The Open-D Tuning Guitar Spot

Most guitar sites I visit treat alternate tunings as a pleasant, but relatively insignificant sidebar. Lest anyone be misled into believing the myth (that alternate guitar tunings are strictly a one-off specialty item), here are some potential songs and genres I play in open-D tuning.

First and foremost, I should clarify – I am primarily an electric guitarist, who plays almost exclusively in open-D tuning (D A D F# A D). I do come from the school of thought, however, which states guitar chops should be built on acoustic guitar. Thus, I do one heck of a lot of practicing on acoustic guitar. Most of my experimentation on alternate tunings, therefore, comes on acoustic guitar.

All joking aside, open-D is a fantastic medium for rhythm guitar in polka music (stop snickering). During my (profitable) years as a sideman (all you starving artists), I played a considerable amount of rhythm guitar, often in oom-pah bands. As I was still discovering the miracle of open-D tuning, I did many gigs in standard (E A D G B E) tuning, struggling with the changes, memorizing rather than feeling the song structures. Somewhere along the way, once I’d felt confident enough, I tried the switch, to open-D tuning. I never looked back. Once my left had was freed from constraining finger positions and difficult chord transitions, I was able to concentrate on my right had stylings. Believe it or not, in polka music, rhythm guitar is an art, and one I never quite had the hang of, until I finally flipped over to open-D. By simplifying the left hand work, my right hand got more subtle, and my strokes developed more variety. I was even able to develop a greater range of chord fingerings, away from the typical I-V7 most polka players use. End result: a much more varied sound, embellished even more by the fact that with open-D tuning, you can reduce or add the number of strings you hold down (with one finger on a mjor chord) at will, from as few as three strings to all six strings.

Admittedly, this (polka) intro to the advantages of open-D might sound off-putting to a long-haired rocker or spiky-headed punk. Believe it or not, though, stroking polka rhythms is just a hair away from much rock rhythm guitar. The closest of all genres to polka guitar strumming has to be ska music. The um-cha um-cha um-cha pulse of that jittery proto-reggae style can be beautifully captured in open-D tuning. Red Red Wine, the old Neil Diamond classic, as done up by UB40 is a perfect example of a song I play this way. Another is a ska’d up version of Bob Dylan’s It Ain’t Me Babe. Just listen in your head for that um-cha um-cha to the I-IV-V pattern of the song.

If the offbeat just isn’t your thing, consider how you can rock out with that DAD bottom of open-D tuning. That full grind (distortion on or not) simply cannot be done better than in open-D. Ask any drop-D tuning fan. Only in open-D, you have the rest of the chord to throw in also (in major keys) without any bum notes dropping in by accident. The Chuck Berry chug of Johnny B. Goode and so many other rock ‘n’ roll songs, alternating between the V and the VI on the low end, is dramatically simplified from how it has to be fingered in standard tuning (something I never got). The move is one finger, two frets up. That’s it. Drop that little movement and you’re back to a typical hard rock eighth note riff, with just on finger on the fret board. Any tempo sounds great, from dead slow to hyper speed punked. Plus, you can duplicate the motion on your other A string (second highest), for a different but equally pleasing texture.

Moving back into the realm of off-beat playing, one that I’ve found which sounds simply terrific is the swinging offbeat shuffle. This is simply stroking chords on the off-beat, to a swinging beat, with a walking bass line. There’s a whole encyclopedia of potential material and songs here, from swing, to blues to country. Think of Pride & Joy by Stevie Ray Vaughan (without all the amazing lead fills – we’re talking about me playing here); Caledonia by Big Joe Turner, Guitars, Cadillacs, by Dwight Yoakam, you name the swingin’ song and tempo – open-D tuning sounds fantastic as an accompaniment. Jazzing it up means adding a finger two frets up on the A string to create a major sixth (e.g. G6). What you're doing, to terrific effect, is emulating the pumping sound of boogie-woogie piano, on your guitar.

These are just some of the styles and songs I play in open-D. That’s not to mention the Rolling Stones stuff, the Chicago Blues, the slide (e.g. Elmore James), and so many more. Blues stylings alone in open-D could be the topic of a whole article to itself.

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