21 replies to this topic

[Kirk Lorange]

I've been plugging away at my How to play Slide in Standard tuning DVD ... it struck me why I love it so much: Standard is in fact a bunch of open tunings all rolled into one; the 2-3-4 stringset is major; the 1-2-3 stringset is minor, major 7th and 9th; the 2-3-4-5 stringset is 11th; the 1-2-3-4 stringset is open minor 7th; the 3-4-5 strinset is sus4 ... drop the low E to D and you've got a maj5 chord on stringset 4-5-6. They may not be six strings wide, but who says they have to be?

Back to work!

[randy_mc]

excellent point!
I guess you could mess someone up telling them that "yeah, I play slide guitar in open A11th...."

Are you working on a new instructional DVD?
I'm getting ready to do one myself on slide in standard tuning with behind the slide technique.

grace & peace & cool tones,
Randy

[Kirk Lorange]

Yes randy_mc, I'm well into it now. Big, big job.

Kirk

[randy_mc]

Good luck with it!
I'll be looking forward to checking it out.
Are you back in Australia now?

RHM

[manwithaplan]

Yea, I've been playing is standard more and more lately.

[Kirk Lorange]

randy_mc said:

Are you back in Australia now?

Yes Randy, been back since May 16 ... it's like I never left now!

[BluesJammer]

Good luck, Kirk!
We all look forward to this DVD

[Schermerberger]

No Doubt

[Schermerberger]

Kirk,
I hope all is well down under. I'm here up top and freezing with too much snow. Is there any new word about your upcoming DVD?

thanks again for hosting this forum
Jourdan

[Kirk Lorange]

Working on it right now, Jourdan.

[Schermerberger]

The thing about standard tuning or drop D is as mentioned before, you don't loose your mental fret board map. I've had the DVD now for some weeks and I cant tell you what an eye opener it is. The chords section is a real treat. I'm now playing with the different voicings of chords.

When you standard/drop d tuners are sliding around, do you visualize the chord when your playing it (like the chord forms for specific string sets Kirk listed above) ?

can you re-learn songs from open tunings and get the same tone, or does that "natural" chorus effect get lost in standard tuning? I've been hot on the trail of some more ragtime tunes but many are in open tunings and there again I'm lost. With more practice I'm sure I could find the "lined up" chords to play the songs but the phrase by phrase licks will they work out the same? Mainly, I was listening to Harlem Slims stuff and Bill Broonzy

[Bearz]

I don't think my reply particularly addresses the idea of transposing stuff from open tuning, but your post reminds of how much open tuning has really thrilled me over the years. However, I think there are not too many guitarists including myself out there who have moved over to open tuning and play all their stuff in all keys in one open tuning. So the open tuning tends to quickly sound much the same from song to song and even with a capo, the properties are much the same. Nevertheless, I have to say that open G or D or Dadgad are great tunings and have a warmth to them that is more difficult to get out of standard.
I think Pierre Bensusan lives in one open tuning and can play in any key in open tuning, but I don't know anyone else who does. Sonny Landreth plays almost exclusively in open tuning but he uses a lot of different tunings - and he is an awesome slide player.
I like Kirk's approach because he not only teaches us to play in regular tuning, he shows that slide in regular tuning when played right can sound awfully like an open tuned guitar. I believe that muting the strings is not only good for a clean sound, it actually improves tone 150% -- gives it a richness one cannot get if not muting. I have no idea about the musical physics of what happens when we mute out the other strings, but maybe if the pickups are only dealing with essentially one or two strings at a time, then we get that nice fat slide sound? I think also that being able to isolate single strings really helps us focus on vibrato -- at first Kirk's muting style in standard slowed me down a lot, and I am still a long way from being to play slide in any way fast, but the slowing down process has allowed me to really appreciate the quality of the sound and to really explore the range of tonal possibilities a little more.
Anyway I am off on a ramble here....
Thanks

Bearz

[csason]

very interesting thread..

part of the problem as I see it regarding tuning open or standard, or a combination of the two is that some songs...IF they are to be played accurately require the specific
tuning they were written in..
Now, I know that sounds stoopit...but an example would be most of Page's work-and his
'secret' open tunings...HA HA

More specifically, (i am going to have trouble describing this, because I lack the training and vocabulary that goes with the training) on slide songs that use 'fram' notes
(Kirk does this quite a bit) like a lead solo riff, cannot be dupicated in any other tuning.

So, my point is..

If I want to play Done Somebody Wrong exactly like Skydog, I will have to be tuned to open E or I won't be able to use the same finger style (fram notes) although I can find the notes..(if I try hard enough) somewhere...ha ha.. but when it comes time for sustain, or a change..I won't be in the right position, etc. to pull it off.

I don't spend much time trying to duplicate songs, so much as learning how the sound was made that made the song enjoyable. That is where the frustration can be found for me, because sometimes the only way to duplicate the sound is to duplicate the tuning.

Sonny's song "Orphan's of the Motherland" is an example of Sonny's D tuning, that has to be followed to duplicate the riffs. The song can't be played in E or A44


very interesting thread

[Kirk Lorange]

You're right, of course, csason ... if you want to duplicate a slide tune originally played in an open tuning, you're going to play it in that tuning. You'd probably be able to get a lot of the details right in another tuning, but not all . But, why bother duplicating someone else's rendition? They've already done it!

[csason]

Kirk Lorange said:

But, why bother duplicating someone else's rendition? They've already done it!

no doubt.. Kirk..



I am so new here.. I am the sort of musician who has spent more time fooling with cool noises, and putting them together for personal enjoyment... than the sort who
has a better understanding of the notes, etc. I guess you'd say the only reason I learn technique or form from replicating someone else would be to incorporate the ability to make the sound(s) into other music..

At some point though..my lack of 'knowing' where I am, or 'what' I am playing..becomes a handicap.


I have a question..(probably should use the search function)

I call dropped D tuning

where the guitar is tuned to open D
and the low E string is tuned to low D

is that correct ?

[si16]

csason said:

I call dropped D tuning

where the guitar is tuned to open D
and the low E string is tuned to low D

is that correct ?

Dropped D is the same as standard tuning but with the low E tuned down to D. The tuning you're describing is just open D.

[Bearz]

Hi, I hope I am understanding what you are saying here, but it sounds like you are confusing a open D tuning with a dropped D. Open D low to high is: D A D F# A D, whereas dropped D (low to high) is: D A D G B E, which of course is regular tuning with the low E dropped down to a D.
Bearz

[SlickCat]

Quote

But, why bother duplicating someone else's rendition? They've already done it!

Kirks right....as they say on American Idol ..."That was ok, but you sound like every other kareoke singer":yawn:

I try to work within the structure of the original song, however make it my own. Good or Bad, no-one will say I sound EXACTLY like ____

[Bearz]

I agree with you guys. I have never really had a great interest in replicating other people's songs verbatim. Instead I like to forage among their riffs or whatever for things to borrow and then try and spin them with my own mojo. I think it is good however to learn how things are done and understand the musical contex in which they are performed. This strikes me as especially true for blues or even country where the background chord structures are often similar from song to song - but the guitar riffs can be vastly different in tone, phrasing and style. Learning riffs and the schemata on which they are hung is a great way to make sense of stuff -- and from that it is up to us to be creative and original. I think most original musicians allude to this process when they talk about their 'influences'
Bearz

[mhuhta]

Kirk, I'm trying to bring up the tab for How to play slide dvd and not having much luck.