhave a certain melodic shape which is part of its identity, it can change drastically if


178

you harmonise it with a new chord. This solo is constructed fromthree four-bar phrases, each based on a distinctive idea.

In bar 1 we take a phrase from bar 3 of ‘Taking the Lead’. There itwas over a G chord and part of a blues-influenced progression.Here it has no blues influence and happens over a minor chord.The same phrase is repeated in bar 2, now over an Am chord.Notice that it sounds different. Bar 3 takes the phrase that was inbar 8 of Idea 39, where it had a major quality, and puts it over notone but two chords, Bm and C. Bar 4 uses the phrase from bar 4of Idea 39, but puts a minor chord underneath it. The next four-bar phrase introduces a significant change of rhythm by takingthe last bar of ‘Taking the Lead’ and setting it first against an Emchord (instead of the E major of Idea 39) and then an Am. Avariation of this choppy rhythm is given in bar 7, before bar 8rounds off the second of the four-bar phrases.

The third phrase (bars 9–12) creates a contrast with what hasgone before by using two-note pairs based around the chordnotes (compare with those in Idea 39). Once more, bar 9’s idea isrepeated in bar 10, but the chord changes so it is heard afresh.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...You can also use the hammer-

on technique to generate notes

without playing them with your

picking hand. On an acoustic,

fret the third fret on the top

string (G), play it, hammer-on

and pull off the fifth fret with

your third finger and then

immediately pull-off onto the

open string from the third fret.

Finally, hammer-on the third

fret note and repeat the

process. This is a good way of

building strength. If you have

an electric guitar it is easy

because the sound of these

un-struck notes is amplified.

Defining idea...‘When old licks start to come

out, try and permute them;

but you shouldn’t be afraid to

do them when the time is

right. Everybody repeats

themselves to a degree.’

John Scofield


Idea 40 – New wine from old bottles

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NEW WINE FROM OLD BOTTLES

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Q I’ve played the phrase in bar 5 many times, but it usually sounds likethe blues. This doesn’t. Why is that?

A This phrase is built from the scale of E pentatonic minor (E G A B D). Hereyou’re playing over the chord of Em and in a context that suggests the key isE minor. In most minor key rock songs the natural minor is used. The notes inE natural minor are E F# G A B C D. Notice there is no clash between the notesof this guitar phrase and that scale – they blend. Therefore, no blues effect.To get the blues effect you have to play this phrase in the context of E majorover an E chord. The scale of E major is E F# G# A B C# D#. The notes G and Dwill clash with it and give the sound we associate with the blues.

Q I’ve heard the phrase in bar 8 lots of times. So why does it sounddifferent here?

A This three note pull-off figure is often heard in blues-rock, as a favourite‘repeat’ lick – a short phrase repeated rapidly. Usually, its three notes aretreated as a minor chord. In this instance the notes C–A–E imply A minor, so aguitarist would normally play it over an Am, or for a blues effect over A. In bar8 of ‘New Wine from Old Bottles’ the phrase takes on a different character,implying a D9.

Play great guitar

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41

Learning to decorateThere’s more than one way to skin a cat, says the proverb.Likewise, how do the pros get to sound so good? There’s morethan one way to play a note.

One way to make your guitar playing sound moreaccomplished is to bring in a variety of approaches tothe basic art of playing a note and moving from one note toanother.

THE FIRM OF SLYDE, HAMMERON, PULLOV AND BENDIN

Initially, when learning guitar, you’re thinking about playing the right notes andchanging from one to another. But there’s more to playing notes than just getting afinger to the right fret. Here are some common techniques to build into your playing.These are the things which experienced guitarists do all the time without beingconscious of them.

Fret a G at the eighth fret on the 2nd string, and then play the A which is two fretshigher. Then play the G and slide your finger up two frets. The A is now produced byyour finger sliding to it; it isn’t struck. This is the slide. Then there’s the timing. Count1-and 2-and 3-and 4-and in a steady tempo and play the G on the first beat and the Aon the first ‘&’. This is equivalent to two eighth notes. The first note in the slide can beturned into a grace note if you do the slide very quick on the beat, so that you’re on Aalmost immediately. Repeat the exercise, but this time start on the A and slide downtwo frets.


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The next technique is the hammer-on. Play the G and snap yourthird finger down on the A. The A is sounded by this movement.The reverse is a pull-off, where you have your third finger on Aand your first already on G two frets behind. Play the A and pullyour third finger downward and off the string; this will sound theG. The movement is very much a plucking action with the thirdfinger. If you combine these two movements you get thehammer-on/pull-off. Play the G, hammer-on the A and then pull itoff to get the G again. The only note you strike is the first G; theother two notes are created by the fretting hand. Now try doingthis repeatedly and fast – which creates the rock guitar trill.

The techniques described above suit the acoustic guitar. Bending,however, has a limited application on acoustic because of thestring tension but really comes into its own on electric guitar.Bends fall into four degrees of pitch change: the quarter tone‘smudge’ bend, the semitone bend, the tone/full bend, and thetone-and-a-half bend. Bends should always be done by more thanone finger – do them with your second or third finger and makesure the other fingers are on the frets behind supporting. The‘smudge’ bend is typical of blues playing and can be done onacoustic. The semitone bend can also be attempted on acoustic.Take the note A at the tenth fret on the 2nd string. Hold it with

your third finger, with the first and second on the same string’s previous frets, andbend it up until it matches the eleventh fret note inpitch. You can play the eleventh fret note first andthen when it’s fresh in your hearing you’ll know whatto aim for.

On an electric you can then try bending this note up atone, comparing the pitch against the twelfth fret B,and then try pushing it up three semitones to C (check

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...Guitar bashing. Really?

Flamenco guitarists generate

rhythms of teeth-rattling

ferocity on their nylon-strung

guitars using their nails and

the back of their strumming

hand. Flamenco players also

have a repertoire of cunning

moves by which they

percussively beat and tap the

guitar in-between chords.

There is a steel-string version

of this, where players hold a

chord and bang the top, sides

or back of an acoustic to make

the strings vibrate. This ghostly,

drummed guitar tone is not

very loud but a mike will bring

it out, either in the studio or

live. Just don’t overdo it!

Defining idea...‘I started getting interested in

the notes that I could hear

being generated when I

hammered on while playing a

classical guitar.’ Fred Frith

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the destined pitch at the thirteenth fret). Go carefully with this one – it can be a string-breaker, especially on the top string, which is the thinnest.

Remember the firm of Slyde, Hammeron, Pullov and Bendin, and you’ll never forgetthat there are many ways to play a single note.

Q I tried to do the slides and bends on my little finger and it didn’tseem to work.

A The little finger is rarely used in slides and bends. It is sometimes used inhammer-on/pull-off figures where there’s a stretch. It isn’t really strongenough to do slides and bends, so normally you would make sure one of theother fingers carries them out. The exception with bends is if you do adouble-stop, i.e. two notes on adjacent strings with the third and fourthfingers – then the little finger works OK.

Q When I do a bend the strings seem to get caught under my fingersand make a noise when I try to come off it.

A This is normal. In some ways it is inevitable in most bending situations thatthe fingers will get caught – the wider the bend the more strings go underyour fingers. After all, a bend pushes a string out of its usual position –they’re supposed to run parallel. Avoid the other strings sliding across thenails on your fretting hand when you do a bend. The way to control this liespartly in your striking hand. Your pick hand can mute the strings when youmove to the next phrase. You can also stop these notes sounding by puttingthe pick against them. It is important to develop muting on electric guitarwhere, with distortion and volume, there are many extraneous noises.

Idea 41 – Learning to decorate

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42

Ethereal bellsHidden on each fret of the guitar are the high-pitched ‘ghost’notes known as harmonics. Learn how to get them and whereto find any harmonic you want.

Harmonics are a lovely way of adding an etherealtouch to a guitar piece, playing an unexpected sound,or otherwise decorating a guitar part.

Harmonics are delicate, high-pitched notes which can be produced on any stringedinstrument. U2’s song ‘11 o’clock tick tock’ from the album Under A Blood Red Sky has amemorable passage where The Edge plays the London ‘Big Ben’ chimes on harmonics.They also feature in the Police song ‘Message In A Bottle’. The questions are: where doyou find them, how do you play them and what do you do with them?

The loudest harmonics on the guitar are found at the twelfth fret. This is how to playthem. Put a finger on the 6th string at the twelfth fret, right over the raised metalsection, not over the wooden area of the fingerboard where you normally play thenote. Don’t press the string down, only touch it. Strike the string and almostimmediately pull your finger off to let the harmonic ring. If it works you hear a ghostlyE pitched as if you had held the note down. Repeat the process at the twelfth on eachof the strings. If you do all of them from 6th to 1st string, you can finish with sixharmonics sounding: lay your first finger flat across the twelfth fret – touching, notpressing down – and try to play all the harmonics at once.


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Use the same technique at the seventh fret. You are now gettingnotes an octave above what it would have been if you had frettedit, and an octave and a fifth above the open string. Going acrossthe strings this produces B E A D F# B. Then go to the fifth fret.There you will find the open string notes in harmonics twooctaves above, one octave above the harmonics you played at thetwelfth fret. Finally try the fourth fret. These harmonics arequieter and harder to project. They are two octaves and a majorthird above the open string (G# C# F# B D# G#).

It is important to recognise that the harmonics on the top threestrings make a minor chord. So you get Em at the fifth andtwelfth fret, Bm at the seventh fret and G#m at the fourth fret.Similarly, strings 2–4 give a major chord. So you get G at the fifthand twelfth fret, D at the seventh fret and F# at the fourth fret.

Other pitches in harmonics can be had by the technique ofartificial harmonics. This works on the principle that harmonicsare always available for every fretted note or chord at a distance

of four, five, seven or twelve frets. The question is, if your fretting hand is busy, how doyou find a finger to touch the string at that distance and strike it too? The answer is todivide the work among the fingers of the plucking hand. Here’s an example:

Hold the note G on the third fret of the lower Estring. Add twelve to three and you get fifteen. Go tothe fifteenth fret and touch the string over the metalfret with the index finger of your playing hand. Thenpluck the string with your third finger and lift theindex finger away to let the note ring. It’s tricky because it requires good co-ordination. Now, hold a C chord, x32010. If we add 12 to those numbers we getx–15–14–12–13–12. If you apply the index finger touch to each of these frets on the fivestrings you can play the entire chord in harmonics. Once you get the hang of this you

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you’re recording a song and

you want to decorate it with

harmonics and the standard

open positions don’t fit, there

are a couple of things you can

do that will help. One is to

put a capo on so that those

frets 4, 5, 7 and 12 away

from the capo will create

notes that fit the key.

Another technique is to go in

for some selective retuning.

Detuning the 5th string by a

tone will give you a 4-string

major chord in harmonics on

strings 5–2.

Defining idea...‘A single harmonic can fill the

Albert Hall.’ Andrés Segovia


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can play any chord in this arpeggio one-at-a-time way, and scales or melodic phrasestoo. Try it slowly at first. As you get accustomed to the amount of touch required andthe positioning you can speed up these harmonics.

Q How can I make the harmonics louder and stronger?A On an acoustic this is partly a matter of touch. If you pull your finger away too

soon you don’t get the harmonic; too late and you muffle it. When your timingis good you can hit the string harder. Groups of harmonics register more thansingle ones. On an electric guitar harmonics are more audible because youhave more volume to play with. Effects like distortion, chorus and phasing alsostrengthen them. Echo and wah-wah lengthen them in various ways. Withdistortion and phasing if you strike any string repeatedly, as though playing amandolin, just touching it with your fretting hand, you will hear harmonicsjump off every fret in a sort of rainbow cascade of pitches.

Q Are harmonics the same thing as the notes you get with feedback?A Yes. Harmonics are overtones of the open string. The first four overtones are

one octave, octave and a fifth, two octaves, and two octaves and a third(there are many more but these are the most noticeable). When feedbackdevelops it will graduate to one of these four overtones, which is whyfeedback notes tend to be high-pitched. These overtones are present in everynote and part of its richness. They are also known as ‘partials’ – hence thejoke, ‘Would you like some harmonics with that?’ ‘Yes, I’m quite partial tothem.’ Ha ha!

Idea 42 – Ethereal bells

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43

White knight/black knightHere is the grandaddy of all rock rhythm figures, fromboogie-woogie piano and Chuck Berry in the 1950s to StatusQuo and Oasis doing ‘Cigarettes and Alcohol’.

A simple formula, like the movement of a knight on achessboard, liberates this rock rhythm figure so youcan play it in any key and in two contrasted positions.

OFF-AN’-ON-AN’-OFF-AN’-ON-AN’…

The figure overleaf can be played in a swung rhythm, in which case it sounds like blues,or it can be played in even eighth notes, in which case it sounds like rock ’n’ roll, orStatus Quo if you do it loud and fast enough. Beginners learn it first through its openstring versions. It comprises two notes, moving from a fifth to a sixth. In the first fourbars of the example you have the figure first based on the open A string, then the openD string and then the open E. The root note open string stays the same and two notesalternate above it. There are many variations. With these open string shapes you canplay a 12-bar sequence in the key of A, but not any other. For other keys you need amovable shape that can be pushed round the neck. And this is where the fun starts …

Bars 5–8 are still on A, D and E but relocate the ideas of bars 1–4 to the fifth andseventh frets. This is a bit more of a stretch. There is also a slight change of rhythm,each chord being hit just before the bar line (‘anticipated’), an effect that is importantto the rhythmic feel of rock. Memorise the shape of these three figures, which we’llcall the ‘white knight’. It reminds me of the double movement of the knight in chess,going one forward and two to the side in an ‘L’.


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Play great guitar

WHITE KNIGHT/BLACK KNIGHT


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Bars 9–12 repeat the figure but in a higher position, starting onthe 5th string at the twelfth fret. Notice that there are now threenotes in each figure, not two. This upper note, held down withthe third finger, is an octave above the root note. It thickens thesound but if you find it awkward you can omit it. If you like ityou can add it to the shapes in bars 5–8. The A figure is at thetwelfth fret, with the D and the E at the tenth and twelfth on the6th string. Memorise the shape of movement that takes youthrough these figures, which we’ll term the ‘black knight’ (norelation to Deep Purple’s ‘Black Night’). It reminds me of abackward ‘L’ shape, one down and two back.

Both the ‘white knight’ and ‘black knight’ patterns are movable.Therefore, you can play either of them in any key, and if you workwith another guitarist you can play the same sequence withGuitar 1 as ‘white knight’ and Guitar 2 as ‘black knight’, ensuringthat each guitar is fingering them in a different part of the neck.

Idea 43 – White knight/black night

Here’s an idea for you...Hold down a barré anywhere

on the top four strings with

your first finger. Select strings

3 and 4 and play those two

notes together. Now add a

third finger two frets higher

on the 4th string and play

both strings. If played in the

same rhythm as the example’s

bars 1–4, these two positions

give you another version of

this rhythm riff, this time

higher pitched. You can give it

to one of your guitar parts if

the other guitar is playing

either of the ‘knight’ patterns.

Defining idea...‘Another thing I learned just

recently concerns laying back,

and pushing on notes, playing

certain notes softer and

certain notes harder. It’s like a

real subtle thing that makes a

ton of difference.’

Kirk Hammett, Metallica


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Q Ow! That’s just too difficult a stretch! Help! What shall I do?A This is a good exercise for stretching the fretting hand, as well as getting in a

boogie. Drop your thumb below the neck so your hand can open out. Hold theroot note with your first finger and the next note on the 5th string with yoursecond finger. Practise this figure above the fifth fret where the frets arenarrower – if necessary go up to the tenth until you get the hang of it.Gradually your fingers will adjust to the stretch.

Q I wanted to do this in a song which was in F, but playing it down atthe first fret made both the F and Bb chords hideous. I mean, myfirst finger is at the first fret, but my little finger is supposed totouch the fifth?!

A F is the most difficult key in which to play this figure. The solution is to startwith the F figure at the eighth fret on the 5th string, then find Bb at the sixthfret on the bottom string and the C at the eighth fret on the 5th string, i.e.what I’ve called the ‘black knight’. (But you can hear Mick Ronson play thefirst fret F figure in Bowie’s ‘Cracked Actor’.)

Q And by the way, how long have you been playing rock guitar?A Over twenty-five years, off-an’-on(-an’-off-an’-on-an’) …

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44

Moonlit strollSimple guitar fingerpicking can be an accompaniment tosinging. But with a few embellishments it can sound likeinstrumental music in its own right.

What do you call a chord that has turned into amelody? An arpeggio – namely, a chord whose notesare played one at a time, instead of being strummed.

A FLAVOURSOME RIPPLE

These days if you hear a guitar the chances are you hear it strummed, as a chordmachine. But chords don’t have to be strummed. You can play the notes of a chordone after the other and make arpeggios. Then you begin to hear intervals between thenotes, instead of a barrage of sound, and with those intervals can come a sense ofmelody. Arpeggios feature on most instruments and in many musical styles. They areparticularly effective on instruments that can play chords with sustain – like the guitar,harp or piano. Romantic piano music is full of arpeggios – think of Beethoven’s‘Moonlight’ Sonata, or in the rock field the opening of Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’.The classical guitar repertoire also has many arpeggio-dominated pieces.


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‘Moonlit Stroll’ begins with a Dm chord at the fifth fret. Hold allthe notes needed for the bar before you start. You will find thatmost bars in the piece arpeggiate a single shape, so try to put allthe notes down at the start of the bar. If you put them down oneat a time you will lose the sustain effect of the notes bleedinginto one another. Bars 2–4 modify this initial chord by having thenote on the third string drop one fret in each bar. This requiresyou to do a little finger-shifting with your fretting hand to getthe shapes. Bars 5–7 alter the picking pattern, with the last twonotes being on the top two strings, and bar 8 provides anecessary contrast by altering the rhythm pattern altogether. Theroot note of the A chord is played twice in the bar, rather thanonce as was the case with the D in bars 1–4.

The pattern of bar 8 becomesthe pattern for bars 9–10, andnow the music is movingupward. Bar 11 does somethingdifferent with the arpeggio tolead to the final chord. This

arpeggio stretches almost two octaves and asks you to change position, from thesecond fret to the fifth. Make sure you play the note at the sixth fret on the 3rd stringwith your second finger. That puts you in the right place to play the last four notesand then the Dm shape which started the piece.

As far as your picking hand goes, follow the pattern of p-i-m-a-m-i-m-i carefully, sothumb and all three fingers are working. Play at a moderate speed to begin with, soyou can avoid pauses between the bars on changing position.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...The up-and-down rippling

fingerpicking in this piece has

many variants. The main point

is to make the thumb hit the

root note of the chord at least

once in each bar. The fingers

can then take any of the

other notes in any order that

seems playable and musical.

Apply this to a sequence of

chord shapes and you will be

half way to creating a guitar

instrumental for yourself.

Choose chords that don’t

cause you a difficulty in

changing and let the notes

ring as much as you can.

Defining idea...‘A guitar has moonlight in it.’

James M. Cain


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Idea 44 – Moonlit stroll

MOONLIT STROLL


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Q I found this much easier than some of the other fingerpicking pieces– like those in Ideas 6 and 33. Why is that?

A The most likely reason has to do with rhythm. The pieces in the ideas youmention feature the rhythmic effect known as syncopation. They require thepicking hand to, in a sense, do two things at once. Not everyone finds thateasy. In ‘Moonlit Stroll’ the arpeggios move up and down in a flowing rhythm.The only technical challenge is playing the bass note on the last beat of thebar at the same time as plucking a note with a finger.

Q If I want to play more music like this, what sort of guitar is best,and do I need to read music?

A You can play this type of fingerstyle music on any guitar, though it doesn’tphysically feel as comfortable on electric. A steel-string acoustic gives plentyof sustain, but makes it sound less ‘Spanish’ or classical. So, if you enjoyedthis I would think about a nylon-strung classical guitar. There’s more aboutthem in Idea 1. As for reading music, traditionally, classical music pieces wereprinted only in conventional notation, but that has changed in the last decade.Shop around and you will find classical guitar books with tablature. However, Ithink it is better to do without tab and read music – which is not so hard andvery useful.

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45

A fistful of luteTake a trip back in time with the Infinite Ideas Time Machineand sample (no, not that kind of sample, Perkins!) the soundof the age of Elizabeth and Shakespeare.

No, you don’t have to buy a lute to play this. Thereare many lute arrangements for guitar, givingguitarists the pleasure of gaining access to this subtle andmoody repertoire.

Back in the 1590s this book would have been called Play Great Lute. At that time thelute was one of the most popular stringed instruments and the guitar, as we know it,didn’t exist. The lute is enjoying a higher profile of late owing to the fact that Sting ofThe Police recently made an album about the Elizabethan lutenist and songwriterJohn Dowland, Songs From The Labyrinth, which featured many of Dowland’s lute songs.Sting is not the first person in the rock field to develop an interest in the lute. In theearly 1970s Jan Akkerman of Dutch band Focus took up the lute, and included acharming lute piece of his own on the band’s Focus III album, called ‘Elspeth ofNottingham’. The lute also found an important champion in the classical guitaristJulian Bream who recorded several albums of lute music (albeit with a classical guitarsensibility) in the 1970s, including The Woods So Wild. Today, there are many expert andauthentic players such as Paul O’Dette.

The lute has a delicate sound which does not project like the guitar. This is despite thefact that its strings (except the highest) are doubled (known as ‘courses’), and, as witha 12-string guitar, the fingers fret two notes at a time. During several hundred years of


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Play great guitar

A FISTFUL OF LUTE


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popularity, it was mostly played fingerstyle, developing a moreornate and contrapuntal style in which there is often more thanone melodic part moving independently. Lutes went throughvarious developments in terms of the number of bass stringswhich were added. The more extravagant models ended up withfingerboards too wide to be completely barréd. Many of the extrabass strings were intended to be played open more often thanfretted.

‘A Fistful of Lute’ is more chordal than many lute pieces, and assuch is closer to those that were out-and-out dance tunes. To getclosest to a lute sound play it on a classical guitar and put a capoat the third fret. Also, move your plucking hand closer to thebridge and away from the soundhole. The piece consists of afour-bar phrase (1–4) which is then repeated with a few variations(5–8) – notice how the top line has more notes on this secondtime through – and is completed by a third phrase (9–12) withscale-like runs of semiquavers. Watch out for the way the melodyof bar 3 is echoed in the bass in bar 4. The resonant first chord ofbar 9 (a B5) is typical of lute pieces in B minor and is madepossible by the altered tuning used in this piece.

Idea 45 – A fistful of lute

Here’s an idea for you...Having the G string tuned

down to F# is a great way of

coming up with sounding

chords in any key where F# is

used. In the lute piece we

were playing in the key of D,

but what about the keys of B

or B minor, or F# major or

minor? You will find some

great open string chords in

those. You can also treat the

F# as a Gb if you want to play

in extreme flat keys or to play

a blues in Eb major where the

Gb is the flattened third. This

can be a songwriting device.

Defining idea...‘If a lute player lives to be a

hundred, he spends ninety-

nine years tuning and one

year playing.’ Anon.


202

Q What is the reason for detuning the 3rd string from G to F#?A Many lute pieces are in the equivalent of the keys of D and B minor. This small

detuning brings the guitar closer to the layout of notes on the lute. As F# isan important note in both keys, and their scales and chords, having it as anopen string makes these pieces less difficult to finger when arranged forguitar. You have to remember that the note G is now at the first fret on the3rd string, and A is at the third fret.

Q Can you play lute pieces on a steel-string guitar?A Yes, that’s possible. Folk guitarist John Renbourn extended the range of the

acoustic steel-string guitar from its blues/folk repertoire in the 1960s byarranging lute pieces for the guitar. This required altering the tuning butworked surprisingly well, since steel strings take on the archaic brittleness of aharpsichord or viol, and the sustain helps the contrapuntal effect of the music.However, playing lute pieces on guitar needs a clean fretting technique so asnot to accidentally mute strings that are supposed to ring for several beatsthrough a change of shape.

Q If I wanted to pursue this music further, can I buy a lute?A You can buy a complete instrument or a kit form. It’s a more complicated

business than buying a guitar because of the variety of types.

Play great guitar

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46

The transatlantic ragCould it be two nations divided by a common … keysignature? Here’s a fusion of American and British fingerstyleguitar music to stretch your hands and your musicalimagination.

You may be used to strumming chords and playingrhythm, or playing solos, but here’s a piece that challengesyou to play the bass, the harmony and the melody.

SHADES OF RED, WHITE AND BLUE

The 14-bar instrumental over the page has the distinctive swing of a ragtime piece,with elements of jazz, blues and British folk guitar. It can be played either with a pickand fingers, or thumb and fingers. On balance, the latter is probably easier. Notes withtails that go down are played with the thumb, although in bar 9 you may wish toexperiment dividing the bass line between thumb and a finger. Sometimes the bassnote is allowed to ring for a bar (see bars 6–7) but most of the time it keeps the beat.Some of the picking patterns use the syncopation technique featured in Idea 6. If youhaven’t played such rhythms before it is a good idea to try that section first and thenreturn to this.

Bars 1–3 are built on an A chord with a first finger barré at the second fret and themelody coming down the top two strings. Keep the thumb nice and steady on thebeat. In bar 4 the harmony changes to an E chord. The first two beats are played inopen position and then you have to change position. The top E on beat 3 is not the


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open string but is fretted, while the second finger holds down aG# in the bass (a momentary example of a first inversion chord,like those described in Idea 12).

In bar 5 the harmony gets jazzy. It might look difficult from themusic but actually the shape you hold down for the first half ofthe bar is only moved up one fret to get the rest of the bar. Itoften happens in guitar music that the finger movements are notas hard as the music might imply by sight. Bars 6–7 feature twovariations on the blues ‘turnaround’ phrase on a D chord – thissort of phrase is often heard in bar 11 of a 12-bar blues. Tofacilitate bar 7, hold the D chord the usual way and move yourfirst finger back one fret to get the Ab when it’s needed – aninelegant fingering, but what the heck! Bars 8–11 take us awayfrom A major, sounding more as though they’re in D, and there’sa hint of the British folk-baroque style (hence the title of thepiece). Be careful to let the notes ring as much as possible in thissection. Finally, in bars 12–13 three minor 7 barré chord ideasmoving chromatically down fretby fret from C# to C to B enablethe music to finish back in Amajor.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you want your guitar

playing to be entirely self-

contained, this is the way to

go. People learning guitar

sometimes have the

disappointing experience of

playing the chords to a

famous song to their friends,

who then comment that it

doesn’t sound like the song.

Chord sequences are only part

of a song’s identity.

Thousands of songs share the

same basic chord changes. For

the song to be identifiable it

might need its melody and

lyrics sung. But with guitar

instrumentals, the music

stands on its own. Defining idea...‘Guitarists should be able to

pick up the guitar and play

music on it for an hour,

without a rhythm section or

anything.’ Joe Pass


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Idea 46 – The transatlantic rag

THE ONE HAND QUARTET


206

Q I find this quite difficult to play continuously. How do I get it tohang together?

A First, play it quite slowly and concentrate on keeping the thumb bass notes onthe beat. Check you’re fingering it correctly – watch out for fingers that don’tneed to move, and guide fingers that can connect chords. Hold down as manynotes for a given bar as you can at the start of the bar. It is also important tothink ahead – visualise where you’re going next, both in terms of finger-shapeand also where the music is leading. That way you avoid playing each bar as aseparate entity. This is what happens when you get bamboozled by the barlines and see them as fencing off each idea from the next.

Q Bar 5 sounds peculiar to me. Are you sure those are the right notes?A Yes, it is right. That’s the jazzy bar. Looking at the notes you see accidentals

appear, a sure sign something funny is going on in the harmony. Bar 5 has anEb, a C and a G; all three don’t belong in the key of A major. But thesechromatic notes tease the ear only for a second or two and then are gone.The chord on the first two beats is actually a weird entity called a diminishedseventh. They are so weird I avoided mentioning them earlier when we werelooking at seventh chords in Idea 11!

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47

The big ringYou know that irritating moment when you’re trapped in abus or train, and there’s a big ring, and someone reaches fortheir cellphone? Well, this is so much better!

Nothing transforms the sound of the guitar like atrue open tuning, when all the strings make the notes of asimple major or minor chord. Here’s how.

OPEN D TUNING

There are many open tunings but let’s go with one that has real depth of sound: openD (DADF#AD). This is how you get into it. Tune the bottom E down to D. Leave the5th and 4th strings as they are. Tune the 3rd string down to F#, the 2nd down to A,and the 1st down to D. When you’ve retuned, to check it:

■ fret seven on the 6th string should match the open 5th■ fret five on the 5th string should match the open 4th■ fret four on the 4th string should match the open 3rd■ fret three on the 3rd string should match the open 2nd■ fret five on the 2nd string should match the open 1st

Open tunings have varying degrees of resonance depending on whether the root notefalls on the 6th or 5th string (others factors being equal). So, open D – where the rootnote is a detuned 6th string – is more resonant than open G (Idea 38) where the rootnote is the 5th string. On open D you find you’re playing the 6th string more oftenthan with open C.


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THE BIG RING


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‘The Big Ring’ uses a number of classic open D shapes. It maylook hard from the music on the page, but it won’t be when youtry it. Bars 1 and 3 use the open strings and a single finger barréto create a D–A–G chord change (try to barré the A chord withyour third or fourth finger, saving the first for the G). Bars 2 and 4demonstrate two ways of colouring the G chord by puttingfingers on and then taking them off. This is the same techniqueas was discussed in Idea 38 on open G tuning. In bars 5–8 thepiece introduces three beautiful minor chords characteristic ofthis tuning. Look out for the variation on the Bm chord in bar 7.

Bar 9 provides a change from full chording to an arpeggio figurebased on A. Hold the second eighth note with your first fingerand use it again on the fifth eighth note halfway through the bar,with your little finger taking the note at fret 7. In bars 10–11another characteristic idea in open tunings comes in. This is tomove an interval up or down the fretboard with the open stringsacting as a drone behind. In bar 10 you hold down a sixth on the1st and 3rd strings, and in bar 11 an octave between the 5th andthe 2nd strings. Experiment with these by moving them up anddown the neck. You can also take the shapes from the second halfof bar 8 (which are thirds) and apply the same approach to them.

Idea 47 – The big ring

Here’s an idea for you...From open D a twist of one

tuning peg takes you to a

deep open D minor. Reduce

the 3rd string by a semitone

to F. You can check you got it

right by holding the F on the

third fret of the D string itself

and then playing the 3rd

string open: they should be

the same. Every barré in this

minor tuning gives a minor

chord. You’ll find Gm at the

fifth fret and A minor at the

seventh. To get a major chord

add a finger on the 3rd string

one fret up from the barré.

Defining idea...‘The more I can surprise

myself, the more I’ll stay in

this business, and the

twiddling of the notes is one

way to keep the pilgrimage

going.’ Joni Mitchell


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How didit go?

Q On the music it looks as though there are often chords in which thesame note is written twice. What is that all about?

A That’s quite right. Look at the Bm7 in bar 5 and you’ll see that there are twoF#s. This is striking visual evidence of one of the magical features of an opentuning – it has a tendency to produce chords where a fretted note and anopen string match in pitch, making what is known as a unison. These greatlyenhance the resonance of the tuning. Moving away from such chords by a freteither way often produces shapes in which there are pungent, shimmeringminor seconds or major sevenths. These also add to the character of thetuning. These sounds are not that easy to get in standard tuning.

Q Who should I listen to who uses open tunings for songs?A Undoubtedly Joni Mitchell, whose albums such as Blue (1971), For The Roses

(1972), Court and Spark (1974), Hejira (1976) and Turbulent Indigo (1994)demonstrate her open-tuned guitar approach. She used open D for songs like‘Free Man In Paris’, ‘People’s Parties’, ‘Both Sides Now’, ‘Chelsea Morning’ and‘You Turn Me On (I’m A Radio)’. Mitchell is possibly the best-ever advert forthe creative potential of retuning the guitar. It was the idiosyncratic sound ofthe shapes she got which sparked her creativity and made her write songs.


211

48

Twelve’s oceanThink of the intros to The Eagles’ ‘Hotel California’, DavidBowie’s ‘Space Oddity’, Led Zeppelin’s ‘Tangerine’, or Boston’s‘More Than A Feeling’ … what gives those acoustic guitarsthat sparkle?

What you hear is the distinctive chime of theacoustic 12-string. The 12-string guitar has an additionalresonance and ring which provides extra delight in playing,and inspiration for songwriting.

12-string guitars are wonderful instruments, provided they are comfortable to play.That isn’t always the case. String gauge and action are critical on a 12-string. A lowaction and light-gauge strings will facilitate playing. If you’re buying one, try as manyas you can. You may need to spend a little more, or buy second-hand and have theguitar properly set up. In addition, they take longer to tune than a 6-string. But it’sworth it. The 12-string acoustic has a shimmering sound with high notes where youdon’t normally hear them. The sound is bewitching and very stimulating forsongwriting inspiration. Since the strings are the same pitches as a 6-string, all thenotes are in the same position on the fretboard. All the shapes, scales and other figuresyou know transfer onto the 12-string.

The idea of doubling strings to get more sound from an instrument goes backcenturies, as we saw in Idea 45. With the guitar it was a small step to get the idea ofdoubling the strings but tuning them an octave higher to increase the pitch range ofthe instrument during normal playing – and make more sound! The standard way to


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tune a 12-string is to have the top two strings tuned to the samepitch (EE, BB) and all the others tuned in octaves (eE, aA, dD, gG).Notice that the higher pitched string is physically the higher ofeach pair. However, sometimes the G strings are tuned in unison.The reason for this is the tendency to snap the high G stringbecause it is so thin.

If you find you keep breaking the G string, here are someremedies. If the guitar is lightly strung, this will be an 0.08 gaugestring tuned up to the G above a guitar’s top E. A very thin stringat high tension, this is the one that snaps most frequently. Someowners eventually get fed up with this and treat the G string thesame as the top two strings, i.e. have two Gs at the same pitch.Alternatively, tune the entire 12-string a semitone or a tonebelow standard pitch.This relieves tensionon the neck,lessens stringbreakage,

Here’s an idea for you...People with large or chubby

fingers often find that the

strings on a 6-string are too

close together, and that it is

difficult to get chords to

sound cleanly with all their

notes. The fretting fingers

keep touching the strings

either side and muting them.

Sometimes the answer is to

adapt chord shapes by

re-fingering them. In extremis,

you could always buy a

second-hand 12-string

acoustic, take the extra six

strings off and play it as a 6-

string. The wider neck will give

your fingers a bit more room.


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and may make the guitar easier to play. Concert pitch can be restored with a capo atthe first or second fret. (In the film Jimi Hendrix, released in the early 1970s, there’s a

memorable sequence where Hendrix plays ‘Hear MyTrain a-Comin’ on a detuned 12-string.) 12-string

guitars are great for arpeggio figures, playedalone or for doubling a 6-string if you’re

playing with someone else or recording asecond guitar part.

You have to adapt your playing technique to a12-string. Strike the pairs of strings evenly, especially

if using a pick on single note runs or fingerpicking.(Some players who play folk-style on 12-string prefer fingerpicks).

Change the angle of your pick slightly so you definitely get both stringssounding.

It’s normal to find barré chords more difficult. Playing barréchords on a 12-string requires more strength than on a 6-string.There’s more chance of a string lining up with a part of theunderside of your fretting finger which is not making a goodcontact, so positioning can be awkward. To help, make sure theaction on the guitar is set as low as possible (if in doubt take italong to a guitar repairer for adjusting – many music instrumentshops have someone who does this). Moving to a lighter gauge ofstrings can also help, or even tuning a tone below concert pitch and then putting acapo on at the second fret. Otherwise, try substituting open string shapes for frettedshapes wherever possible, or use a capo to put the guitar into a better set of chordshapes for the key you’re playing in.

Idea 48 – Twelve’s ocean

Defining idea...‘I find every guitar’s got a

sound of its own and you can

use them all and get

something different out of

each of them.’ Jimmy Page


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Q I’m not sure I can get used to this – there are too many strings!A The first time you strum an acoustic 12-string is a startling experience. First,

the body is usually bigger than a 6-string. Second, and more important, theredoesn’t seem to be any spaces between the strings. Your fretting hand tries tonegotiate between the strings on the fretboard, and your strumming handfeels like it’s trailing across the strings on the inside of a piano. Fingerpickerswill notice this even more, with the additional challenge of plucking twostrings at once. Don’t worry – your fingers will get their bearings. When youfirst own one it makes a 6-string sound quite ordinary. Don’t worry – thiseffect does wear off! Then you come to appreciate the relative merits of bothtypes of acoustic guitar.

Q What about electric 12-strings?A Electric 12-strings combine the resonance of the acoustic version with the

additional cut and sustain of amplification. They can be heard in mid-60sBeatles songs like ‘You Can’t Do That’ and ‘Ticket To Ride’, in the Byrds (mostfamously their cover of ‘Mr Tambourine Man’) and early R.E.M. The most well-known models are made by Vox, Fender and Rickenbacker. Many peopleassociate the electric 12-string with the Gibson 6/12 doubleneck guitar, butthat hybrid is a different (and heavier) beast with musical properties of itsown.

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49

The joy of bassThe pulsing, deep throb of the electric bass. You may havenever consciously listened to it. But it’s there, in the depths,driving the groove of most songs.

Playing bass is a great way to extend your guitarskills. It provides new musical satisfactions and tunes into a layer of your favourite music which you may have nevernoticed.

THE STORY OF DOUBLE BASS

Time for a story. Once upon a time there was a very fat but upstanding member of thestring section of an orchestra, called Double Bass. Sometimes it was plucked andsometimes bowed. It gave out very low notes which supported the music’s harmonyand kept the rhythmic pulse going. Double bass loved Viola, but Viola was attached toCello. They and two violins amused themselves by forming a group called the ‘stringquartet’. They went off to play music where they wouldn’t get overlaid by chirpingwoodwind or blasting brass or rolling timpani. Some even got together with the pianoand formed a trio. But they wouldn’t let Double Bass into their group. The bass notesof the cello were deemed quite low enough, thank you.

So Double Bass got its revenge by moonlighting with a pianist and a drummer to playjazz in late night lounges. With plenty of alcohol on hand, it dropped its bow, gotabsolutely syncopated, played millions of notes, and dreamed of long-lost Viola. Herewas consolation at least … but then a crazy new music called rock ’n’ roll happened.


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Suddenly everybody got louder. And in the mayhem Double Bassfound people even trying to stand on it!

Then one night a man called Leo Fender came to Double Bass ina dream and said, ‘You have secret powers that I will release withelectricity.’ Next day, Double Bass heard a rock ’n’ roll grouprehearsing and dashed – superhero-like – into the nearest phonebooth. There was a strange sound of the splintering of wood. Outstepped Electric Bass and his transistorised Chinese sidekick AmPli Fier. He was ready to take on the whole world of rock ’n’ roll.‘Oh goodness!’, exclaimed Double Bass’s flame Viola, ‘My, you’vegrown frets! And pick-ups! You’re no longer an uprightinstrument! And no one will try to climb on you anymore!’. Andso Double Bass started its dual life as upright member of theorchestra and the superhero of throbbing low-pitched bass in allforms of popular music, and lived Happily Ever After.

So you see, the electric bass is hybrid in its character – partlylooking to its orchestral self, and partly toward the guitar. Thefour strings of a bass are tuned E A D G, one octave lower thanthe six strings on a guitar. In practical terms this means that allyou are familiar with on the lowest four guitar strings istransferable knowledge. The notes are in the same places on thebass. Scale patterns are the same too. Some riffs work moved overto the bass. And no one expects you to play an F chord!

Musically, playing bass involves two tasks: one is to supply the root notes of the chordsto support the harmony. A bass player tries to find effective ways of doing this, forexample linking the root notes together with passing (in-between) notes drawn fromthe appropriate scale. The second function is to be rhythmic, and lock into the drums.Traditionally this is where guitarists who take up bass come unstuck – they play toomany notes and don’t think rhythmically enough.

Idea 49 – The joy of bass

Here’s an idea for you...Many guitarists are familiar

with a sheet music format

called the chord songbook.

These books give lyrics and

chords for well-known songs.

As long as you know the song,

or have a recording of it, you

can strum along. There’s no

music to read. You can use

these books/arrangements for

bass playing. Simply read the

chord names as root notes on

the bass and try to play a few

of each on the beat before

proceeding to the next. This

way you can start inventing

simple bass lines.

Defining idea...‘You’re the bass player, the

bottom – you drive the band.’

Matt Freeman


218

You can learn bass lines from conventional notation or TAB. Most of the time you cangroove playing one note at a time. Some players play chords. Some (like Jaco Pastorius)even turned the instrument back toward the upright bass by removing the frets, toplay ‘fretless bass’. When you learn bass you will be amazed by how much classic basslines contribute to a song without us noticing. You also learn a skill that can be usedon your own song demos if you’re a songwriter.

Q Should I play the bass with my fingers or with a pick?A You can play with either. Playing with fingers comes naturally to those who

play fingerstyle guitar, especially classical (the ‘rest stroke’ hand position isvery similar to the ‘hanging wrist’ shape for bass). Playing with a pick treatsthe bass more as a guitar. This suits a brighter, twangier bass sound with lotsof sustain. Fingerstyle bass sounds better with the treble wound off and nottoo much sustain.

Q Is it true there are acoustic bass guitars?A Yes. They don’t have the penetration or focused sound of the electric bass,

but they are light, don’t need an amp and blend well with acoustic instrumentssuch as guitar and mandolin.

Q Is it true you can get basses with more than 4 strings – 5, 6, 7, 8 … 12!?A Yes, it is … but don’t let’s even go there!. Some of those necks are so wide

you could throw them in the sea and land aircraft on them. I mean, if God hadmeant bass players to have more than 4 strings He would have … ah … erm …done something. Or not done something. Or made Leo Fender an octopus.

Q My mate says there’s a brilliant Detroit duo who do play-along CDsfor bass players, but can’t recall their name …

A The White Stripes (ahem … joke).

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50

Write a happy songHave you got a song inside you? Many harbour the desire towrite a song. It isn’t that difficult a thing to do, otherwisethere wouldn’t be so many people doing it!

You don’t need to be a great guitarist to writesongs. An ear, a bit of creativity, a few chords, somewords, and a little know-how to put it together … likethis.

A song is made of lyric + melody + chords + tempo/rhythm. Any of these are apotential start point for a song. A song’s structure requires an intro, an outro, a verseand a ‘hook’. The intro sets the scene for when you start singing; the outro concludes.The verse makes the bulk of the song. Popular verse-lengths are 4, 8, 12, and 16 bars,with longer verses like 20 or 24 bars possible. The ‘hook’ is the bit of the song whichlodges in the listener’s mind almost immediately, often lyrically the song’s title. A hookcan be as short as a 1-or 2-bar phrase. When developed it becomes a separate section,the chorus. That chorus may itself have one specific bit which is a hook within a hook.

The most popular way to write a song is to begin strumming a chord sequence. Thisevokes a certain feeling or atmosphere, which inspires words and/or a melody. As far aschoosing chords, you can find ones that relate by ear. The guitar’s eight master shapes(A, C, D, E, G, Am, Dm, Em) fit together well, although not usually all in a single songas they do not belong to one key. Each major key has seven chords, one for each noteof the scale, labelled with roman numerals, I–VII. I, IV and V are always major; II, IIIand VI are always minor; VII is a diminished chord and rarely used.


220

Imagine writing a song in the key of C major. Its scale is:

I II III IV V VI VIIC D E F G A Bmaj min min maj maj min dim

Dropping the B (diminished), the six likeliest chords for a song inC are C, Dm, Em, F, G and Am. These chords go in any order, aslong as the chord C isn’t made to sound less important than theothers. Most songs end on the key chord, but otherwise you arefree to do what you like. Try strumming each chord for fourbeats so they have one bar each, then create interest byremaining on a chord for two bars (8 beats) or even half a bar (2beats only).

These chords also have first and second inversions. Counting theinversions means three ways of playing these six chords providesa resource of eighteen chords for a song. In addition, you canturn these chords into sevenths: Cmaj7, Dm7, Em7, Fmaj7, G7 andAm7. (This order of maj7–m7–m7–maj7–7–m7 is true for all major

keys). For more harmony opportunities, lower chord VII by a semitone, in C majorfrom B to Bb, and turn it into a major. This is the flattened VII chord for progressionslike C–Bb–F–G. Now write some words and try humming them over the top of yourchords. Your ear will guide you as to whether you have the right notes or not. Mybook How to Write Songs on Guitar deals with these issues.

Play great guitar

Here’s an idea for you...If you want to write a major

key song but with a harder

edge, for example a blues-

rock influence, you can make

some small adjustments to the

chords you select. First, take

out the three minor chords of

the key. That leaves you with

chords I, IV and V – in A major

that is A, D and E – then

bring in the bVII chord – in

this case G. Then bring in thebIII chord which here is C.

Then further experiment by

playing these chords as

sevenths (A7, D7, E7, G7, C7),

add9s or strummable fifths.

Defining idea...‘When I first started writing

songs I started using a guitar.

The first one I wrote was …

based on three chords – G, G7

and C.’ Paul McCartney


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Idea 50 – Write a happy song

Em7

C

BmAm7Am

2 3

G

1

11

2

1

3 3

D

4

Bm7 Cmaj7

3

1

12231 2 2

F

1

32

1

3 4

1

D7

4

22 3 2 3

Em

3

2 23

3

1


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Q Is it possible to create a song from only a bass line or a drum loop?A Yes. You can compose from a rhythm and/or a bass line and build the song

from there, adding melody and chords later. This approach suits any popularmusic style where rhythm is king, especially if the song is constructed withinthe recording domain.

Q Is there an advantage in writing the words or the melody first?A Words first is how many songs were written in the middle decades of the last

century. The beauty of this is that it encourages you to write a good tune,and there is no more powerful hook than a strong tune. Some people find iteasier to write melodies with a sheet of lyrics in front of them.

Q I’ve written songs and they sound like rubbish versions of otherpeople’s.

A Don’t ask too much of your early efforts. Listen to what John Lennon and PaulMcCartney were writing before 1963! A few write well and individually fromearly on, but the majority of songwriters write many songs before they getgood at it and integrate their influences. Everyone has musical influences andpeople they admire. Learn from those people. Over time you gradually findyour own voice and those influences get absorbed into what you do.

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51

Write a sad songIs it raining on your parade? Everyone likes sad songs. Therehave probably been more tear-soaked chart hits than happysongs. Songwriters will tell you its easier to write a sad songthan a happy one.

You’ve written a song in a major key. So the nextquestion is how to write one in a minor key. This is partlyabout a change of mood but also a change of chords.

IT’S MY CHORDBOOK AND I’LL CRY IF I WANT TO

Like the major key, each minor key has seven chords, one built on each note of thescale, numbered in roman numerals, I–VII. The minor complication (pun intended) isthat there is more than one kind of minor scale. As a result you can have slightvariations in the chords.

Imagine writing a song in the key of A minor. The most common form of the A minorscale in rock is the natural minor. Its scale is A B C D E F G giving the chords Am, Bdim, C, Dm, Em, F, and. G. The more eagle-eyed among you may have noticed thatthese are the same chords as those in Idea 50 for C major, except in a new order. It isas though we have started at VI and turned it into the new I. The diminished chord isnow II, which we discard. This leaves the six likeliest chords for a song in Am as Am, C,Dm, Em, F and G. These chords can be played in any order you like, as long as thechord Am remains the central one.


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Fmaj7

Em

DmCAsus4

2 3

Am

1 1

2

1

EDm7 Em7

3

1

2223

1 2

3

G7

1

32 2

1

E7

3 3

2 2

4 43

F

4

111

2 23

4 3 3


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As with the previous example, if you need more ‘colour’ in theharmony these chords can be played in first or second inversion.Counting the inversions, this means you have three ways ofplaying each chord and six chords giving a resource of eighteenchords for this minor key song. The sevenths go like this: Am7,Cmaj7, Dm7, Em7, Fmaj7 and G7. This sequence of maj7–m7–m7–maj7–7–m7 is true for all the minor keys when the naturalminor scale is used as the basis for the chords. Turning the threeminor chords here into minor sevenths will lighten theatmosphere, as in a romantic ballad or, at a quicker tempo, in asoulful shuffle. If you want to make the atmosphere of a minorkey song more tragic try Amadd9 or Dmadd9, and to make itthreatening as well as sad try Asus2 and Dsus2 along with Am andDm, or Am6 and Dm6.

If you want to give the minor key song a stronger identity, andmake more of a contrast with the harmony of the C major song,draw on the A harmonic minor scale (A B C D E F G#). Only onenote is changed – G to G#, but that note changes chord V fromEm to E, and you would sing G# against that E chord in yourmelody. If you play the chord sequence Am–Dm–E–Am you willhear how this E chord promotes and strengthens the feeling ofthe sequence being in a minor key. In addition, it is alsopermissible to bring in a D chord instead of Dm.

Idea 51 – Write a sad song

Here’s an idea for you...It is an interesting challenge

to work out how to write a

sad song without using any

minor chords at all. This is

possible, and it makes you

aware of what other factors

lead one to hear a song as

sad. Obviously the lyric will be

a big factor, but in musical

terms techniques that work

involve slowing the tempo,

using inverted chords (see

Idea 12), altering major

chords with extra notes, using

sus2 and sus4 chords and

fifths (see Idea 15) and

making your melody as

expressive as possible.

Defining idea...‘It was my 16th birthday – my

mom and dad gave me my

Goya classical guitar that day.

I sat down, wrote this song,

and I just knew that that was

the only thing I could ever

really do.’ Stevie Nicks


226

Q How do I know which notes in the melody fit with my chords?A The simplest guide is your ear. Against any chord, the 1st, 3rd and 5th of that

chord when sung will fit snugly. The other four notes of the scale givediffering amounts of tension. Test this by playing a major chord and singing amajor scale from that root note, slowly, one note at a time so you can hearthe change from notes that sit in the chord to those that are outside it. If amelody only formed 1st, 3rd and 5th relationships with the chords underneathit would probably be too predictable and therefore dull. Tense passing notesadd spice. My book Melody goes into more detail on this.

Q If the same six chords feature in the C major happy song and the A minor unhappy one, what is the difference? Isn’t it only that theirnumbers have changed?

A Their numbers have changed (in C major, an F chord was IV; in A minor it’s VI)which means more than just labelling. A change of numeral signals a changeof intent and meaning. When Am is ‘being’ chord VI in C major it has aparticular identity. When it is chord I in A minor it has another – it is now themost important chord in that key, around which the others revolve. It is thegravitational centre of the A minor key, and that musical gravitation affectsthe melody, words and mood of the song.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


227

52

Listen to a new guitaristMany great players have played the same basic instrument asyou. Down the decades their recordings still sound, to amazeand inspire. It’s your inheritance.

So many different approaches have been taken withthose six strings and that fretboard. These playersshine like stars in their varying styles.

LOOK TO THE GUITAR CONSTELLATIONS

If ever you feel tired by the sound of the guitar it is more likely that you’re tired of theguitar being played in a particular manner. Refresh your outlook on the guitar byinvestigating recordings of other guitarists and guitar music.

Play Great Guitar began with the classical guitar. To sample the classical style listen to AndrésSegovia, John Williams and Julian Bream, who played music from many centuries, not all ofit Spanish. Deeper in this repertoire lie the Preludes and Études of the Brazilian composerHector Villa-Lobos, or guitar concertos like the Concerto de Aranjuez by Rodrigo.

For fingerstyle steel-string guitar try Davy Graham, Bert Jansch, John Renbourn andMartin Carthy – who came to fame in the 1960s playing ‘folk baroque’. Further back inthe jazz field there’s Django Reinhardt. Singer-songwriter Nick Drake (Five Leaves Left)used many unusual tunings for his songs. America had John Fahey, Leo Kottke(especially for 12-string) and Stefan Grossman. The albums Crosby, Stills and Nash andDéjà vu are fine collections of harmony singing and altered guitar tunings.


228

Play great guitar

Michael Hedges’ Aerial Boundaries was a landmark album forexperimental acoustic guitar.

If blues is your thing, seek out Robert Johnson (King of the DeltaBlues Singers), Leadbelly, Son House, and for electric blues MuddyWaters, Hubert Sumlin, the three kings – Albert, B.B. and Freddie– and more recently Stevie Ray Vaughan (Texas Flood). For mid-60sBritish blues check out Eric Clapton on John Mayall’s Bluesbreakersor Cream’s Disraeli Gears, Peter Green on Mayall’s A Hard Road orthe Fleetwood Mac album Then Play On, or Jimmy Page on thefirst Led Zeppelin album.

If you like ‘jangle guitar’ – where the guitar parts are chordal,arpeggiated and rhythmic – listen to players like Roger McGuinnof The Byrds, Peter Buck with R.E.M. (Life’s Rich Pageant) or JohnnyMarr with The Smiths (The Queen Is Dead). The electric guitar wastaken in new directions by John McGeoch with Siouxsie and theBanshees (Ju-Ju), U2’s The Edge (The Unforgettable Fire) and AndySummers of The Police (Synchronicity).

When it comes to early electric guitar a copy of The Shadows’Greatest Hits will be full of not-too-difficult melodies. For leadguitar played fingerstyle sample the first Dire Straits album.

According to TV documentaries Jimi Hendrix was a great guitarist because he worefunny clothes and set fire to his instrument. If this is your concept of Hendrix, grab apair of headphones and immerse yourself in the soundscapes of Electric Ladyland. Don’tforget Carlos Santana who took electric lead into Latin American music.

After Hendrix, rock guitar was given a major stimulus by Eddie Van Halen’spyrotechnical playing on Van Halen, where the technique called ‘tapping’ waspopularised. This technical direction was developed by Al Di Meola, Joe Satriani andSteve Vai on albums like Passion and Warfare. Also highly proficient, but with a European

Here’s an idea for you...Another way to refresh your

ear is to listen to music which

is not guitar-based, especially

outside the realm of popular

music. The world of music is

so much bigger than the

things we tend to hear.

Popular music only uses a tiny

fraction of the melodic,

harmonic and rhythmic

possibilities that exist in the

‘classical’ field – especially in

the music of composers

working between 1890–1960.

It is vital to listen to music

that has a different ‘grammar’

to the generally short

structure and phrasing of

songs; it extends your sense

of what music can be.


229

jazz-rock approach, was Jan Akkerman of Focus (Moving Waves andFocus III). To prove you don’t have to be fast and/or clever to makememorable guitar music, what about Mick Ronson, Ron Wood andNeil Young? None are technical players but each had an individualtone. Listen to Bowie’s Aladdin Sane, The Faces’ A Nod’s as Good as aWink, and Neil Young’s Harvest. Dave Gilmour’s slide and echosound effects with Pink Floyd or Brian May’s guitar harmonies onearly Queen albums (Sheer Heart Attack) are two more approaches.

Some guitar records exhibit great technique. But that’s not theonly criteria. Great guitar playing is primarily great because it’s expressive. It’s where aguitar style – the notes, the tone – perfectly fits the music and the sense of whatwants to be said.

Idea 52 – Listen to a new guitarist

Defining idea...‘… never stop listening to

other players. You’ll never be

as good as you want to be …

and that’s the way to stay so

you’re always open to being

wowed by someone else.’

Peter Frampton


230

Q Is it true that playing along with CDs is a good idea?A Yes. It’s good for your technique, insofar as it forces you to keep time and

keep up with the music. You can also try improvising lead, or substitutingchord shapes, once you know a song. To make things easier, you can buyspecial portable CD players which allow you to plug your guitar in and puteffects on. You can hear the CD and play along on headphones. They will evenlet you slow phrases down. Many rock guitar parts are just that: parts. Theydon’t work on their own; they need the whole song.

Q Isn’t there a danger that if I listen to other players I won’t find myown style?

A That’s a common fear, but misplaced. Very few players turn out to be originals– they are one or two in a million. Many more, however, manage eventually todevelop their own ‘voice’ on the guitar. How? Most go through a phase oflearning by listening carefully to and replicating the guitarists they enjoy. Itsustains your enthusiasm when you’re grappling with the early technicalchallenges. Gradually, these influences are absorbed. But otherwise, if you justwant to play like x or y, who cares? There’s nothing wrong in simply wantingto play your favourite guitar music so you can feel immersed in it.

Play great guitar

How didit go?


231


232

Play great guitar

The end...Or is it a new beginning?

We hope that these ideas will have inspired you to try new things with your strings.We hope you’ve found some interesting tips and techniques that will help you takeyour playing to the next level. You may not be a guitar hero yet but you should begetting a lot more out of your instrument.

So why not let us know about it? Tell us how you got on. What did it for you – whatreally made your six-string sing? Maybe you’ve got some tips of your own that you’dlike to share. If you liked this you may find we have more brilliant ideas for other areasthat could help change your life for the better.

You’ll find us, and a host of other brilliant ideas, online at www.infideas.com.

Or if you prefer to write, then send your letters to:Play great guitarInfinite Ideas Ltd 36 St Giles, Oxford OX1 3LD, United Kingdom

We want to know what you think, because we’re all working on making our livesbetter too. Give us your feedback and you could win a copy of another 52 BrilliantIdeas book of your choice. Or maybe get a crack at writing your own.

Good luck. Be brilliant.


233

Offer oneCASH IN YOUR IDEAS

We hope you enjoy this book. We hope it inspires, amuses, educates and entertains you.But we don’t assume that you’re a novice, or that this is the first book that you’ve boughton the subject. You’ve got ideas of your own. Maybe our author has missed an idea thatyou use successfully. If so, why not send it to [email protected],and if we like it we’ll post it on our bulletin board. Better still, if your idea makes itinto print we’ll send you four books of your choice or the cash equivalent. You’ll befully credited so that everyone knows you’ve had another Brilliant Idea.

Offer twoHOW COULD YOU REFUSE?

Amazing discounts on bulk quantities of Infinite Ideas books are available tocorporations, professional associations and other organisations.

For details call us on: +44 (0)1865 514888Fax: +44 (0)1865 514777or e-mail: [email protected]

Offers


234

Play great guitar

Where it’s at...Note: Page number references in

bold print denote defining ideas

A chords, 32–3, 36, 46, 57–8boxes showing, 37, 47, 51, 65,

73, 81, 157, 221accidental notes, 41–4, 93–6, 166,

205–6‘Achilles Last Stand’, 127acoustic bass guitar, 218acoustic guitar

bending notes, 88, 174, 182harmonics, 187note decorating, 181–2steel-strung, 5–8, 66, 196, 202sustain, 31see also guitars

additional notes, 93–6Akkerman, Jan, 199, 229Albarn, Damon, 72‘All You Need is Love’, 52amplification, 6–7, 10–11

close miking, 32feedback, 187

arpeggios, 58, 60, 193–6, 213augmented chords, 79, 82

B chords, 48boxes showing, 47, 51, 65, 73, 221

‘Baby Strange’, 76bass guitar, 52, 215–18, 222

acoustic, 218fretless, 218

bass notes, 51, 137–40, 147, 155–8bending notes, 88, 93, 95, 120, 174,

184degrees of, 182

Benson, George, 123Berry, Bill, 76blues, 85–8, 228

hexatonic scale, 93–6solos, 173

Bolan, Marc, 68bottleneck guitar, 8, 168Bream, Julian, 199, 227‘Brontosaurus’, 149‘Brown-Eyed Girl’, 127Buck, Peter, 228Buckland, Jonny, 165Buckley, Jeff, 168

C chords, 5, 26, 36, 38, 45–6boxes showing, 47, 51, 65, 73, 157

Cain, James M., 194capodastro (capo), 13–16

E flat songs and, 166limitations of, 44single string detune and, 155–8see also transposition

Cartes, Des, 31Carthy, Martin, 227CDs, 11, 230chords

augmented, 79, 82chromatic, 80fifths (two-fingered 'power

chords'), 63–6, 131–4, 149–52inversions, 42, 49–52, 80, 82,

220, 225labelling, 174, 219–20, 223, 226naming, 139ninths and elevenths, 53–6, 77

add ninths, 54, 56, 81open string, 75–8

sevenths, 35–7, 45–8, 77sharp and flat, 19, 41–4, 72, 73, 77suspended, 36, 162triads, 57–60see also fretting hand; keys; andsee individual chords

chromatic scale, 80, 96‘Cinnamon Girl’, 160Clapton, Eric, 80, 228classical/'Spanish' guitar, 3–4, 196

Flamenco players, 182playing technique, 2, 4, 20see also guitars

‘Classical Gas’, 3composition see songwritingCooder, Ry, 58copy guitars, 12Corgan, Billy, 99Cropper, Steve, 127Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, 144

D chords, 18, 36, 37, 130, 207–10boxes showing, 47, 51, 65, 73,

77, 81, 221decoration, 181–2Di Meola, Al, 228Diddley, Bo, 32digital 'modelling,' 11direct signal recording, 32‘Dirty Pool’, 54dissonance, 78Doan, John, 147‘Dolly Dagger’, 123double bass, 215double octaves, 19, 20double-stops, 173Drake, Nick, 227


235

Index

drone notes, 141–4, 155see also pedal notes

drop D see sixth string detuning

E chords, 36boxes showing, 47, 65, 81, 157,

221Eddy, Duane, 118effects processors, 6–7, 10–11

authentic 60s sound, 120octave-splitters/harmonisers, 124sounding harmonics and, 187

electric guitar, 9–12bending notes, 88, 182–3carrying the melody, 117–20finger picking, 26flatpicking, 30harmonics, 187percussive recorded sounds, 32

12-string, 214see also guitars

'11 o'clock tick tock,' 185exercises

CD, 11, 230metronome, 104, 116practicing octaves, 123

expression, 229

F chords, 18, 19, 36, 48, 71boxes showing, 18, 19, 37, 47,

51, 73, 157, 221Fahey, John, 227feedback, 187Feliciano, Jose, 3Fenders, 120, 217fifth chord ('power-chord'), 63–6,

131–4drop D tuning and, 149–52fast tempo, 132under a major or minor chord, 134

fingering see fretting hand; pick hand

fingers and handschubby, 212nails, 5–6soreness, 8stiffness, 30, 72

Flamenco, 182flat and sharp chords, 19, 41–4, 72,

73, 77flat and sharp notes, 41–4, 93–6,

166, 205–6Flick, Vic, 118folk dance tunes, 114–16folk guitars see steel-strung acousticFrampton, Peter, 168, 229Freeman, Matt, 217fretboard

action, 2buzz, 6using a capo, 14–15on classical/'Spanish,' 3on steel-strung acoustic, 5, 7

fretless bass, 218fretting hand

arpeggios, 194–5barré chords, 2, 3, 6, 7, 19, 36, 42,

44, 68, 71–4, 80, 110, 191, 213bending, 88, 93, 95, 120, 174,

182, 184fast tempo, 132finding new chord shapes, 35–8,

71–4lifting a finger, 67–70

shifting one note, 79–82shifting open strings, 75–8

hammer-ons and pull-offs, 104–5,182, 184

harmonics, 185–7major scales, 103–4octaves, 121pressure, 152thirds, 127–30thumb positionchord shapes with, 17–20

muting, 18stretches and, 192see also chords; pick hand; and

see individual chordsFrith, Fred, 182

G chords, 36, 38boxes showing, 18, 19, 47, 51,

59, 65, 73, 81, 157, 221Gibsons, 9, 12gigging, 156Gilbert, Paul, 114Gilmour, Dave, 229Gorman, Scott, 123Graham, Davy, 227Green, Peter, 228Greenwood, Colin, 64Grossman, Stefan, 227guitars

bass, 52, 215–18buying, 2copy, 12cutaway, 6, 9Fenders, 120Gibsons, 9, 12quality of, 1–4slide, 8, 16812-string, 15, 211–14, 227see also acoustic guitar;

classical/'Spanish' guitar;electric guitar

hammer-ons and pull-offs, 104–5,182, 184

Hammett, Kirk, 191hands see fingers and hands; fretting

hand; pick handharmonics, 185–7harmony, 31, 177–8

triplets, 127–30valid numbers in second octave,

53–4


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Play great guitar

Havens, Richie, 20Hedges, Michael, 156, 228Hendrix, Jimi, 20, 42, 50, 89, 123,

139, 213, 228hexatonic scale, 93–6Holdsworth, Allan, 46hook lines, 219Hooker, John Lee, 86

influences, 230, 227–9inversions, 42, 49–52, 80, 82, 220,

225

Jam, 130Jansch, Bert, 227jazz, 96, 121–4, 215, 227Jett, Joan, 129Johnson, Robert, 228

‘Kashmir’, 82keys

A major, 86, 87, 90–2, 94, 104–5,133, 138–9, 205

A minor, 223–5B, 201, 202C major, 97–9, 103–4, 108, 122,

195, 220D major, 99, 99, 115, 128, 146,

151, 200, 208E major, 165, 165F sharp, 201G major, 99, 119, 129, 142, 179,

190capo variations, 13–14, 14changes, 46, 110

with open strings, 114see also chords; scales

Knopfler, Mark, 30Kossoff, Paul, 64Kottke, Leo, 227

labelling chords, 174, 219–20, 223, 226

lead guitar, 66, 86evasion of key note, 99melody playing, 103–6repeat phrases, 95solos, 58, 96decoration, 181–4over unlikely chords, 177–80rock, 171–4single note phrases, 85thirds, 127–30

Lennon, John, 222listening, 227–30, 228Love, Courtney, 11lutes, 199–202

‘Man on the Moon’, 76Marr, Johnny, 95, 228Marvin, Hank, 10May, Brian, 19, 229McCartney, Paul, 220, 221, 222McGeoch, John, 228McGuin, Roger, 228Mclaughlin, John, 104melody playing, 103–6melody writing, 222‘Message in a Bottle’, 185Metallica, 150, 191metronomes, 104, 116microphones, 32Mitchell, Joni, 209, 210‘Moby Dick’, 149Montgomery, Wes, 123More, Keith, 173muting, 18, 32, 123

natural sign, 86neck, 3, 5, 7

capos and, 15tuning up and, 148

neutral chords, 63–6Nicks, Stevie, 225ninths and elevenths, 53–6, 77

add ninths, 54, 56, 81

Nirvana, 50notation, 4, 8, 210

octaves, 19, 121–4off-beats, 140open strings, 189–91

chords, 75–8keys containing, 114pedal notes and, 137–40

open tuning, 20, 167–70, 168,207–10

Page, Jimmy, 82, 213, 228Pastorius, Jaco, 218pedal notes, 137–40

see also drone notespentatonic scales

and hexatonic scale, 93–6major, 89–92minor, 85–9, 171–4D, and playing fifths, 150, 150E, 180

percussive effects, 32, 32, 182Petty, Tom, 50pick hand

arpeggios, 58, 194–5bass guitar, 218control when bending notes, 184electric guitar, 26, 30fingerpicking, 6, 168, 193and flatpicking, 27–30lute arrangements, 201octaves, 123offbeat (syncopated) patterns, 24–6picks, 27–8, 213, 218standard patterns, 23strumming with, 4, 18, 31–4thumb, 18, 23–6, 194, 194

12-string guitars, 213, 214see also fretting hand

pick-ups, 6single and double coil, 9–10

picks, 27–8, 213, 218


237

Index

‘power-chords’, 63–6, 131–4drop D tuning and, 149–52

progressions, 49–50, 50, 52through common notes, 78through one-note shifts, 79–82

pull-offs and hammer-ons, 104–5,182, 184

ragtime, 203–6Read, Vernon, 132recording, 32Reinhardt, Django, 227Renbourn, John, 159, 202, 227resonance, 42, 207rest strokes, 4rhythmical patterns

anticipated, 189standard, 23strummed, 32–3syncopated, 24–5

Richards, Keith, 28, 109, 150riffs, 60, 90, 107–10, 131–4, 149–52rock

lead playing, 171–4phrases and figures, 177–80,

189–92‘power-chords’, 63–6, 131–4,

149–52riffs, 107–10, 131–4, 149–52see also solos

Ronson, Mick, 192, 229root notes, 26, 36, 49, 58, 59, 64, 217

as a drone note, 141–4bass playing, 217evading, 99

‘Sail Away’, 72Satriani, Joe, 228Scaggs, Boz, 90scales

A major, 174B mixolydian, 142'alternate' pentatonics, 97–100

chromatic, 80, 96hexatonic, 93–6major, 103with open string notes, 129pentatonic major, 89–92pentatonic minor, 85–8, 107–9,

150, 171–4see also keys

Segovia, Andres, 3, 227sevenths, 45–8, 77‘Sex Machine’, 56Shadows, The, 10, 228‘Shaft’, 123sharp and flat chords, 19, 41–4, 72,

73, 77sharp and flat notes, 41–4, 93–6,

166, 205–6shifts

one note, 79–82open strings, 75–8single fret, 110three-frets-down, 109

single note phrases, 85sixth string detuning, 145–8, 207

double drop D, 160rock riffs and, 149–52with capo, 155–8

sixths, 129, 162slide guitar, 8, 168slides, 104–5, 174, 181solos, 58, 96

decoration, 181–4over unlikely chords, 177–80single note phrases, 85see also rock

songbooks, 31, 38, 217songwriting, 13–14, 70, 78, 107,

120, 219–26happy songs in minor keys, 225using pedal notes, 139

Spanish guitar see classical/'Spanish'guitar

‘Starman’, 76

‘Stay With Me Till Dawn’, 50steel-strung acoustic guitars, 5–8,

66, 196, 202, 227Stills, Stephen, 142Sting, 199Stradlin, Izzy, 7strings

capo use and, 14–15finger pressure, 152, 184gauges, 6nylon, 3, 4, 34, 196snapping, 148, 166, 21212-string guitars, 211two and three, 129, 129see also fretboard; tuning

strumming, 4, 18, 31–4barré chords and, 72patterns, 32–4triad chords and, 60

Summers, Andy, 24, 36suspended chords, 36, 162sustain, 31, 34, 194, 196syncopated rhythms, 24–6

playing on last off-beat, 140

tablature, 4, 8, 196tempo, 113–16, 132, 181

time keeping, 106‘The Boys Are Back in Town’, 48‘The One I Love’, 76thirds, 127–30Thompson, Richard, 76thumb position

fretting handchord shapes with, 17–20muting, 18stretches and, 192pick hand, 18, 23–6, 194, 194

‘Thunder Road’, 48time keeping, 106‘Tomorrow Never Knows’, 141tone, 2, 74top string detuning, 159–62


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Play great guitar

up a semitone, 163–6Townshend, Pete, 15, 64, 140transposition, 107–10, 158

three-frets-down, 109see also capodastro (capo)

triads, 38, 59triplets, 28‘Trouble’, 160tuning

bass guitar, 217cheap guitars, 2during gigs, 156finger pressure, 152standard, 145, 158to a capo, 1412-string guitars, 212see also tuning alterations

tuning alterationsaltered for inspiration, 159–62drone notes and, 144, 155enharmonic mutation, 165–6

for lute arrangements, 201, 202open tuning, 20, 167–70, 168,

207–10to minor chords, 209single string change, 145–8and retuning, 148rock riffs and, 149–52top string a semitone, 163–6with capo change, 155–8see also tuning

12-string guitar, 15, 211–14, 227electric, 214

two fingered fifths see fifth chord('power-chord')

unison notes, 167–8, 210Unplugged (MTV series), 7

Vai, Steve, 54, 228Van Halen, Eddie, 228Vaughan, Stevie Ray, 96, 228

vibrato bar (tremolo arm), 10Villa-Lobos, Hector, 227Visconti, Tony, 68voicing, 38

Waters, Muddy, 228‘Whiter Shade of Pale’, 52Who, The, 140‘Wild Flower’, 132Williams, John, 227Winter, Johnny, 16‘Wonderful One’, 144Wood, Ron, 229

Young, Neil, 144, 160, 229


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