Mind the weather - 10 tips for guitar maintenance.

Today's article is to be short and sweet. Just ten little tips that one should bare in mind with regards to their instruments:


1. Don't leave your guitar in a hot car. They are mostly held together with a type of glue that softens when heated. Furthermore, wood sweats, dries out, stiffens and cracks when exposed to high temperatures. 


2. Do have your guitar checked out by a qualified technician from time to time. You might not know what to look for, but a technician will easily be able to identify impending disasters, and recommend an out before they come about. 


3. Don't allow your guitar to stand in a place that is too humid. What is too humid. 50 percent relative humidity is ideal. That is to say, the humidity of a nice autumn day in Johannesburg. This does pose a problem to people living in humid places like Durban, and dry places like the Northwestern province. Joburg winters can also be fiercely dry. The expensive solution is a climate controlled room the likes of which not even many guitar stores have. A more moderately priced solution is simple. Keep the instrument in it's case. If it's wet out, vacuum the case now and then to remove moisture. If it's dry out, keep it in it's case with a guitar humidifier hanging between the strings. 

4. Guitars are a bit like creatures of the night, and don't like the sun much. See point one.


5. There are certain things that it is unwise to play with. Truss-rods are one of those things. The truss-rod is a metal rod that runs along the inside of most steel-string guitar necks, and some nylons. Tightening on this rod by means of the correctly sized wrench causes if to pull back, and loosening it relieves it, allowing it to bow more. When your guitar is very buzzy when you are fretting at the first four or five frets, it probably means the neck is bent too far back. Buzziness in the middle frets I.e.: 5 to say 10 often means it is too lose. This is not the rule, as uneven frets and bad technique also contribute to buzziness. Sometimes, truss-rods are ill-effective and when manipulated, might be entitled to break or become stripped. Having a new truss-rod made up and installed is very expensive, and in most cases, it would be better to simply buy another guitar. Again, it is wise to take your guitar to a qualified technician. He'll know what to do. 


6. Every four months or so, it's a good idea to get your (rosewood or ebony) fret-board oiled. The oil used by most is pure boiled linseed oil. Don't rush out to your corner hardware store for some of that now. You'll find that most bottles with labels reading 'pure boiled linseed oil' are lying through their teeth. They mix the stuff with motor oil. Motor oil should never have anything to do with wood. Some people use Lemon oil. I like Linseed oil. Oiling the fret-board of your guitar stops it from drying out and cracking, and gives you a chance to clean all the old finger muck. Use very fine steel-wool (grade 0000). Anything else is likely to scratch. Better yet, see a tech.


7. You can use furniture polish to clean your guitar. I use pledge because it doesn't have any nasty chemicals in it.


8. Wipe your strings clean after you play. Sweat is corrosive, and the muck that your fingers leave behind will eat away at your frets, never-mind deaden your tone.


9. Check now and again just to be sure that all the nuts and bolts holding your guitar together are snug. Don't over-tighten then and this can lead to damage. When your guitar's volume and tone nobs start to complete 360 degree revolutions, they are warning you that soon you will have an electrical problem. Pull off the knobs, and tighten the bolts. Having tuning problems? Check that your tuning machine heads' bolts are good and snug. Does your guitar neck bolt on like a Strat? Check that it is good and tight. Rattles are often dead giveaways. Something zinging, twinging or anything like that, check you nuts and bolts. Can't find the source? Take it to a tech.
         
10. Is your guitar hard to play in the open positions, or any positions? Take it to a tech. You will be amazed what a trained hand can do do make the playing of your instrument a more enjoyable experience. 

Andrew Bird's "Tenuousness". Folk guitar and lyrical genius.

In my last article in which I presented a tab for Kermit the Frog's 'It's Not Easy Being Green' a mentioned Andrew Bird and posted a video of him doing the same song his way. Andrew Bird is a musician in the truest sense, and now that I have stripped his song 'Tenuousness' down to it's essentials and taken note of his lyrics, I have all the more respect for him. He is amazing. 


The song is very simple, and playing it serves as a good beginner's exercise in finger-picking. I have tabbed the three parts of the album version. There is also a From the Basement version that I will post the video for at the end of the article. In the From the Basement version, Bird uses a sampler and plays the whole song without deviating from the key it begins in I.e.: C. It is awesome seeing him in action. He's like a little one-man orchestra.


First, the album song.

That's the verse. Note the hammer-on from the A note to the E. 

This is the guitar part that goes with the lyric, "Love of hate acts as an axis". The bottom staff shows the traverse picking part continued, while the top is the piano line. Then it's the verse again.

And then it's "Who want's to look upon this?" And the outro.

The Lyrics:

There you have it. Learn the three parts, and stick 'em together with the words, and what you have is a lovely little campfire ditty. 

The simplicity of the song amazes me. That something so great can be so simple. It's inspiring. 

Here's the From the Basement version. Enjoy.

Kermit the Frog and Andrew Bird - It's Not Easy Being Green

My Grandad, Ellis (Red) Sutherland Dadds was awesome. He loved Jazz, Tap-dancing, white wine and Muppets. 


He had taped episode 2 of season 19 of The Muppet Show sometime in the early 80's. Peter Sellers was the special guest on that episode. That tape was my favorite thing in the whole world. I watched it again and again. I must've watched it a million times. Kermit performed this song in that episode.

Kermit the frog's adorable introspective nature is well illustrated by every aspect of this beautiful song. The gentle, jazzy chord tones with their rich harmonic content played so soft and sweetly on the guitar draw me in and have always drawn me in to such an enormous degree that I've found myself compelled to score the tune and share it. I have included in the tab some of the main instrumental melodic ideas. 


At the end of the tab you'll find a video of an amazing musician - ex-fiddle player from the 90's swing phenomenon The Squirrel Nut Zippers - Andrew Bird, performing the very same tune in a different key using mainly open chords. I have not tabbed his version but if you search it on the inter-web, you should be able to find a suitable chord-sheet pretty easily. I will be taking apart a 'From the basement' version of Andrew Birds 'Tenuousness' some time next month. 


Here we go with bars 1-5

I've put in a 2 beat bar before the introductory melody. I noticed now that I failed to put in any indication of the chord over which the intro melody is played. It is an F chord. The introductory melody has a major  feel over F, and consists of the 1st (F), 3rd (A), 5th (C), 6th (D) and 7th (E) notes of F which are also the 1st (C), 2nd (D), 3rd (E), 4th (F) and 6th(A) of C major. Notice, the note B flat (the fourth of F) is omitted. Just play it for interest sake. It just sounds wrong. The harmony of this song lingers around the key of C major. 


I'd play the song using a hybrid picking style or with straight fingers to bring out the underlying melodies and harmony of the overall piece. Kermit's first line, "It's not easy being green" is sung over a Cmaj7 chord, with an easy, quarter-note rhythm  feel. Now, bars 6-10.

In bar 4 we found some little notes walking from A to B via B flat. In this section we get G walking to A through A flat. Take note of the movement created there. I've always thought that short flurries of walking notes like this make music sound more conversational. At bar 9 we get a little melody to fill the space between verse one and two. Again, the melody stays well confined in the area of C major, maintaining an Ionian feel. The verse then repeats until bar 20. Then we get the middle 8, starting at bar 20 on a B flat chord.

 

At bar 26, we get another pretty little melody to fill the gap where Kermit, having considered some of the several awesome things about being green, rests his voice. Notice the A flat in bar 29. 

To me, the A flat suggests a half step up from the G chord to which the melody is harmonizing for half a beat. One could play an A flat (G sharp) chord over that one note in the rhythm section. We then hold for 4 beats while Kermy finishes his pondering, and goes into the final verse. The song ends with another beautiful little melody.

I hope you enjoy the song. 


This is Andrew Bird playing the song on a boat. 

Clicking on the following URL will direct you a chord chart representing a way of playing the song that's a little more like his.


http://www.e-tabs.org/tab/kermit_the_frog/bein_green 


If you want lyrics, go here:


http://www.stlyrics.com/songs/m/muppets9423/itsnoteasybeinggreen314600.html


Cheers.

An Introduction to modes on guitar - Ionian (Major) to Mixolydian

To many aspiring jazzters, rockstars and all other style-favoring guitarists, the concept of 'modes' can seem very baffling. That's hardly surprising when one (assuming one is not yet familiar with them) opens a tutorial book and is assailed by the words Ionian, dorian, phrygian etc... Hell! These words are Alien-sounding. But in truth, these are words of Greek origin, often representing the root province from which these modes rose. 

A mode is really only a scale with certain characteristics that make it fit better with certain chords than others. They are expressive tools, and once understood, they make it a great deal easier to for one to choose the right notes to play for a given piece of music. The Jazz great and master of the CAGED system (to be addressed another time) used to say that modes were far less important to him than the question of whether the sound required was a 'major' or 'minor' sound. I would not argue with proponents of this view however, apart from forming a guideline as to what to play over major and minor chords, modes also encompass characters that sit nicely with different chord types, for example, the Locrian mode suits diminished chord tones very well. 

Today I am writing about the Mixolydian mode and how it relates to a C Major scale. I am doing this as an introduction to the topic because a) It's the most popular scale to use in rock'n'roll music and it's parent forms and b) It is exquisitely simple to remember what makes it what it is, and to apply it. It has a major key sound and fits very well over a C7 chord.

I have chosen to relate it to C major because C major has no sharps or flats. It goes C,D,E,F,G,A,B and finally, C again to complete one octave. Tabbed on one string it appears thus:

If you play it for yourself you see that the first step from C is a whole step (two frets up), the second, likewise is a whole step, and the third is a half step (only one fret up). That is followed by another three whole steps, and finally, and half-step to complete the octave. This is the formula for a Major (or Ionian) scale. 

W, W, H, W, W, W, H 

Numerically, counting the first C note as 1, the major scale goes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. This sequence never changes in the case of the major scale.

1 is always the root. 

2 is always a full-step from the root. Whole (W)

3 is always a full step from 2. Whole (W)

4 is always a half-step from 3. Half (H)

5 is always a full-step from 4. Whole (H)

6 is always a full step from 5. Whole (H)

7 is always a full step from 6 (Whole) (W) and finally,

8 is always a half step from 7. Half (H)

For now, you should cement that good and proper, because all of the other modes are relative in practice to that scale.

Now, a C Mixolydian scale is the same as that but for one note. That note is the 7th note of the scale. The 7th note of the Mixolydian scale is flattened a half step making it:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, flat 7 (-7), 8

To demonstrate in tab:

 Note that the seventh note of the scale a half-tone back from the seventh note of the major scale. That is what makes the Mixolydian scale what it is. In numbers it runs:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, flat 7, 8

If you're confused now, don't worry. A lot of people are confused at this point. It is only important that you remember that the major scale is numbered 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. It is the first of the  7 modes and all of the others spring from it. Continuing with the Mixolydian. Have a look at the tab below.

That is the C major (Ionian) scale played from C to C for one octave only in the 1st - open position on the guitar. 

This is the C Mixolydian scale played in the same position. Play it, and note the flattened seventh. Notice it in terms of the scale pattern as made by your hand on the fret-board, as if your fingers were covered in paint and you were leaving spots where your fingers landed.

In the following example, I have tabbed both the major and the Mixolydian scales in a second position on one staff. Again, note the patterns, as if you were leaving spots on the fret-board.

Another position. This time two octaves:

Another, again two octaves:

And finally, just for fun, an example that moves up the neck through three positions using slides from one position to another:

Sample a C7 Chord, or get a friend to jam one for you, and play over it with this scale in these positions. It works so well simply because the C7 chord as detailed above consists of a 1 (C), a 3 (E), a 5 (G) and a flattened 7 (B flat). C7 again:

Now, all that's left to you is to internalize these patterns. Once you've done that, try shifting it all up half a step to C sharp. Then to D and so on. So long as the pattern made by your hand remains the same you'll be playing in the same mode. You will find that, over a normal C chord, the Major Scale will sound good. Over the C7, the Mixolydian is perfect. 

Next time I write on this subject, I will be detailing further how all the Modes relate to the first mode - the Ionian - and I will be providing scale exercises for the next easiest mode to internalize - this time with a minor feel - the Dorian.

Cheers.

G&L Guitars are here, and they are killer!

Tuerk Music Technologies has recently become the South African, registered importer of G&L Musical Instruments. I was fortunate enough to get my hands on some of their Tribute Series models and check them out, and have been phenomenally impressed with the quality of these very affordable instruments, so much so, that I simply cannot help writing about them.


One cannot really write about G&L without firstly venturing a little into the history of G&L's late founder Leo Fender. Leo Fender's inventions arguably form the tap-root of the modern, solid-body electric guitar industry.


I defy you to show me a guitar player who doesn't know Fender. You show me a guitarist without respect for the Telecaster or the Stratocaster, and I will easily prove that guitarist to be a total muppet, or at least, a wax-sculpture.

Leo Fender realized the Fender Telecaster (originally Broadcaster) in 1951. It was the first mass-produced Solid Body Electric-Spanish guitar that the world ever knew. He went on to develop the Stratocaster in 1954. He also created the famous Precision and Jazz basses, and some of the finest guitar amps the world has ever seen. Do I need to list the names of some of the great Fender players to have rocked the Music-World's timeline? Hendrix, Blackmore, Clapton, Marvin, Malmsteen, Cobain, Harrison... The list goes on and on.


Owing to poor health, Mr Fender sold his guitar manufacturing company to CBS in 1965. He took his mind with him however, and in the 1970's, designed and produced instruments for Music Man. When relations between he and Music Man began to sour, Leo Fender and his long-time associate George Fullerton formed G&L (George and Leo) to keep the machine rolling. Leo Fender reported in a print advertisement for G&L that G&L guitars were, "the best instruments [he] had ever made."


G&L's production lines have always been limited somewhat. Because of that, G&L have always had the ability to built a range of custom instruments to various specifications. Owing to this fact, and of course the ridiculously high quality the instruments, G&L guitars and basses are highly regarded by musicians and collectors the world over.


In 2003, G&L launched their Tribute Series as a more affordable alternative to the American built instruments. The instruments in this series were built in Korea to G&L specs using pickups developed in the G&L factory and mostly foreign-made hardware. As I stated in my introductory paragraph to this article, I simply cannot help but sing their praises. Relative to the price, these instruments are awesome.


Although the hardware is manufactured outside of the G&L factory, it's still pretty dang good. The ASAT (Tele) models come with a set of six, easy intoning brass saddles set in a steel bridge, Basswood or Swamp-ash bodies, 18:1 ratio sealed-back tuners, American-made, Fullerton designed, magnetic-field single-coil pickups and beautiful hard-rock maple or rosewood fingerboards.

I also had the pleasure of playing a G&L Legacy. This to all intents and purposes, is a Strat, and Strat-type guitars are my favorite. This guitar blew my mind from the moment I struck my first chord on it. It rang like a bell, and had a great-deal more sustain than one comes to expect from a Strat, much less one in THIS price-range. Where it differs from the ASAT is obviously in the bridge (G&L Dual-Fulcrum Vibrato with die-cast saddles), it has a five-way switch (as opposed to the ASAT 3 way) and 3 Fullerton-made Alnico V single-coil pickups.

&L Dual Fulcrum vibrato with nickel plated die-cast sa
ddles 
When plugged into an amplifier, the ASAT has a much hotter sound than the Legacy, the Legacies Alnico V's being somewhat closer in spec to the pre-CBS fender sound. Still, as any Strat player would most likely agree, crank the thing right up to 11 and ears will bleed joyously. It's as sweet sounding as any sonic ice-cream, and is smothered in audio-fudge. 


All of that being said, one must remember that these are not the American model G&L's. The Tribute Series instruments do have some rough edges, but that is nothing that a half-decent Luthier couldn't sort-out with a file, a bit of sand-paper, a measure of patience and an hour or so. At the price that these instruments are fetching, one can easily justify a few hundred Rands spent on a mild setup. Once that is out of the way, you'll have an instrument worth faaaaaar more than it's weight in gold.


Now, onto the American model G&L's. They landed in South Africa a week or two ago and so far, I've only had a gander at them. To be truthful, they were so beautiful, framed up in their high quality cases in the warehouse at Tuerk Music, I could hardly bring myself to sully them with my sweaty fingers. Sadly, I was too pressed for time that day to get over my guitar-geek anxiety and really pick one up and get into it, and it's probably better. Those guitars are special. They are like exquisite virgins, just waiting to be owned by someone who will love them wholly. I spoke to Mike, the man in charge of the guitar department at Tuerk, and asked him to tell me a little about their G&L range of guitars.


Mike: There are Indonesian ones, the Tribute Series, they make replicas of the American models using the American Pickups, the exact same pickups. The difference would be in the electronics and the hardware, which is designed after the fashion of the American stuff. Other differences would be that generally they have three piece bodies as opposed to the one or two-piece bodies of the American models. Generally, with the clear finishes (which are 2K acrylic) you'll get an ash body and with the opaque finishes a basswood body. They also do a full range of basses, the L2000's, the L2500's, the SB2's, and then on the guitar side there are the ASAT classics, the ASAT specials, the Bluesboys, the Legacies, the S500's and Commanches. You don't have any custom options in the case of the Tributes which is also obviously where the price comes down. 
With the American ones, all the basic models are completely customisable so you can order the ASAT classic S  which is basically a Tele type but with a middle pickup, a cutaway for your arm and a rib-cage contour which is pretty cool, and a series switch so you can run all three pickups in series. You can order a standard model with a rib-cage contour with a Bigsby if you want too. You can order for the body to be hollow. Lot and lots of options available and made to order. They are not ordinary production-line guitars. We tell them exactly what we want down to the last detail in terms of neck-profiles, machine-heads, bridges. If you wanted, you could even order a guitar with active EMG pickups, although I'm not sure why you would wanna do that, but you can. 
The guitars are also run through a Plek machine, so they are precision setup and the fret-work is very very good. The pickups are all made in their factory in california except when you're looking at Seymour Duncans or EMG's and the bridges and tuners are all made by Schaller and you can specify locking or non-locking. They also all come with GNG hard-shell cases. They're the original hard-shell cases, they used to make cases for Fender. Obviously great quality cases. They all come with authenticity certificates signed personally by Phyllis Fender [Leo Fenders Wife and honorary chairperson of G&L] to show you just how real it is. They're all made in Fullerton California at the original Music Man factory. 
As far as a brand is concerned, I'd put them up there with the Fender Custom Shop in terms of the level of quality and the types of pickups they are using. There is a lot more past that though. If you order a custom you don't have to wait a year. You can order one now and have it in eight weeks at exactly the spec you want. 


Me: What's kind of response have the guitars gotten since they landed in South Africa?


Mike: The response is very positive, in fact, there is a high-end guitar dealer in Cape Town, a guy called Guitar Experience who only does Custom Shop Fenders, Custom Shop Martins, old, vintage guitars and boutique brands. He bought a couple of ASATs the other day and he was telling me, and I asked if I could quote him, he's telling me that the pickups easily stand up to anything that comes out of the Fender Custom Shop, and in terms of build quality, there is no Fender that is built this well, which is quite something coming from someone who only sells custom, quality guitars, so definitely, quality-wise, they're really really great. 


Me: Thanks Mike.

                                       __________________________________________

If you are in South Africa and are interested in G&L guitars, and would like to check them out for yourself, you can start following the following links:


http://www.tuerkmusic.co.za/
http://www.glguitars.com/index.asp


or you can call Tuerk Music Technologies on 011 792 8402. 
           

Cleopatra's Cat - a 90's funk-rock masterpiece

As I wrote in my introductory article, it was largely the music of the 90's that got me wanting to play guitar in the first place. 1994 saw the release of The Spin Doctors second studio album entitles 'Turn It Upside Down' which, though wasn't the commercial hit-box that was 'Pocket Full of Kryptonite', still packed a funky karate-chop to the boogie bone. This music video posted above from 'Turn It' can, in my view, never date. Beside the beautiful Egyptian/bohemian brunette heart burners dancing about like sailor snatching sirens, the very witty lyrics and super-smooth groove, the song is packed with catchy hooks, Jeff Beckian cat-emulating wah/tremolo effects and contains a guitar solo to die for. It is a tasteful and tasty jam. I am looking to tab the solo out in it's entirety one of these days but for now I am just going to leave the songs main hook, this delicious lick here for anybody who's interested to check out. 

The tune has what is really a pretty straight beat, but the one needs to roll the notes of the lick a little to give it that swaggery swing. In the recording the guitar player Eric Schenkman picks each of the notes out using his plectrum, with a bright, lively and only-just over-driven tone dialed into his amp. It is easy to be jealous of such a tone but just remember, that guy is famous and has probably had his choice of gear over the years. 


Once again, I have used the Powertab editor to score this. I featured a link to it in my previous blog. One could probably find Cleopatra's Cat fully tabbed in the Tab Library. 


Keep it surreal.

A great campfire song (if you can remember the words.)

This made me hoot. It has a great and very simple riff to it, a bluesy run of notes around A minor, D and E or even G. I bet that if anyone were to bring this out at a braai they'd have an audience struggling for breath. Just for kicks, I tabbed the main riff below.

You just play it over and over again, like a boss.


I tabbed that out using the Powertab Editor. If you don't have The Powertab Editor, and are looking for a tidy, free way to tab out songs, then go to the link below. The file is tiny. Thereafter you can go to the other link below and download just about any tab you could ever want. The editor even has cheap midi playback capability. 


http://www.power-tab.net/guitar.php
http://www.tablibrary.com/

Those are sites to visit.


Cheers.

Welcome to My Blog

My first guitar was a Yamaha FG300 that my father had bought in the early 70s and handed down to me in the early 90s. I must have been around 10 years old then and, believe me when I tell you, I would have packed it in very quickly if it hadn't been for all the great guitar bands that I was privileged to know about. The guitar had a warped soundboard and an action (height of the strings relative to the fingerboard) that you could park a truck under. Still, I would huddle over it for hour a day like a safe-cracker picking a lock, figuring out the melodies to my favorite songs . I improved steadily and eventually won a few talent shows but it was only when I got my first electric guitar, a pitch black Japanese Fender Stratocaster and went to college to study music that I really saw what it was all about.  The relationships between the notes, the formulae, keys, scales and of course round the clock practice enhanced my understanding of music as well as my creativity. I've heard people say things to the effect of, "I don't want to learn music theory/go to school to learn music because it'll hamper my creativity". The truth is quite the contrary. Working hard to strengthen hands and fingers while contemplating the relationships between the multitudes of musical participles makes a musician more spontaneous, and therefore more creative, in the same way that a writer's knowledge of  language paves the way for he or she to properly express his or her ideas.


Then there is another matter. The condition and quality of an instrument. In my six years working in a busy guitar and general strings instrument workshop I've seen instruments of all shapes, sizes and in conditions that made the instruments at times difficult to play if not simply unplayable. Nevertheless, it has seldom happened that I have returned an instrument to it's owner without gaining the pleasure of knowing that he or she will derive massive enjoyment from it relative to that which was before derived. I shudder to think how much ground I could have covered on that badly set up old Yamaha if I'd only known a quarter of what I know now regarding repairs and setup of guitars.


If you want to learn to play an instrument, it must be because you love music. The love of music is enough to keep you working out those tunes, but the easier it is to play the instrument, the more you know about the instrument, and the more you understand about the art that is music, the more of a joy it will be to you.


I am currently teaching and repairing in Johannesburg. Students who visit me not only learn how to play guitar, but also learn how to maintain and care for it. Feel free to email me for more information.


I will also be using this blog as a way to share my music related joys and woes with you, as well as some choice tutorial videos that I am making and some videos by other folk too. I will also be posting links to other very cool guitar and music related sites.


Keep those fingers picking.