Dear Heartwood Beat Readers,

Sometimes I come across a rhythm that’s so complicated, or weird, or fantabulishously funky, that I can’t stand it. I’m at the gym on the hamster wheel, listening to this cool groove on my iPod, and I want to grab the poor guy on the machine next to me and yell, “You gotta hear this!”

Thankfully, there are other people I can turn to, like the great drummer and teacher Mark DiFlorio (that’s him on the right). Here are Mark’s reactions to some of my favorite Strange and Wonderful Rhythms. I’ve included clips of each of the songs we discuss. They’ll open in a new window/tab so that you can read as you listen.

Rhythm #1: “Unison” by Bjork, starting at 0:20
(LISTEN)

Rob: I love that electronic instrument that comes in at 0:20—not the bass, but that other thing (who knows what it is, it’s so heavily processed). It sounds a touch out-of-sync with the rest of the song, but I can’t figure out why—I just know I like it. Is it swinging a little, or is the rest of the band swinging and it’s not?

Mark: What I’m hearing that makes it a touch out-of-sync is that the sound is layered in two parts: A percussive clicking, and a tonal flute-like sound. The percussive clicking itself is a flam, like the sound of two hands clapping not quite at the same time. The flammed percussive clicking sound happens ever-so-slightly earlier than the tonal flute-like sound. This gives the sound some length, with the tonal part of the sound happening a little later than the exact subdivision each time. This lateness is what I think makes the part “swing.”

Rhythm #2: “Rockin’ Chair” by The Band, starting at 0:16
(LISTEN)

Rob: As a follow-up, this mandolin part is definitely playing straight while the rest of the band is swinging. I love that opposition! How often do you hear musicians do this?

Mark: I hear this all of the time, especially in jazz, and music that involves improvisation. It’s often done intentionally to create some rhythmic tension, eventually to be released coming out of a solo or into another part, like the chorus. When it’s done throughout different parts of a song or solo, it gives the music a natural ebb and flow.

(Note from Rob: If you like this song, there’s more written about it than you could possibly imagine here.)

Rhythm #3: “Honky Tonk Women” by The Rolling Stones, 0:00-0:50
(LISTEN)

Rob: I don’t mean to pick on one of my favorite guitarists, but in this live performance, Keith Richards’ rhythm is too loose for my tastes. I want to shout at him, “Tap your foot,” or maybe, “Sober up!”

I’ve heard you describe some of your favorite drummers as having “greasy” rhythm because of their loose feel—what makes some musicians greasy and others just sloppy?

Mark: Technically, what makes a musician “greasy” is his ability to manipualte and control the spacing of his rhythms. A greasy rhythm is not subdivided evenly, but is always being varied while remaining within the overall parameters of the tempo.

I usually talk about greasy when referring to New Orleans drummers like Johnny Vidacovich. Johnny’s hi-hat patterns lay back with wide swinging 8th notes, and push forward with tight straight 8ths. His snare drum is sometimes far behind the bass player, while at the same time his ride cymbal is pushing ahead with the pianist.

But what truly makes a musician greasy is attitude. If you walk a straight line in life, you most likely will sound like that. And if you live in New Orleans sweating in the summers, drinking the tap water and eating red beans and rice, then that what you sound like.

Rhythm #4: “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy” by Tchaikovsky
(LISTEN)

Rob: Here’s a counterpoint to Keith: A performance on the celesta that’s too pretty to be called “greasy.” Still, it has slight variations in tempo (and dynamics)—little ebbs and flows, like at 0:15—that I find gorgeous. What do you think? Beautiful? Sloppy?

Mark: Beautiful! Not sloppy. It ebbs and flows very naturally. I don’t think anyone is telling this conductor, “Tap your foot,” or “Sober up!” This music serves a different purpose and was created and is performed with a different intention. There is different attitude behind it.

Rhythm #5: “Red House” by Jimi Hendrix, 0:00-0:09
(LISTEN)

Rob: Aw, yeah! I taught this song recently, and hadn’t realized until then how rhythmically cool this intro is. It was a challenge to teach. How would you explain to a beginning musician what’s going on in this section? How would you recommend they count along with it, and learn how to play the rhythm?

Mark: Subdivide! I would have my student listen to this from the perspective of 4/4 and 6/8.

4/4
The intro begins with the guitar clicking on beat 4 of the pick-up measure. The bass notes are struck on beats 1, 2, 3, and 4 of the next two measures and finally on beat 1 of the third measure.

(Listen to Rob doing this)

6/8
The intro begins with the guitar clicking on beat 4 of the 6/8 measure and then continues to subdivide along the 6/8 count.

(Listen to Rob doing this)

The drummer enters on beat 2 of the measure and groups his fill in 2’s (snare drum & bass drum), which makes counting tricky. This goes until the end of the next measure when he strikes his toms on beats 4, 5, and 6, and then starts his groove. Something like this:

1 2 3 4 5 6 | 1 2 3 4 5 6 | 1 2 3 4 5 6
  s b s b s | b s b t t t | GROOVE

s = snare
b = bass
t = toms

Rhythm #6: “One” by Metallica, 4:20-End
(LISTEN)

Rob: RAWK! I’m not a big metal fan, but I love this song. Weren’t you into metal in high school? Did you ever learn that fast double-kick-drum technique? The guitar matches the kick-drum rhythm in parts of this song, and it requires some insanely fast picking. I can’t imagine what it’s like to do it with your feet.

Mark: I was, more specifically, a “hair band fan” in high school. (Have I shown you the pictures? I must!) Motley Crue, Ratt, Poison, etc… and although the hair is what inspired me the most I did have a double bass drum pedal at one time. I never learned to use it.

I eventually stopped showering, became a hippy and never quite cultivated the aggressiveness that seems to be needed to acquire burning double bass drum chops. I’ve begun showering again.

Rhythm #7: “Over the Hills and Far Away” by Led Zeppelin, 0:00-1:09
(LISTEN)

Rob: You have no idea how much it grieves me that I can’t tap my foot with one of my favorite songs. What’s wrong with me?

Mark: I have good news for you, Rob. Nothing is wrong with you, and I have an answer that just might have you tapping your foot in a whole new way.

You see, this song has a quarter-note pulse (which is where you want to tap your foot), but is subdivided in alternating phrases of 9/8 and 7/8 (which makes for some weird-feeling foot-tapping). Here’s how the measures are subdived until the drums enter:

(The numbers refer to the number of 8th notes there are in the measure. Keep in mind the song begins with two 8th-note pick-ups, so you don’t start counting immediately.)

9-7-9-7-9-7-8-8-8
9-7-9-7-9-7-8-8-8-8 enter vocals
9-7-9-7-9-7-8-8-8-8-8-8-8-8 enter drums

I have two options for you. Try both:

1) You can tap your foot to the 8th note subdivision, which is twice as fast as you’d naturally approach tapping your foot to this song.

(Listen to Rob counting this way)

OR

2) Since 9 + 7 = 16, you can tap your foot on the quarter note and it will work out in the end. It may sometimes feel awkward as you will be tapping on the upbeats during the measures of 7/8 but rest assured you will be back on the downbeat when the 7 is over.

(Listen to Rob counting this way)

It’s all quarter-note foot tapping after the drums enter, and although there is a 5/4 measure coming out of the guitar solo, the quarter note pulse is still your friend.

Rhythm #8: My Wiper Blades

Rob: I love grooving with rhythms in everyday life—the turn signal, windshield wipers, industrial machinery. Do you do that too?

Mark: I groove to every sound and rhythm that I hear in the world, especially my wiper blades. Wiper blade pulses & tempos vary widely. I’ve had cars with swingin’ wiper blades, very straight and tight pulses and everything in between depending on the weather.

Recently I’ve been jamming to the clicking of the motor on my infant daughter’s swing. Its rhythm is consistenly irregular and I can only jam along with it by guestimating the unevenly subdivided pause before it repeats.

You might say it’s greasy!

*

You can learn more about Mark’s teaching at his Seattle Drum Lessons website.

I hope you’re all having a great summer. The Heartwood Beat reached 4,000 subscribers since I last wrote. Welcome new readers!

Fingerpicking Hand Position

This past week I introduced yet another beginner to fingerstyle guitar–that is, picking the guitar with thumb and fingers instead of a flatpick. Every time I teach those first steps–how to orient your picking hand, how to play a simple pattern–I relive the excitement I felt when I first started down that musical path. Learning to play fingerstyle opens so many new doors, and it’s a thrill to watch a student cross the threshold.

Whenever I teach fingerstyle, I start with picking hand position. Good positioning decreases tension in the hand, and improves accuracy and tone. There are several ways of doing it, each with their benifits and drawbacks. I’m going to teach the Classical Position, which I use most of the time. It’s inspired by lessons I took with classical guitar wizard Michael Nicolella.

I hope this discussion will be helpful both for beginners and experienced fingerpickers who want to take a second look at their technique.

Here’s how it looks (playing “Falling Slowly” with my girlfriend Meg at the last Coffee Shop Jam):

Here’s how it works:

1. Hold A Lemon: Imagine you’re holding a lemon with your picking hand. That’s the shape it should be in as you pick. The knuckles are curved slightly, and the hand is relaxed.

2. Tilt Wrist: If you hold your guitar like most rock and folk guitarists, you put your guitar on your right leg when sitting (if you’re right-handed), which orients your guitar neck more or less parallel to the ground. This poses a problem for your picking hand. To get good tone, your fingers need to pluck strings at a nearly perpendicular angle–up toward the sky–but if you keep your wrist straight, they’ll be picking more toward the bridge of the guitar. This will cause what I call “slicing”–picking the strings at an angle that causes wimpy tone and scratchy sounds on the wound strings.

Fix this problem by tilting your hand down. You can do this by getting into normal flatpicking position, and then totally relaxing your wrist (but not your arm), so that your hand droops but your palm’s still facing your guitar.

Note that the ideal ergonomic position for your hand is to have no bend in the wrist, so just tilt a little. If you want to avoid tilting altogether, hold your guitar in classical position when seated (a big change that I’m not willing to make), or stand up and point your guitar neck toward the ceiling, like this: (Suzanne Vega playing my favorite song of hers, “Gypsy”):

3. Make a Cross: To keep your thumb from bumping into your pointing finger (when you play two strings simultaneously, for example), straighten your thumb and point it toward your headstock. Your thumb and first finger should make a cross.

4. Keep Thumb Straight: The most ergonomic way to pick with your thumb is to move the joint where the thumb meets the hand. The other two knuckles should stay straight. It can be harder to use your nail in this position–grow it out longer (yes, fellas, I’m talking to you too) or use a thumbpick.

5. Plant Before You Play: This is a good tip for any fingerpicker. In most fingerstyle songs, your fingers are assigned to particular strings. Before you start playing, plant your fingers on the appropriate strings so that they can feel what they’re about to play. For example, if your pointing finger is picking the 3rd string, slot the fingertip between the 2nd and 3rd strings, and rest it against the 3rd string.

OK, fingerpickers: Repick, and slice no more!

Enjoy the music,

Rob

Hi Heartwood Beat Subscribers,

I hope you’re all enjoying February. I want to let you know about several updates I’ve made to the website.

Print or Save Function

One of the fun things about having a popular guitar instruction website is bumping into people (usually at guitar camp) who’ve printed music from my site to make songbooks. But I wince when I see what their web browsers did to my careful formatting—chords aren’t aligned with lyrics, margins are miniscule so that binder ring holes obliterate information, and there’s tacky-looking text at the top and bottom of every page.

I recently started doing some limited advertising on my site, and realize that this will make printed song pages even more cluttered. So I’ve added a “Print or Save” link to the top of every song page that links to the original MS Word document. Click the link, and either save the song on your hard drive or open it in Word and print it.

Now go make a songbook, if you don’t have one already. Print twenty of your favorite songs and keep them in a binder to bring to parties, camping trips, etc. Punch holes in both sides of each page, and orient them so that both pages (most songs are two pages long) face one other. No more frantic page flips to take the oomph out of your orgasmic pre-choruses!

Better yet, make two or three binders so that other musicians can get in on the fun, page numbers and a table of contents for easy navigation, and a stack of lyric sheets for singers (paste all songs into one document and delete all guitar information, just leaving lyrics). And when it’s time to play, don’t forget music stands and light sources (headlamps work well) if your eyes are like mine.

All the songs can be found on my Free Guitar Chords page.

And if you don’t have MS Word, or have an old version that won’t read your song file, you don’t have to go out and buy it. Bill Gates will still be able to pay his mortgage if you use this great free online service that converts Word docs to PDF docs (chances are good you have Adobe Acrobat, which reads PDF’s). Download song, convert, and print.

Guitar Pro

For the past few years, I’ve been using the tablature editor/player Guitar Pro to teach myself new songs and write out music for my students when chord charts don’t show enough detail. Being able to play back written music so that you can hear how it’s supposed to sound makes learning so much more efficient. If you’re interested in learning how to pick individual notes, add a cool riff to your repertoire, or learn your first guitar solo, Guitar Pro makes it a lot easier. Experts and teachers love this program, too.

I’ve started adding links to Guitar Pro song files on some of my more popular song pages. Think of the chord charts as Cliff’s Notes, and the GP songs as the unabridged versions. I’ll also be supplementing all future blog guitar lessons with GP files.

Click hear to learn more about Guitar Pro and watch my little video tour of the program.

Chord Chart Update

I just added seven new songs. Hope you enjoy them. They are…

All-American Rejects – It Ends Tonight
David Bowie – Ziggy Stardust
Islands – Creeper
Pedro the Lion – I Am Always The One Who Calls
The Presidents – Naked and Famous
Bonnie Raitt – Love Has No Pride
Townes Van Zandt – Pancho and Lefty

All the songs can be found on my Free Guitar Chords page.

That’s it! Please feel free to leave comments, especially concerning the advertising I’ve added to the site. I want Heartwood Guitar to be a pleasant place to visit, so let me know if I’m harshing your mellow.

Enjoy the music,

Rob

Did you know that it’s impossible to tune a guitar perfectly? I don’t mean impossible as in, “It’s impossible to play an entire gig without some joker yelling ‘Freebird!’” I’m sure that’s happened somewhere. I mean impossible as in, Swedish-physicists-in-lab-coats-standing-around-a-guitar-shaking-their-heads impossible.

To fully explain why, we’d need to talk about Greek philosophers experimenting with harps, and Bach’s contemporaries arguing about how to get an orchestra in tune, and there’d be lots of charts, graphs, and ratios involved. I’m unqualified to do any of this.

Here’s a brief explanation though, to the best of my knowledge

Looking at the fretboard of the guitar, you’d get the impression that our musical system is very orderly. Those perfect parallel frets line up so nicely, diminishing in width at an even rate as they move up the neck, like the world’s straightest sidewalk stretching into the distance. What if I told you that in order to get the guitar to play perfectly in tune, that sidewalk would look like a bomb landed on it? And even then, you could only play it in one key? This is what I’m talking about.

Time for an example. Most of you know the way of tuning your guitar by ear, where you tune pairs of strings by playing the 5th or 4th fret of the lower-pitched string. Those of you who are really sensitive to tuning have probably noticed that by the time you’re done, you compare your 1st string to your 6th (both E notes) and that 1st string is sharp! “Arrgh! I knew I should have bought that extended warranty!”

Actually, there’s nothing wrong with your guitar. Or rather, David Gilmore’s Strat has the same problem. The problem is, the note you play on the 5th fret of your guitar is ever-so-slightly sharp compared to the open string note. Every time you tune a string, you introduce a little bit more sharpness, so that by the time you get to the first string, you’ve drifted out of tune. It’s like the game of telephone—error on top of error on top of error.

The distance between an open-string note and a 5th fret note is called an interval of a fourth. Where things really start sounding out-of-tune is when you play the interval of a third. Try tuning your guitar with an electric tuner, and then play the open third and second strings—this is an interval of a third. That second string sounds a tiny bit sharp.

Why is this? Basically, nature handed us a spiral, and for the last 500 years we’ve been trying to figure out how to squish it into a circle. The best we’ve come up with so far is the system we use today, called “equal temperment”. Google this term and you can learn more. Be prepared for some math.

In the meantime, how should you tune your guitar? First of all, the electric tuner is superior to that fretting-the-fifth-fret method. It appalls me how often I hear about guitar teachers who force their students to always tune by ear using that method. Sure, it trains your ear, but shouldn’t the primary goal be to get the thing in tune?

There is a tuning-by-ear technique that does work great, described by Richard Lloyd (guitarist for the awesome 70’s punk band Television). It’s harder to memorize, but it’s worth it! You can find it on his website’s FAQ here, second question down.

But ultimately, you’re going to have to put up with your guitar being a bit out-of tune. If it’s any consolation, pianos and other fixed-pitch instruments have the same problem.

And if you just can’t stand it, you can always switch to an instrument like trombone, where you have full control of your pitch.

Of course, you can’t play a trombone behind your head or light it on fire….

Dear Faithful Heartwood Beat Subscribers,

Hello again! It’s been too long.

Since I sent my last newsletter, I managed to injure my arms playing too much guitar (and, though I’m embarrassed to admit it, taking workout advice from an over-caffeinated Hulk Hogan look-alike in a YouTube video). The injury put me out of work for three weeks and continues to prevent me from doing much typing or guitar playing, but I’m slowly recovering. Once I fully understand how the injury happened and how it could have been prevented, I’ll dedicate a newsletter to telling my story. Perhaps it will save you some grief down the road.

In honor of my hiatus, I’d like to share some thoughts on one of the most powerful tools you have when you’re accompanying another musician: Silence. This newsletter is geared toward guitarists who play with other musicians, but really, it’s a lesson everyone can benefit from.

First, here’s a little story…

Two weeks ago, I was at a barbecue celebrating the visit of my high school buddy, Justin. After the meal, Justin, a fantastic guitarist and songwriter from California, performed some of his songs, accompanied by another friend on harmonica.

The harmonica player had fantastic chops, but he treated the whole song like an extended harmonica solo. No matter if Justin was singing or even playing a fingerstyle guitar solo, that harmonica player blew right through, confusing and obscuring the song’s melody and Justin’s lead guitar work, and creating a kind of relentless, frantic tension through the whole song.

I guess it’s performances like that one that gave rise to this joke:

Q: What do you call a harmonica player who doesn’t blow all over a singer’s lines?
A: Deceased.

This is a pretty extreme example of overplaying: Thankfully, most guitarists know better than to overwhelm a song with constant soloing. But did you ever consider that strumming through a whole song could be overplaying too?

Think of how a typical contemporary rock, folk, or country song is arranged. The song often starts with just one or a few instruments. Then the vocals come in, singing the first verse. Another instrument kicks in at the chorus, adding a new texture for a fuller sound. Maybe the band backs off a bit in the next verse, and then come back with full force for the second chorus. If it’s a pop song, there’s sometimes a breakdown next, where the drums and bass drop out and give the listener’s ears a chance to relax before building to a huge, glorious final chorus.

Most contemporary musicians follow some variation of this formula: Artists as disparate as Steve Earle (listen to the layering of the dobro and second acoustic guitar in his song “Goodbye”), Nirvana (the kings of quiet verse/loud chorus), and Coldplay (who seem to have made a pact that 75% of their songs must start with sensitive piano playing). Why? It’s because they all understand the emotional power of the crescendo–of getting louder as the song progresses.

You miss out on creating crescendos when you accompany another musician by playing through the whole song. To get louder, you must first be quiet. Sure, you could strum or fingerpick quietly through some parts, and then really whomp on the strings during the choruses, but the most powerful way of injecting majesty into a song is waiting for that perfect moment to add your instrument to the mix.

If this approach to accompanying someone else is new to you, here’s a formula to get you started. Obviously, you’ll need to tweak it to match the structure of your song.

Intro: Don’t play
Verse 1: Don’t play
Chorus: Play full volume
Verse 2: Strum once per chord change
Chorus: Play full volume
Solo: Let loose!
Chorus: Play full volume
Ending: Strum once per chord or don’t play

Take note: Styles that typically DON’T follow this approach include old-time music and punk. There’s still a variety of textures, but usually everyone’s playing from start to finish.

Finally, here’s a trick I learned for jamming on songs I don’t know: Wait until the second verse (after the first chorus) to come in. It’ll make you sound like a pro…

…and you’ll get a preview of how the #@$% song goes.

Happy Thanksgiving, musicians!

I’ll be spending the holiday with my family in California. I’m excited to try a bluegrass song with them this trip, called “Devil’s Dream.” We never played music together when I was a kid, but as my sisters and I have gotten older the family’s been able to find some common ground in our skills and tastes.

Bluegrass is a real stretch, though. My mom plays violin, but never “fiddle” (a violin becomes a fiddle when your spouse is in jail and the car’s on the front lawn). And my younger sister is just getting good enough at guitar to make quick chord changes.

I’ll consider the song a success if my polka-loving dad wakes up in his rocking chair and says, “Hey, you could two-step to that!”

One thing I’ve done to make the song easier for my sister is to show her how to use a capo to avoid barre chords, which is the topic of today’s newsletter.

But first, I want to dispel two illusions about capos:

1) Using a capo to avoid difficult chord shapes is lazy

I wonder if this attitude stems from America’s puritanical work ethic. Wherever it comes from, understand that musicianship is all about efficiency–getting the best results with the least effort. Even when playing difficult passages, good musicians do whatever they can to minimize strain. This approach not only helps them avoid injury, but it also improves the music.

So if playing a song in Bb using all barre chords gets you the best sound (like when playing reggae or funk, styles that require a lot of left-hand muting), then go for it. But if you’re crooning a tender love ballad that needs smooth chord changes, save your fingers–and schnookum’s ears–and play open chords with a capo!

2) You should play songs in the capo position of the original song

Sometimes this is a good idea. Capoing some songs, like The Beatles’ “Blackbird,” is impossible without dramatically altering the guitar part (put a capo on the 5th fret, and you run out of real estate as soon as you hit the second measure). But most songs can be played equally well in a variety of capo positions.

Which key is best? If you’re singing with the guitar, choose the key that’s best for your voice. The voice is usually the most important instrument, and everything else defers to the voice’s requirements. Playing “Closer to Fine” with Capo 2 just because that’s how the Indigo Girls did it is like buying shoes in your friend’s size because you liked the way they looked on her.

Enough with the dispelling. Here’s how to avoid difficult chord shapes by using a capo. Let’s use my sister Margaret’s predicament as an example.

“Devil’s Dream” is usually played in the key of A. The chords are A, D, E, and the ever-despised Bm, a barre chord. Why it’s played in the key of A, I don’t know, but that’s how I learned the melody, and there’s no way I’m learning that fingertip-flayer using a whole new scale shape. On the other hand, you could float the Macy’s Day Parade through the pauses in Margie’s barre chord changes. Time to bust out the capo.

First, we need to choose a key that Margie can play in. Let’s use the key of G. If we transpose “Devil’s Dream” to the key of G, we get the finger-friendly chords G, C, D, and Am. For more explanation of transposing, read my three newsletter issues on chord families, starting here.

Now we need to figure out where to put the capo so that Margie will be playing those chord shapes (G, C, D, and Am), but because of the capo, will actually be playing in the key of A.

To do this, you need to know the musical alphabet. If you don’t know it, here it is, but you should memorize it. Notice that some notes (called accidentals) have two different names (divided by a “/”). Also, keep in mind the pattern starts over at the beginning once you get to G#/Ab.

A A#/Bb B C C#/Db D D#/Eb E F F#/Gb G G#/Ab

You really should memorize this. Really. There are some tricks to it, but that’s for another newsletter.

OK, so where do we put Margie’s capo? Let’s try inching up the fretboard fret-by-fret until her G chord (the I chord in the desired key) becomes an A chord (the I chord in the despised key). Well, if you put the capo on the first fret, and play a G chord shape (It’s just a chord SHAPE now, right? We’ve entered Capoland!), the chord is now a G# (or Ab) chord–one note higher in the musical alphabet.

And if you move the capo up to the second fret, now you’re playing an A chord (A is the next note in the musical alphabet after G#/Ab). So to play in the key of A using G chord shapes, capo 2.

Think of it this way: When we changed from the key of A to the key of G, we lowered the key of the song a whole step (two notes of the musical alphabet). To compensate, we need to capo 2 to raise the key back up to A.

In short, to figure out how to play a hard song using easier chord shapes but keeping the key the same, follow these four steps:

1) Choose a new key that’s easier to play in. G’s usually the easiest.

2) Fret the I chord of the new key (the I chord is the chord the key is named after).

3) Inch up the fretboard with your capo, raising the name of your chord by one note in the musical alphabet, until you reach the I chord of the original (despised) key.

4) Transpose the other chords in the song from the despised key into the desired key. You’re done!

Once you get good at this, you can do it in your head. There are other shortcuts too (experts, have at it in the comments section of the blog!), but this will get you started.

Also, note that this process might land you on Capo 10 or 11. Yow! You’d need surgical instruments to play up there. Go back to step 1 and choose a different easy key.

Incidentally, if you’d like to hear “Devil’s Dream,” there’s a cool video of some young women playing it on YouTube.

Happy Thanksgiving,

Rob

Hi Musicians,

First of all, I’d like to welcome all the people who signed up for the newsletter recently. We’re coming up on one thousand subscribers! Holy cow!

I’ve been traveling a lot this past month, and The Heartwood Beat went into cardiac arrest as a result. Thanks for your patience.

To my amazement, several readers have been clamoring for some more music theory, so I’ve decided to dedicate this newsletter to celebrating the weird and wonderful Land of Capo. For you total beginners, the capo is a clamp you put on your fretboard that enables you to, among other things, change keys without changing chord shapes. Speaking of which, this newsletter is geared toward beginners, so the rest of you can go back to working on your fingerstyle interpretation of Van Halen’s “Eruption.”

In particular, I hope to teach you how to use a capo without getting your butt whooped. This topic occurred to me last week when one of my students recounted a conversation she had with her singing teacher. It went something like this:

**********************

Professionally-Trained Singing Teacher, Who’s Unaccustomed To Dealing With Guitarists (PTSTWUTDWG): Oh, I love “Dark as a Dungeon!” What key do you usually sing it in?

My Poor, Unsuspecting Guitar Student (MPUGS): Um…well, I do capo 4, but I play it in G.

PTSTWUTDWG: So you play it in G?

MPUGS: Yeah, but capo 4.

PTSTWUTDWG (sweat forming on her brow): So is it in G or not?

MPUGS: Well, see, I play it in G like this (puts the capo on 4th fret and strums a chord), but the capo’s on the 4th fret.

PTSTWUTDWG: That’s not a G chord (plays a G chord on the piano). THAT’s a G chord

MPUGS: Yeah, this G’s different ‘cause it’s capo 4.

Long Silence…

**********************

The problem? MPUGS was in Capo Land, where the grass is blue, the sky is green, international disputes are solved by games of checkers, and Angus Young plays french horn for the Danville Community Orchestra.

To put it more simply, the capo creates an illusion that you’re playing a certain chord, or that you’re in a certain key, but you’re not. And in order to bridge the cultural gap between the Capolese people and the Notguitaristians, you must do this simple thing:

Understand the difference between CHORDS and CHORD SHAPES.

Take the C chord. If you’re a beginning guitarist, you probably know just one way to play that chord. But this isn’t the only way to play a C chord—you could play it in dozens of different places up and down the neck. C chords, like most chords beginners learn, just require three notes—C, E, and G in this case—and combinations of these notes are found all over the place on the fretboard.

The problem is, beginners don’t think of a C chord in terms of “C, E, and G.” Instead, they picture the shape of the chord on the fretboard.

So when my poor guitar student (it was all my fault, so let’s call her My Poorly-Educated Guitar Student (MPEGS)) tried to explain to her singing teacher what key she was playing in, what she should have said was…

**********************

MPEGS: Um…well, I play it in Capo 4 using G chord shapes.

PTSTWUTDWG: So what key is it in?

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And the answer to that question will be the topic of the next newsletter.

Until then, my Capolese comrades,

May all your B-flat chords have G shapes.

Rob

Hi Musicians,

Last week I spent six days making music under the trees at the Puget Sound Guitar Workshop, and I’m still floating. What a great intellectual, social, and dare I say…spiritual experience. If you like traditional acoustic music (folk, country, blues, western swing), or if you’re a rocker who’s interested in broadening horizons, I highly recommend this camp. More info here. I realize most of you don’t live in Washington, or the US for that matter, but hey—we’ve had campers from the UK every time I’ve gone.

It was interesting going to camp on the heels of writing that last newsletter, on jamming skills. I participated in some great jam sessions on the last few nights of camp, and after one of them, a woman came up to me and said, “I really like the way you lead your songs, and the way you showed us the chords beforehand.” I’ve heard somewhere that orchestra conductors have the longest life expectancy of any profession, and I can see why—leading a group of people in performing a beautiful song is so uplifting, it must be good for the body as well as the soul.

Speaking of jamming, a reader named John proposed that we make a list of good campfire singalong songs, so I’ve started a poll on my blog. I’ve gotten the list started with a few ones I like. You can vote for as many as you want (one vote per song, please), and if you’d like to add songs to the list, do so in the comment section and I’ll add them when I get a chance. You can find the poll here.

In other news, I’ve taken a week off work to script an instructional DVD (for new guitarists). I’ve had this project in the wings for a while, and it’s been great to finally get started. I’m still brainstorming songs I’m going to teach in the DVD, so maybe next newsletter I’ll do another poll and see what you would have liked to learn back when you were a total beginner.

In the meantime, I’d like to turn you on to a couple of my favorite instructional websites. Here’s a great one for beginner and intermediate guitarists, called Guitarnoise.

And this website has tons of video lessons, mostly geared toward advanced guitarists.

Enjoy the music,

Rob

One of the great rewards for becoming a skillful guitar player is being able to sit down with a total stranger at a campfire, bus stop, wherever—and make music. I recently had an experience like this leading a singalong up at Diablo Lake, Washington. The other guitarist in our group, who I’d never met until that night, just sat down next to me as I took my guitar out, and when I gave him a chance to play a solo halfway through “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” he launched into a gorgeous cascade of notes, as if he were inspired by the Milky Way stretched over our heads.

While he played beautifully, I had a hard time following him when it was his turn to play a song. He never made eye contact, and it wasn’t until halfway through an instrumental verse that I realized he’d wanted me to play a solo. Playing with him reminded me that even some expert musicians don’t learn the basics of communicating with other players. So here are some tips for leading other musicians. We’ll call them…

Five Campfire Courtesies

1. Choose an appropriate song

If you want to play with other people, choose a song within their ability. 12-bar blues is a great common denominator. And there are hundreds of great folk and rock songs that just require three or four chords.

2. Prep ‘em

Most songs, even if they’re simple, have something funky about them—an extra beat at the end of the bridge, a really quiet second verse, etc., and most musicians appreciate a heads-up before you start.

Along those lines, unless they’re obviously competent soloists, it’s nice to ask people if they want to solo before you start the song. I can’t count the times I’ve mortified a non-improvisationally-inclined jamming buddy by ambushing them with a “Take it away, Jenny!”

3. Call out the solos

This technique is ubiquitous in bluegrass circles, but appears to be unknown by almost everyone else. Which isn’t surprising: If you were only raised on rock, you’d assume that band members only communicated by telepathy—they rarely talk to one another during a song. That’s because they at least have the structure of the improvised parts planned out beforehand (who will solo, and how long it’ll be). But to jam with people, you need to play more like bluegrass musicians, even if you’re sitting around a Duraflame log swilling 40’s and playing AC/DC covers. Listen to live bluegrass, and you’ll hear things like, “Let’s hear some of that gee-tar!” and “How about a little harmonica now?”

4. Give ‘em “The Look”

The Look is the universal signal for “I’m done with my solo” and “This song’s about to end”. You’d think it’d be easy to give people an unambiguous facial expression, but often people think they’re giving me The Look when in fact they look like they’re really getting into their solo, or they have gas. So how do you do it? Simple. Raise your eyebrows.

5. Kill it with a swing of your axe

This helps everyone to end the song at the same time, especially if the song ends with a ritard (a gradual slow-down). Right before the last chord, raise the headstock of your guitar, bringing it back down as you strum the final chord.

All this talk of campfire singalongs reminds me of what a great instrument the guitar is. It’s portable enough to strap on your back, and it provides beautiful accompaniment for the human voice. And this reminds me of my favorite Far Side cartoon. A group of cowboys is sitting around the campfire. One cowpoke turns to his buddy and says, “Hey Hank, why don’t you pull that thing out and play us a tune?” Sticking out of Hank’s impossibly-stretched-out back pocket is a grand piano.

In the last newsletter, I showed you how you can play a I - IV - V song in five different keys. Today I’d like to introduce you to the four other members of a chord family. At the end of this lesson, you should be ready to transpose a simple song into a different key.

But first, a song I wrote to the tune of “Theme From The Brady Bunch”:

Here’s a story
of a pop ditty
whose chorus used three bright and cheerful chords.
They were named I, IV, and V,
and in their future,
they saw some Grammy awards.

Still, the chorus
woulda bored us
But for the minor ii - iii - vi chords in the verse
They were darker-sounding chords,
and with this contrast,
the song was better, not worse.

Now there was one more chord added to this ditty
By an overpaid producer named Henri.
It was called the vii chord and sounded jazzy,
And it doomed the ditty to obscurity.

Obscurity!

Obscurity!

That’s the way to guarantee obscurity!*

*Unless your name is Paul Simon

As you’ve gathered, there are seven total chords in a given chord family. For run-of-the-mill popular songs (in a major key using non-jazzy chords), these are the seven chords:

I - ii - iii - IV - V - vi - vii°

And here’s how to decode the roman numerals:
Capitalized = Major
Lower-case = Minor
Lower-case with a ° = Diminished

Your life will be easier if you take a moment to memorize this pattern. I often think of music in terms of colors, so try this: The I, IV, and V chords are major. They’re the blond girls in the chord family—like Marcia, Jan, and Cindy in the Brady Bunch. The other chords are minor, represented by the dark-haired boys. I know, I know, hair color has no bearing on personality. Sheesh, I’m just trying to teach a little music theory here….

This leaves the vii° chord, the oddball of the family. Remember Cousin Oliver, the little kid who came in for the last season of The Brady Bunch to boost ratings? He was cute but didn’t quite fit. Likewise, the diminished chord, with its dissonant, jazzy sound, doesn’t fit in most straightforward rock and folk songs (not to diminish diminished chords—they’re common in blues and jazz, and many songwriters use them beautifully).

So to review, say this aloud a few times: “One, major. Two and three, minor. Four and five, major. Six, minor. Seven, Oliver. I mean, diminished.”

Now that you’ve memorized that pattern, figure out the seven chords in the key of C chord family. To do this, just run up the C major scale (C, D, E, F, G, A, B), turning each note into a chord. You should get:

C, Dm, Em, F, G, Am, Bdim.

Now let’s try the key of G. This is little tricky, because once you deviate from the key of C, you need to know what “sharps” or “flats” are in your scale. For instance, in the key of G, you have an F#, not an F. Knowing this, can you figure out the chord family for the key of G?

G, Am, Bm, C, D, Em, F#dim.

There’s a trick to memorizing the sharps and flats in all keys, and also an amazing little diagram called the Circle of Fifths that does it for you, but both of these are beyond the scope of this newsletter, so here’s a chart of the major scales in all keys (as a .pdf if you want to print, and here if you don’t). Read left to right.

Ready to try a practice activity?

Print out one of the following songs from my website. They’re all in the key of G. Next to each chord, write the roman numeral identifying the role that chord plays in the chord family. For example, you’re going to write “IV” next to all the C chords. Then choose a new key from the five most common guitar keys (C,A,G,E, or D), and transpose the song (change its key). Use that major scale chart to help you. For instance, if you wanted to change to the key of A, you’d write “D” next to all C chords, because D is the IV chord in the key of A. Now play the song in its new key to confirm you did it right.

“Blowin’ in the Wind” by Bob Dylan
“Brown Eyed Girl” by Van Morrison
“Island in the Sun” by Weezer
“Out on the Weekend” by Neil Young

Hungry for more? Try writing a song by picking a key (C and G are easiest) and using chords in that key’s family. It often sounds good to use primarily I, IV, and V chords, with an occasional minor chord thrown in to balance out the sweetness. There are no hard rules in songwriting of course—if you feel so compelled, start your masterpiece with a diminished chord. I’m sure Henri will be very impressed.