Saturday, February 25, 2006
Open-D Tuned Guitar - How I Got There
My repertoire of songs is 300+ and they are all played in open-D tuning. I've played this way (almost) exclusively for over 20 years.
Virtual ineptitude on guitar led me to where I eventually got. As with most good things in life, it happened largely by chance.
A perpetual neophyte on guitar, I had switched to horns and then bass from my pre-teen years through to my early twenties, always with an eye to the axe sitting, unused, in the corner of the rec room.
Playing bass in a band around 1984, I was advised by the guitarist that he couldn't duplicate the solo in the Stones' Hang Fire, because the guitars were tuned differently. To that point I only had a vague knowledge that guitars could be tuned differently.
Out came the guitar magazines. Sure enough, Keith Richards did play in alternate tunings - a lot. Thus I came along an article describing how he had been experimenting open-D tuning, acoustic guitars and cassette tape recorders, around 1968. Legend had it that this was how Jumpin' Jack Flash born, and Street Fighting Man.
Open-D tuning?
A re-tune of the guitar in the corner was in order. I found it (it wasn't that difficult, being that the D and A string stay right where they are). I strummed it.
The lightbulb, as they say, came on.
I had been strumming in standard tuning for long enough. But to strum this way - pow! There was the opening chord of Street Fighting Man! A two finger manipulation (I got the wrong one at first, but I learned) and pow! There was the progression - that classic Stones I-IV progression.
From there, rather than a lightbulb coming on, it was more like a series of Christmas minilights, igniting one after the other. An E chord played with one finger. A G chord played with one finger. An A chord played with one finger (whoa! A to open D - there's another I-IV). So on, and so forth, until I hit that B with one finger. Boy, did that sound familiar. More fritzing, then bang! B, E, A, one after another, all on one finger - there it was, Jumpin Jack Flash (sounding its best with guitar slung around knee-level). It was only hop and a skip from there to discover the only real way to play Elmore James' one riff on slide (Dust My Broom et al); and from there to Bo Diddley's chop in just about any key you like.
I felt like I had just discovered the cure for the common cold. Why wasn't this information plastered on billboards across the nation?
This all happened while I was in my early twenties. It took a few more years before my confidence and chops built to the point where I could take any of it on stage. Keith Richards, for his part, never played JJF the same way again, having subsequently switched to open-G as his alternate tuning of choice. But for this aspiring guitarist, let's just say I was hooked - on open-D tuning, hook, line and sinker.
As for the 300 songs - we'll talk, I'm sure.
http://www.easierguitar.com
Virtual ineptitude on guitar led me to where I eventually got. As with most good things in life, it happened largely by chance.
A perpetual neophyte on guitar, I had switched to horns and then bass from my pre-teen years through to my early twenties, always with an eye to the axe sitting, unused, in the corner of the rec room.
Playing bass in a band around 1984, I was advised by the guitarist that he couldn't duplicate the solo in the Stones' Hang Fire, because the guitars were tuned differently. To that point I only had a vague knowledge that guitars could be tuned differently.
Out came the guitar magazines. Sure enough, Keith Richards did play in alternate tunings - a lot. Thus I came along an article describing how he had been experimenting open-D tuning, acoustic guitars and cassette tape recorders, around 1968. Legend had it that this was how Jumpin' Jack Flash born, and Street Fighting Man.
Open-D tuning?
A re-tune of the guitar in the corner was in order. I found it (it wasn't that difficult, being that the D and A string stay right where they are). I strummed it.
The lightbulb, as they say, came on.
I had been strumming in standard tuning for long enough. But to strum this way - pow! There was the opening chord of Street Fighting Man! A two finger manipulation (I got the wrong one at first, but I learned) and pow! There was the progression - that classic Stones I-IV progression.
From there, rather than a lightbulb coming on, it was more like a series of Christmas minilights, igniting one after the other. An E chord played with one finger. A G chord played with one finger. An A chord played with one finger (whoa! A to open D - there's another I-IV). So on, and so forth, until I hit that B with one finger. Boy, did that sound familiar. More fritzing, then bang! B, E, A, one after another, all on one finger - there it was, Jumpin Jack Flash (sounding its best with guitar slung around knee-level). It was only hop and a skip from there to discover the only real way to play Elmore James' one riff on slide (Dust My Broom et al); and from there to Bo Diddley's chop in just about any key you like.
I felt like I had just discovered the cure for the common cold. Why wasn't this information plastered on billboards across the nation?
This all happened while I was in my early twenties. It took a few more years before my confidence and chops built to the point where I could take any of it on stage. Keith Richards, for his part, never played JJF the same way again, having subsequently switched to open-G as his alternate tuning of choice. But for this aspiring guitarist, let's just say I was hooked - on open-D tuning, hook, line and sinker.
As for the 300 songs - we'll talk, I'm sure.
http://www.easierguitar.com
