Acoustic Guitar 275.pdf

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PETE HUTTLINGER | JUDY COLLINS | SEAN WATKINS | HAPPY TRAUM

NOVEMBER 2015 | ACOUSTICGUITAR.COM

CHRIS CORNELL GRUNGE GOD UNPLUGGED!

INSIDE STAGE & STUDIO HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE

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www.elixirstrings.com/phosbronze *Elixir Strings player survey GORE, ELIXIR, NANOWEB, POLYWEB, GREAT TONE · LONG LIFE, “e” icon, and other designs are trademarks of W. L. Gore & Associates. ©2015 W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc.

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JOEY LUSTERMAN

CONTENTS

‘Before the Watkins Family Hour, I considered myself strictly a bluegrass guitarist. The show’s been a gateway into whole other scenes of music—rock, jazz, and more— for me.’ SEAN WATKINS, P. 22

Features 18 Happy Trails Happy Traum taps his roots on new album By Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers

22 Live from Largo The Watkins Family Hour brings together bluegrass greats and the LA music elite By Adam Perlmutter

Special Focus Nylon Strings, No Limits 38 Metal Flamenco Ben Woods explores the marriage of two genres

By Whitney Phaneuf

10 From the Home Office 32 Holiday Gift Guide 88 Marketplace 89 Ad Index

By Pat Moran

40 A Feel for Nylon Jeremy Bass blends classical, bossa nova, and folk By Kenny Berkowitz

28 Seeking Higher Truth Chris Cornell unplugs and finds his voice as a singer-songwriter

Miscellany

44 World Beat Lawson Rollins is a musical tour guide By Kenny Berkowitz

November 2015 Volume 26, No. 5, Issue 275 On the Cover Chris Cornell Photographer Andrew Stuart

AcousticGuitar.com 5

CONTENTS Phoenix Nylon-String OM, p. 76

NEWS 13 The Beat Judy Collins on living a life in song; Hank Williams biopic; new docs focus on Wrecking Crew and Elliott Smith; Eagles and Carole King honored PLAY 47 Here’s How Bouncing back from an injury or illness 51 The Basics Improve your accompanying skills 55 Weekly Workout Versatile chord shapes offer a break from barre-hopping Songs to Play 62 Fearless A dreamy Pink Floyd flight 66 Midnight Moonlight Peter Rowan’s spry bluegrass romp 68 Checkers & Chess Billy Joe Shaver gets the acoustic treatment AG TRADE 71 Shoptalk Sturgill Simpson’s new Martin dread; Santa Cruz Guitar Co.’s new strings; fresh imports for the US market

6 November 2015

74 Guitar Guru Do vintage guitars live up to their reputation? 76 Review: Phoenix Guitar Company’s Nylon String OM The 25th-anniversary edition dazzles and delights 78 Review: Recording King Harmonella Single 0 A modern spin on a vintage vibe 80 Review: Grace Design Felix Preamp Feature-rich box delivers studio-quality sound 90 Great Acoustics A handmade Guy Clark flamenco-style nylon-string MIXED MEDIA 83 Playlist The Dave Rawlings Machine returns with Nashville Obsolete; also, Tommy Emmanuel’s It’s Never Too Late, Richard Thompson’s Still, Bobby Long’s Ode to Thinking, Lowell Levinger’s Get Together: Banana Recalls Youngbloods Classics, and the 20th anniversary of Corey Harris’ Between Midnight and Day

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In the Studio: Jackie Greene Enjoy a recent Acoustic Guitar Session episode with blues/rock guitarist Jackie Greene. Watch Greene perform his new song “Light Up Your Window” and talk about his guitars and his new album, Back to Birth. Visit acousticguitar.com/sessions to check out interviews with and performances by Richard Thompson, Ani DiFranco, Seth Avett, Peter Rowan, Della Mae, Bruce Cockburn, Valerie June, Julian Lage, Eliza Gilkyson, Preston Reed, and many others. SAVE BIG ON VIDEO LESSONS, SONGBOOKS & MORE Every Friday at 12PM, AG sends a special Acoustic Guitar Deal to thousands of guitarists like you. Recent Deals include $20 off Fingerstyle Jazz Guitar Essentials, 70 percent off Acoustic Rock Basics, and the ever-popular Acoustic Guitar Owner’s Manual is on sale for just $14. acousticguitar.com/deals GET ‘ACOUSTIC GUITAR’ IN YOUR E-MAIL INBOX Sign up for Acoustic Guitar Notes and receive articles and videos that will help you improve your playing and stay connected to the acoustic-guitar world. acousticguitar.com/acoustic-guitar-notes 8 November 2015

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FROM THE HOME OFFICE Chris Cornell

AcousticGuitar.com • AcousticGuitarU.com

CONTENT DEVELOPMENT Editorial Director & Editor Greg Cahill Editor at Large Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers Managing Editor Blair Jackson Senior Editor Marc Greilsamer Associate Editor Whitney Phaneuf Copy Editor Anna Pulley Production Manager Hugh O’Connor Contributing Editors Kenny Berkowitz, David Hamburger, Steve James, Orville Johnson, Richard Johnston, Sean McGowan, Jane Miller, Greg Olwell, Adam Perlmutter, Rick Turner, Doug Young

CREATIVE SERVICES Creative Director Joey Lusterman Senior Designer Brad Amorosino

INTERACTIVE SERVICES Interactive Services Director Lyzy Lusterman Creative Content Coordinator Tricia Baxter Community Relations Coordinator Courtnee Rhone Single Copy Sales Consultant Tom Ferruggia

MARKETING SERVICES Sales Director Cindi Kazarian Sales Managers Ref Sanchez, Greg Sutton Marketing Services Manager Tanya Gonzalez

Stringletter.com Publisher David A. Lusterman

he stylistic diversity of the acoustic-guitar scene is nothing short of amazing. This issue is proof of that. For our cover story, AG associate editor Whitney Phaneuf interviewed former grunge demigod Chris Cornell about his new acousticrock album. I had a chance to chat with folk guitarist and singer Judy Collins about her new duets CD. AG editor-at-large Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers sat down with the legendary bluesand folk-guitarist Happy Traum to discuss his first album in a decade. And contributing editor Adam Perlmutter delivered a dispatch from Largo at the Coronet, the theater-club located deep in the heart of LA’s trendy Silver Lake District, where Nickel Creek guitarist Sean Watkins, and his fiddler sister Sara, host the occasional bluegrass showcase the Watkins Family Hour, a project the siblings took on the road this summer.

T

The nylon-string special section features a trio of artists—Ben Woods, Jeremy Bass, and Lawson Rollins—all classically trained players who are stretching the boundaries of music not always associated with nylon-string guitars. Elsewhere, you’ll find three songs—Pink Floyd’s overlooked rock song “Fearless,” Peter Rowan’s progressive-bluegrass standard “Midnight Moonlight,” and an acoustic arrangement of Billy Joe Shaver’s “Checkers & Chess,” perfect for practicing picking and strumming—as well as reviews of new CDs by acoustic-guitar phenom Tommy Emmanual and the Dave Rawlings Machine, and a look back at key recordings from the 1990’s country-blues revival. There also are guitar and gear reviews, a crash course on better barre chords, and tips on improving your rhythm chops. Play on! —Greg Cahill

DISTRIBUTED to the music trade by Hal Leonard Corporation (800-554-0626, [email protected]) GOT A QUESTION or comment for Acoustic Guitar’s editors? Send e-mail to [email protected]

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10 November 2015

Except where otherwise noted, all contents ©2015 Stringletter, David A. Lusterman, Publisher.

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The Beat A Hank Williams biopic is coming

15

The Beat New doc focuses on Elliott Smith

15

NEWS

The Beat Eagles and Carole King honored

COLLINS AND COHEN: A LEGACY INTERTWINED

THE BEAT

Amazing Grace Folk legend Judy Collins on living a life in song, and a new duets CD BY GREG CAHILL

n her 1968 Top 40 album Who Knows Where the Time Goes (Elektra), singersongwriter Judy Collins penned “My Father,” a touching tribute to her late parent. It was her father, a blind radio broadcaster, who introduced her to the American songbook and bought his then-teenage daughter her first guitar, a National, after Collins, a gifted concert pianist, became fascinated with folk music. “I worked so hard at the piano,” she recalls, during a phone interview from her home on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. “But then I ran into folk music and that changed my life. It was a recording of ‘The Gypsy Rover’ [by Leo Maguire as performed in the soundtrack to the 1954 film The Black Knight] that was the instigator of all the trouble. It had all the bells and whistles, and I had to learn it,” she says with a chuckle. Later, hearing the folk ballad “Barbara Allen,” by Jo Stafford, “sealed the deal,” she adds. “I never looked back. I had to go tell my teacher I didn’t want to play Rachmaninoff anymore.”

O

Emerging from the mid-’60s folk revival, Collins scored early hits with Joni Mitchell’s pensive ballad “Both Sides Now” and the antislavery hymn “Amazing Grace.” Her repertoire soon expanded to include pop, art songs, and show tunes. She’s closely tied to Stephen Sondheim’s “Send in the Clowns,” the swan song for a fallen lover from the Broadway musical A Little Night Music. Her 1975 recording of that melancholy missive earned Sondheim a Grammy Award for Song of the Year. Sondheim continues to play a major role in her career—joined by Don McLean, Collins reprises “Send in the Clowns” on her new album of all-star duets, Strangers Again. “The songs I identify with are the ones I’ve made my own—it’s that simple,” says Collins, 76, who sports a thick white mane, piercing blue eyes, and still-strong soprano voice. “There’s lots of music in the world, but when you decide to take [a song] into your life, you sort of take over a piece of its landscape. You own it. And I own a CONT. ON PG. 14

When Judy Collins met Leonard Cohen in 1966, as she recalled in her autobiography Judy Collins: Trust Your Heart, he sang her “Suzanne” and “Dress Rehearsal Rag”—and altered the course of both their careers. That same year, Collins recorded those two songs on her 1966 album In My Life, which went gold in 1967. Collins finally persuaded Cohen to perform his own music, arranging for his public debut at a Vietnam War protest concert in 1967 at which she shared the bill. Despite his protest that he’d “die from embarrassment,” Cohen reluctantly played “Suzanne” and the crowd loved it, as Collins promised they would. “The audience responded to his writing. The songs were like water to a person dying of thirst. They were songs for the spirit when our spirits were strained to the breaking point,” Collins wrote in her autobiography. “His songs carried me through dark years like mantras or stones that you hold in your hand while the sun rises or the fire burns. They kept me centered as I stood in front of thousands of people, my eyes closed, my hands around the neck of a guitar, my voice singing his ethereal lyrics.” Collins would go on to record dozens of Cohen songs over the course of her career, which were collected on her 2004 compilation Judy Collins Sings Leonard Cohen: Democracy. —Whitney Phaneuf AcousticGuitar.com 13

A FEW COLLINS/COHEN CLASSICS

IN MY LIFE “Suzanne” “Dress Rehearsal Rag”

THE BEAT

lot of that landscape, because I’ve recorded it, I’ve performed it, I’ve lived it. So even if I didn’t write it, it has a sense that it belongs to me because of what I’ve done with it. It puts a personal mark on it. It’s kind of magic, really.” Collins became one of the first artists to cover the works of Joni Mitchell, Randy Newman, and then-poet Leonard Cohen. “I was very impressed with Leonard’s songs—nobody had recorded them, he hadn’t even recorded them. When I heard them, I just felt that he was so brilliant and the poetry was so moving,” she explains. “He thought of them as poems and not songs. I said, ‘Oh, yes, they are songs!’” In 2008, Cohen returned the favor, recording one of Collins’ originals on Born to the Breed: A Tribute to Judy Collins, which also featured Joan Baez, Rufus Wainwright, Dolly Parton, and Shawn Colvin, among others. Despite having auctioned off part of her

guitar collection in 2013, the dreadnought remains an important part of her music— Martin Guitar archivist Dick Boak designed a pair of Collins signature models based on a vintage D-35 12-string she owned and that is her go-to guitar onstage. (Martin also released a six-string version.) How does the septuagenarian songstress— immortalized by the Crosby Stills and Nash song “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”—account for her 50-year career? “I showed up,” she says. “You know, getting what you want in life, and what you think you need, has to do with showing up. By some fortune, and certainly not my own, because I was a mixed-up kid at the time, I did what I wanted to do and I did what my heart told me to do. “You do what you’re passionate about—I’ve been passionate about my politics and my music, and those are the things that mean the most to me.”

PHOTO BY SAM EMERSON, COURTESY OF SONY PICTURES CLASSIC

WILDFLOWERS “Priests,” “Sisters of Mercy,” “Hey, That’s No Way to Say Goodbye”

WHO KNOWS WHERE THE TIMES GOES “Story of Isaac” “Bird on a Wire”

Tom Hiddleston as Hank Williams

LIVING “Famous Blue Raincoat” “Joan of Arc”

HANK WILLIAMS BIOPIC TO HIT THEATERS

BREAD AND ROSES “Take this Longing”

I Saw the Light, a movie based on the life of Hank Williams, is set to open in theaters on November 27 with Tom Hiddleston (Thor, The Avengers, Midnight in Paris) in the lead role. Williams, who died at age 29 of heart failure, created a huge body of work in his short life, penning such classics as “Your Cheatin’ Heart,” “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” and “Lovesick Blues.” Hiddleston will sing and play guitar in the film, and was coached by

14 November 2015

Rodney Crowell on how best to emulate the country legend. The decision to cast Hiddleston, a Brit, has created some ripples in the country community, with the loudest grumblings coming from Hank Williams III, who said he’d rather see Matthew McConaughey in the part. The film is based on the 1994 book Hank Williams: The Biography by Colin Escott, George Merritt, and William MacEwen. —W.P.

SPONSORED

Country Star, Jerrod Niemann has Some Great Advice for Young Musicians and Songwriters

Elliott Smith

HOME VIEWING: ‘THE WRECKING CREW’ AND ‘HEAVEN ADORES YOU’ If you’ve listened to the Beach Boys, Sonny and Cher, or the Mamas and the Papas, you’ve listened to the Wrecking Crew, a behind-thescenes group of Los Angeles studio musicians who played on some of the biggest hits of the ’60s and ’70s and helped create the West Coast sound. A new documentary, The Wrecking Crew, which is now streaming on Netflix, aims to give these artists their just due. Directed by Denny Tedesco, son of Wrecking Crew guitarist Tommy Tedesco, the documentary features interviews and session footage with Simon & Garfunkel, Brian Wilson, Cher, Nancy Sinatra, Frank Zappa, and former Wrecking Crew member Glen Campbell. The Wrecking Crew, a nickname coined by drummer Hal Blaine, anonymously laid down the instrumental tracks on dozens of hits, including “Ain’t No Woman (Like the One I Got),” “Good

Vibrations,” “California Dreamin’,” “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” “Be My Baby,” and “Mr. Tambourine Man.” Elliott Smith fans may find some closure in a new documentary about the late songwriter’s life and music. Now available on Blu-ray and DVD, Heaven Adores You: A Documentary Film About the Life and Music of Elliott Smith uses archival videos and interviews with Smith, his friends, family, and bandmates to create an intimate portrayal of a complex artist. The documentary traces Smith’s life from his childhood in Dallas, to his unexpected catapult to fame after his song “Miss Misery” received an Academy Award nomination, to his tragic death from two stab wounds to the chest at age 34. Smith’s catalogue, including various unreleased tracks, is featured heavily in the film. —W.P.

EAGLES, CAROLE KING TO RECEIVE KENNEDY CENTER HONORS The Eagles and Carole King are among six honorees who will receive 2015 Kennedy Center Honors, which recognizes an artist’s lifetime achievements and contributions to American culture. Kennedy Center Chairman David M. Rubenstein writes in a statement: “Our honorees represent the voices, soundtracks, and stories of our personal lives and memories. The music of the Eagles has endured as the quintessential American rock ’n’ roll sound for generations; Carole King’s heartfelt lyrics and tunes are woven

throughout the tapestry of American music.” Other honorees include filmmaker George Lucas, actress and singer Rita Moreno, conductor Seiji Ozawa, and actress Cicely Tyson. The awards ceremony, which will be attended by President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama, takes place on December 6 and will be broadcast on CBS on December 29. —W.P. Look for a feature on Don Henley and his new country-influenced album in our December issue.

Jerrod Niemann is one of today’s hottest country artists. In just a few short years Jerrod has released four major label albums, generated six top 40 songs, co-written three singles for the great Garth Brooks and he’s had half a dozen artists cover his songs. This Kansas born talent started writing at the age of eight and he hasn’t slowed down. “Elixir Strings simply play the smoothest and last the longest. I’ve never heard a fuller, brighter or cleaner sound out of my guitar than when strumming on Elixir Strings. Putting a set on a guitar is like giving your car a tune up. Elixir Strings bring new life to any classic.” –Jerrod Niemann

Watch the video now:

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HAPPY TRAILS

18 November 2015

Folk-guitar legend Happy Traum taps his roots on his first album in ten years By Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers

FRANCO VOGT

I

n early 1963, Happy Traum carried his guitar into Folkways Studio in New York City to record with the New World Singers, a folk group he’d joined a few months earlier. This was the young player’s first time in a professional studio, and he had some remarkable company. Among the musicians packed into the famous but cramped studio that day, along with Traum’s bandmates Gil Turner, Bob Cohen, and Delores Dixon, were Phil Ochs, Peter La Farge, the Freedom Singers, Bob Dylan, and Pete Seeger. At the session, a benefit for the protest-song publication Broadside, Dylan suggested that Traum join him for a duet of his song “Let Me Die in My Footsteps.” And the New World Singers recorded Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind”—the first version of the song to be released, months before The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan or Peter, Paul, and Mary’s breakthrough hit. (Both of these Broadside tracks can be heard on the Smithsonian Folkways box set The Best of Broadside 1962–1988.) “We all recognized that this was a song unlike anything we’d ever heard before,” Traum says of “Blowin’ in the Wind.” “You know, it’s kind of an old chestnut now, but when we first heard it, fresh off Bob’s pen practically, the originality of that song was just startling. It was staggering.” Since those auspicious early days, Traum has built a sturdy career as a musician—recording with Dylan again in 1971; performing with his late brother, Artie, and with the all-star Woodstock Mountains Revue; and doing periodic solo projects. Recently, Traum released Just for the Love of It (Happy Traum), his first new album in a decade, which he coproduced with multiinstrumentalist Larry Campbell. As the album title and the timing suggests, marketing himself as an artist has not been Traum’s primary focus over the last five decades. That’s because, as generations of roots musicians know well, Traum has devoted himself to teaching—he and his wife, Jane, have been producing music lessons through their company Homespun Tapes since 1967. (Full disclosure: I have released two video lessons on Homespun.) AcousticGuitar.com 19

HAPPY TRAUM

Happy Traum, left, and Artie Traum perform at a guitar workshop at the 1968 Newport Folk Festival.

WHAT HAPPY TRAUM PLAYS Traum’s main guitar is a sunburst Santa Cruz H-13, pictured on the cover of Just for the Love of It. Also on the album are two Veillette 12-strings, a standard and a baritone; a Paul Beard RF round-neck resonator guitar; an all-koa Froggy Bottom 12-fret 000; and an unusual Collings C10 with a cedar top and maple back and sides.

The instinct to teach, Traum says, is part of his DNA as a musician. “It’s always been for some reason part of my mental state that if I learn a song, part of my brain is saying, ‘How can I teach this to other people?’” he says. “It’s very strange—I don’t know why or where that comes from. And having done several hundred lessons with other people, I realize that many musicians never think for a second about how they’re going to teach their songs.” Traum’s special combination of talents places him in a specific lineage, according to his longtime friend and collaborator John Sebastian. “I now feel he is in the direct line with Pete Seeger,” says Sebastian, who first met Traum in the Greenwich Village folk scene of the early ’60s and then, in the ’70s, followed Traum’s example by settling in Woodstock, New York. “Both guys are entertainers with an educational side. Happy’s skills are in the tradition of Seeger and Jack Elliott and the generation that was inspired by the ’40s folksingers. Happy carries on that tradition.” 20 November 2015

ESTATE OF DAVID GAHR

He performs primarily with the Santa Cruz, equipped with a Fishman saddle pickup and sometimes run through a Fishman Loudbox amp. He uses DR coated Dragon Skin strings (light gauge), plays with a John Pearse plastic thumbpick and acrylic nails, and capos up with a G7th Newport.

OLD FAVORITES, REVISITED Traum’s path as a musician is easy to trace through the songs on his new album. The arrangement of “Careless Love Blues” that opens the album comes from the repertoire of Piedmont blues guitarist Brownie McGhee, who gave Traum occasional guitar lessons at his apartment in Harlem between 1958 and 1960 [a transcript of Traum’s arrangement was published in AG in August 2015]. “Basically Brownie’s way of teaching was to sit down in a room and play with you,” Traum recalls. “He’d start playing a song, you’d play along, and he would occasionally emphasize certain things like, ‘Oh, your thumb isn’t steady enough’ or ‘You’ve got to tap your feet while you play,’ stuff like that. And then I’d stop him—he’d take a solo of some kind and I’d say, ‘You’ve got to slow that down for me.’ But it was very informal. It wasn’t like a structured lesson—we didn’t use music or tablature or anything.”

Around seven years ago, Traum was surprised to discover forgotten tapes he’d made of some of those lessons—an early sign of the documentary and educational mission of Homespun. He had the deteriorating reel-to-reels transferred to CD and used some excerpts in his video series The Blues Guitar of Brownie McGhee. On the rendition of “Careless Love Blues” on his new CD, Traum actually fingerpicked a Gibson J-200 that was once owned by another guitar mentor of New York’s folk scene in the ’60s: Reverend Gary Davis. At the time of Traum’s recording sessions, John Sebastian was temporarily the keeper of this sweet-sounding J-200 and brought it for Traum to check out. “I was like, ‘Good: somebody who knows how to play like the Reverend,’” Sebastian says. “Let’s let him try a tune with this thing.” Elsewhere on Just for the Love of It, Traum tips his hat to Pete Seeger, one of his “major heroes,” with two songs from Seeger’s repertoire. Traum plays a swaying rendition of “Deep Blue Sea” (with Sebastian on rhythm guitar,

Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams on vocals, and David Amram on pennywhistle) and a solo version of “Sailing Down My Golden River” played on a Veillette 12-string. Traum also revisits Woody Guthrie’s “I Ain’t Got No Home,” which he recorded with the New World Singers in 1963. More than 50 years after learning the song, Traum feels he can approach it with a new kind of maturity. “The aging process—hopefully it’s like fine wine and not stinky cheese,” he says with a chuckle. “I hope it brings more depth to the songs.” THE DYLAN CONNECTION Traum’s history with Dylan also is represented on the new album, with a blues shuffle arrangement of “Crash on the Levee (Down in the Flood)” that features Adam Traum, Happy’s son, on slide guitar. This was one of the songs from the Basement Tapes period that Traum recorded with Dylan. It appeared on Greatest Hits, Vol. 2, along with “I Shall Be Released” and “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere.” In 2013, a fourth track surfaced from these sessions: the Woody Guthrie-esque “Only a Hobo,” released on Another Self Portrait, Vol. 10 of Dylan’s Bootleg Series. Back in 1971, when Dylan invited Traum to join him in the studio, Traum had no idea which songs they would be playing. Dylan just asked him to bring a guitar, banjo, and bass (though Traum had never played bass before in a professional setting). As at the Broadside sessions, Dylan moved fast, calling the tunes on the spot and doing no more than two takes. Traum is particularly fond of their rendition of “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere,” which he calls “one of my favorite things I’ve ever recorded. There’s something about that take. It has an infectious, joyous quality that I love.” FINDING FREEDOM In making his new album, Traum wanted to take a similarly spontaneous approach in the studio, recording mostly live and minimizing retakes. Several tracks, including Leroy Carr’s “In the Evening When the Sun Goes Down” and Pee Wee King’s “Tennessee Waltz” (with Martin Simpson on slide) were unplanned first takes. “I didn’t want to fuss over it too much,” Traum says. “It was really fun to do it that way, because I always find it very tedious when you lay down the rhythm tracks and then you start adding stuff and then you sing and you worry about your vocals.” For Traum, Just for the Love of It marks a satisfying new phase for his music. “There was a certain freedom in doing this album, because

I feel like I don’t have quite as much to prove anymore,” he reflects. “I am what I am, and I’m not striving for fame and fortune. I’m just playing the music and enjoying it more, I think. It feels like slipping into great old comfy clothes and being very in tune and comfortable with the material. I’m just trying to get across the joy of playing.”

Of course, now that this new batch of songs is out, Traum is already scheming about how he can share what he learned. “Even now I think, oh, these songs that I did fairly spontaneously on this CD, maybe there are some that I can actually turn into a lesson and show people how I do it,” he says. “I think there are things that people would have fun doing.” AG

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LIVE FROM LARGO

22 November 2015

The Watkins Family Hour brings bluegrass greats and LA’s music elite to an intimate theater By Adam Perlmutter Photos by Roman Cho

L–R: Sean Watkins, Fiona Apple, Sara Watkins, Greg Leisz (his back to the camera), Benmont Tench (on piano), Sebastian Steinberg, Tyler Chester, and Don Heffington.

AcousticGuitar.com 23

WATKINS FAMILY HOUR L–R: Sean Watkins, Sara Watkins, Fiona Apple, Jackson Browne, Paul Bryan, Benmont Tench, and Glen Phillips

I

n 2002, guitarist Sean Watkins and his sister, fiddler Sara Watkins, of the alternative bluegrass group Nickel Creek, which they co-led with the mandolinist Chris Thile, received a compelling proposition: the opportunity to host their own regular performance series at Largo, a small but venerable club in Los Angeles. “We stumbled onto this amazing scene of musicians and comedians, all playing for a hundred people in this little pub on Fairfax,” says Sean Watkins. “One day the guy who ran the place—Mark Flanagan, who everyone calls Flanny—said to me and my sister, ‘Why don’t you do a monthly show here? Bring whoever you want to play with. I don’t care if ten people show up or the place is sold out.’ I would be a completely different person musically if that hadn’t happened.” MUSICAL LABORATORY Now in its second decade, the Watkins Family Hour is a musical laboratory for Watkins and his sister. They’ve used the series to audition many songs in progress, especially between 2007 and 2014, when Nickel Creek was on hiatus, and they were focusing on solo projects. Guests like singersongwriter Jackson Browne, Susanna Hoffs of the Bangles, actor John C. Reilly, multi-instrumentalist John Paul Jones (of Led Zeppelin fame), and 24 November 2015

Grant Lee Phillips have made the show grounds for interesting cross-fertilizations. “Before the Watkins Family Hour, I considered myself strictly a bluegrass guitarist,” Watkins says. “The show’s been a gateway into whole other scenes of music—rock, jazz, and more—for me.” Until recently, the Family Hour was exclusive to LA. But last summer the Watkinses and their all-star core band since 2008—pedal steel and ace session dobro player Greg Leisz, pianist Benmont Tench (from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers), bassist Sebastian Steinberg (Soul Coughing), and drummer Don Heffington (Bob Dylan, Emmylou Harris)—embarked on a mini US tour. The Watkins Family Hour can be heard on a new self-titled CD on the Family Hour/Thirty Tigers labels. It features a guest appearance by Fiona Apple. “A couple years ago a friend of mine, [Grammy-award-winning producer, engineer, and bassist] Sheldon Gomberg, who has a killer studio in [LA’s] Silver Lake [district], told us that we should record ourselves—if only to document the Family Hour,” Watkins says. “We found a couple of days where we were all free and went into the studio with no idea what we were going to record. We ended up doing all covers, and really capturing the vibe of the live show.” The band is taking the show on the road through the fall.

LIVING LARGO On a Wednesday night in May, I go to see the Watkins Family Hour at Largo at the Coronet, on La Cienega Boulevard, where the show has been held since the club moved from its smaller Fairfax Avenue location seven years ago. The Coronet holds an important place in the West Coast theater scene, having hosted the American premiere of Bertolt Brecht’s play Life of Galileo upon its completion in 1947, and after that a long line of productions, including Edna St. Vincent Millay’s Conversations at Midnight and Eve Ensler’s The Vagina Monologues. Mark Flanagan bought the theater in 2008, rescuing it from gentrification when the building was earmarked as an Urban Outfitters store. Entering the exterior courtyard at the Largo’s front door and passing into the lobby has a transporting effect—it was reportedly painted by the composer Igor Stravinsky in 1947, and is now decorated with old pictures of film, theater, and music luminaries. The main room has what appears to be the original seats, made at a time when the general population was narrower than it now is. There are few clues suggesting that the year is 2015 and not 1955. Heeding Largo’s warning to arrive punctually for the show, or risk being declined admittance, I am the first person in the theater. On the stage, a red-velvet backdrop and overhead tea lights

Sean Watkins

‘BRINGING IN NEW PEOPLE AND NEW MATERIAL EACH TIME, WE USUALLY DON’T KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT.’

AcousticGuitar.com 25

WATKINS FAMILY HOUR

lend an intimate feel. There is a curious battery of instruments—an upright piano, its strings exposed, and a Viking helmet resting on its top; a tenor ukulele; a Fender Telecaster; and a Mellotron—tools not traditionally associated with the Watkins siblings’ genre of origin. As a newbie, I find myself wondering what to expect of the evening, but Watkins concedes that he usually feels the same way. “Bringing in new people and new material each time, we usually don’t know what to expect either,” he later tells me via telephone.

Concertgoers gradually trickle in, filling most of the main room’s 280 seats, and then an announcer kicks off the evening’s festivities by advising the audience of the consequences of using cell phones during the performances. The comedian Pete Holmes first takes the stage, with a joke about the emasculating effects of wearing Lululemon exercise slacks, culminating in another bit invoking the classic Dr. Seuss children’s book Green Eggs and Ham. After Holmes’ brief set, the Watkins siblings and their house band, with bassist Tyler Chester

sitting in for Sebastian Steinberg, amble onto the stage. Thirty-eight and bearded, Watkins is no longer the fresh-faced lad he was in 2002, when Nickel Creek’s self-titled debut was released, let alone when the band was formed, 11 years before that. Instead of his customary battle-scarred 1954 Gibson J-45, Watkins straps on a 1940s Gibson LG-1. “I have to name-drop,” he says, self-mockingly. “The LG is on loan from Jackson Browne—he’s one of those generous guys who would rather see his guitars out in the wild than tucked away in a storage space. “It took me years to find the right J-45, and now it’s been in the shop for a while,” he continues. “A friend of mine fell knee-first into the top, and it imploded. But I’ve really grown to love the LG and it’s become my main guitar. It’s small-bodied, which is good for me, since I don’t have the longest arms, and it just sounds really good—much bigger than it actually is. I’m not looking forward to returning it.” As the band works through its original pieces, Watkins plays with gravity and a powerful rhythmicity. His pick hand—working rapidly in precise, controlled movements for strummed passages, and appearing barely to move during fingerpicked sections—looks less like an appendage than a machine. And his accompaniments, which go beyond the scope of bluegrass, demonstrate a consistent rectitude. When guest Matt Hales, aka Aqualung, sits at the piano and plays an original that owes less to the bluegrass tradition than to Radiohead, Watkins provides the perfect supportive parts. Watkins credits bluegrass—with its intensive technical demands—for giving him the solid skill set needed to integrate these new influences in a seamless way. “Bluegrass makes for an easier jumping-off point than other kinds of music,” he says. “With a focus on rhythm and dexterity—not to mention being expected as an instrumentalist to be able to automatically sing in harmony—it’s easy to transfer to so many other situations.”

L

argo’s programming focuses on comedy as well as music. Performers such as Sarah Silverman and Zach Galifinakis have sharpened their already prodigious chops there, and in the late 1990s, Larry David held a series of stand-up shows in the club, leading to the creation of his HBO television series, Curb Your Enthusiasm. The comic arts, too, have impacted Watkins’ musicality. “Before the Family Hour, I didn’t know anything about comedy, except that I thought Seinfeld was funny,” says Watkins, referring to the television series that David co-created with Jerry Seinfeld. “Now, I’ve been exposed to a lot of amazing comedians, and it’s been fun to 26 November 2015

discover the similarities between comedy and music. Musicians really want to be comedians and vice versa. We’re all just trying to connect with a wide group of people in a concise way. But I could never be a comedian—you can play a mediocre song and an audience will clap, but tell a bad joke and the audience will be unresponsive.” Comedy has been an obvious influence on the Watkins’ relaxed, funny banter during their Family Hour. Between numbers in the show in May, Watkins expresses musical admiration for bassist Tyler Chester. When Watkins introduces his own song “All I Do Is Lie” as being about the beginning stages of a relationship, his sister, not missing a beat, asks if the song is, in fact, about the bassist. Watkins says, “At first [during the Family Hour] I wouldn’t talk at all, it was so nerve-wracking. Then, I got into it and I started blathering. Now, I’ve learned to rein it in, and audiences always seem to resonate with my banter. But Sara’s always been more natural at it than me.” ROOTS & PIZZA As much as the Family Hour has stretched Watkins, he feels it brings him full circle to his formative years in Carlsbad, California, in San Diego County. Every Saturday he and his family would go to a weekly bluegrass jam at the restaurant That Pizza Place, where he, his sister, and Chris Thile first performed before they were even teenagers. “We were just really fortunate to have fallen into it at a young age,” he says. “My family and I listened to really amazing bluegrass while eating pizza and drinking pitchers of cola. That’s where we met Chris Thile. Before we formed Nickel Creek, he and I would huddle up and play together in the hallway leading to the bathroom. There would be two or three core players in the band, and people from the audience were always asked to come up and join in. Looking back on that time, it all makes sense why the Family Hour is so important to us these days.” At the Largo, in between full-ensemble numbers, Watkins and his sister break off into a duet to perform an instrumental version of the traditional English nursery rhyme “Polly Put the Kettle On.” The two play together uncannily, so attuned to each other’s nuances, showing the sort of musical telepathy that develops over the course of many years. “Anyone who plays music with someone for an extended time really gets to know that person and can anticipate what he or she will play at any given moment,” Watkins says. “It’s been awesome to make music for all these years with a sibling who’s a friend and great musician.” AG

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SEEKING ‘HIGHER TRUTH’ Chris Cornell unplugs and finds his voice as a singer-songwriter

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t’s 1990 and Soundgarden is on the cusp of becoming one of the biggest hard-rock acts in the world. The band had just signed to a major label, released its Billboard-charting second album, Louder Than Love, and Guns N’ Roses’ Axl Rose had declared Chris Cornell the best vocalist in rock. On a threemonth tour with metal band Voivod, Soundgarden warms up the crowd, igniting mosh pits, thrashing, and crowd-surfing—no doubt encouraged by the long-haired head banging and thunderous wails of frontman Cornell. Who would have guessed at the time that, back in the tour van, Cornell was binge listening to a cassette by lo-fi outsider folkie Daniel Johnston? “None of those guys [in the band] liked it. They all kinda hated it,” recalls Cornell, 51, during a phone call from his home, adding that he started with Johnston’s Hi, How Are You, but quickly became obsessed with his 1988 debut, Songs of Pain. “I remember thinking that I got no less pleasure out of listening to that record, which was recorded on a mono boombox—and was probably a 20th generation cassette-tocassette-to-cassette copy—than listening to Dark Side of the Moon, from a band with years of experience making epic albums. There’s no difference to me.” Discovering Johnston, along with Nick Drake’s Pink Moon and Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska, planted the seed in Cornell’s mind that one day he might attempt similarly strippeddown, acoustic songwriting. It inspired his first solo release, the acoustic song “Seasons,” for Cameron Crowe’s 1992 movie Singles, and, later, his first solo album, 1999’s Euphoria Morning, which hinted at such aspirations. But it took 25 years from a fascination that began in 1990, in between fronting Soundgarden and Audioslave—and, he candidly admits, learning to play, write, and perform with just an acoustic guitar—to arrive at his new album, Higher Truth (Universal), written specifically to support his current all-acoustic tour of the same name. 28 November 2015

As a child growing up amid the soft rock of the ’70s, Cornell was firmly rooted in the same camp as his Soundgarden bandmates who thought acoustic music was uncool. “The reason why I hated it had more to do with who I associated it with. Something like, ‘Their taste sucks. Whatever you like, I definitely hate.’ The best example I can think of is probably Cat Stevens. Great songs, amazing albums— hated the people who liked it,” Cornell says, chuckling at the notion. “I’m a little kid then, thinking this was not a group of people who could possibly know what’s cool. It was that ’70s organic, hippie, Clarks-wearing, hot-tub bullshit that I couldn’t stand. “Another thing that put me off of [folk] were all these rules and specific references and things that I thought rock music didn’t have— because rock music is free and you do whatever the fuck you want and that’s the whole point.” Slowly though, acoustic songs by Led Zeppelin and the Beatles crept into Cornell’s consciousness, and he found himself writing more and more on acoustic guitar. “I only started playing a guitar in earnest when Soundgarden just was forming,” he says. “I hadn’t learned anyone else’s songs or techniques of how other guitar players played. I became someone that was really interested in experimenting with what the guitar could do, but I wasn’t proficient at it.” By 1990, just as the Seattle sound and grunge started becoming mainstream, Cornell confesses he was tiring of hard rock, having already been in Soundgarden for six years. “Soundgarden had been touring for a few full years and playing really aggressive music, and pretty much every band we toured with played super-loud, aggressive music,” he says. “There were a lot of black sweatshirts and neck tattoos and dyed black hair and black fingernails, and it was all hard rock, all the time. Something happened to me around then where I got a little bit sick of it. I started listening to palate-cleansing, minimalist, homemade stuff. It wasn’t a passing phase. It stuck with me.”

CARLOS RAMOS

By Whitney Phaneuf

AcousticGuitar.com 29

CHRIS CORNELL

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Cornell deviated from the heavy vibe on his first solo album, which favors psych melodies and pop hooks driven by a mix of electric and acoustic guitars. “That was the beginning of me starting to learn the instrument,” he says. “I started learning how to move in a way that was less blocky and less childlike, a little more eloquent and poetic to support what I wanted to do.”

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ast forward to 2006 and Cornell’s post-Soundgarden project Audioslave. The supergroup he formed with members of Rage Against the Machine was doing a European press tour for its third album, Revelations. In Stockholm, someone suggested Cornell perform an hour-long acoustic set at an intimate venue as part of a radio promotion. He agreed before he even thought about a set list. “I thought, ‘An hour is going to be a long time. Will people be bored after four songs? Then they’re going to start talking and it’s going to suck.’ When that didn’t happen, it was a great experience,” Cornell says. “I struggled a little, ’cause I had never done it before. I played some songs acoustically that I’d never played acoustically before. It all worked—in that context right then and there.” When Cornell returned to the States, he was surprised to hear songs from the acoustic set on the radio (the bootleg Chris Cornell: Unplugged in Sweden also was widely shared online). He eventually decided to book a few one-off acoustic gigs in LA—where he lived at the time. “My manager didn’t want me to tour, he wanted me to slowly get into it,” recalls Cornell, adding that his first LA show at the Hotel Cafe went well. “And then . . . it started to go away. I was losing what it was. It wasn’t as good and I made the decision that I actually had to go out and do 30 shows in order to know what this is. This is one of those things you don’t get good at until you go do it. So I did it.” In early 2011, between Soundgarden reforming and releasing King Animal, Cornell hit the road on his first solo acoustic tour, Songbook, which drew its set lists from Soundgarden, Temple of the Dog, Audioslave, solo material, and covers. He released an acoustic live album, Songbook, later that year. “That first Songbook tour sold out before I ever played the first show. That in and of itself was an indication of ‘Oh, this is actually something that people do want to hear me do,’” he says. Then he had to deliver. “There was quite a bit of on-the-job training that I did. I did a lot of touring as an acoustic singer-songwriter where I was struggling. It was just a matter of allowing myself to do it,

7/2/15 9:50 AM

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allowing myself to struggle, and allowing myself to figure out what the feel of an acoustic instrument is, how to make it sound right, and how to use it. After about the fifth show of that first Songbook tour, I knew what it was going to be. “The dynamics were the first thing I noticed, as it pertains to being a singer and performing a song, on an acoustic instrument you can bang the shit out of it, but you can also relax and pull back on it to the degree where you can barely hear it at all. That, combined with speeding and slowing down, in terms of punctuating the emotional part of a song, started to happen. It was all something that happened naturally in front of people.” Following a second Songbook tour in 2013, Cornell set out to write new material designed to be played in an acoustic environment. The resulting album, Higher Truth, demonstrates an artist experimenting and challenging himself on acoustic guitar over 12 songs that range from just guitar-and-vocals on the spare and solemn “Through the Window” to “Nearly Forgot My Broken Heart,” which pairs a Zeppelinesque fingerpicked melody with dramatic piano and heavy percussion. “I felt the need to expand as an acousticguitar player to support some of the ideas that I wanted to convey, so I had to start learning different kinds of picking styles and techniques, rhythm playing, things that make the guitar do more than just simple strumming, so that the accompaniment of just a guitar is enough to carry the whole thing,” says Cornell. “It’s really been a work in progress to be able to do it.” The Higher Truth North American tour kicked off in Phoenix, Arizona, on September 17, and makes 30 stops before ending in Austin, Texas, on November 2.

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STRETCHING THE BOUNDARIES OF NYLON-STRING GUITAR

38

Metal Flamenco With flamenco arrangements of heavy-metal classics, Ben Woods explores the ‘perfect marriage’ of two genres

40

A Feel for Nylon Jeremy Bass blends the lessons of classical, bossa nova, and folk

44

World Beat Lawson Rollins is a musical tour guide with nylon-string guitar in hand

AcousticGuitar.com 37

SPECIAL FOCUS NYLON STRINGS, NO LIMITS

METAL FLAMENCO

With flamenco arrangements of heavymetal classics, Ben Woods explores the ‘perfect marriage’ of two genres

VINCE TRUSPIN

By Pat Moran

38 November 2015

“W

‘FLAMENCO IS NOT LIKE CLASSICAL GUITAR OR FINGERSTYLE. IT UNLEASHES A BURST OF VIRTUOSITY.’ BEN WOODS

Ben Woods with flamenco dancer Arleen Hurtado

hen I first heard flamenco guitar,” Ben Woods says, “I thought it sounded like acoustic speed metal.” At the time, Woods, who crafts flamenco arrangements of heavy-metal tunes on Cordoba, Godin, and Ortega nylon-string guitars, was playing death metal on electric guitar, and sharing a house with fellow musicians when he hit upon his fusion of Pantera’s pyrotechnics and Paco de Lucia’s precision. It was a flash of inspiration—aided by a drug addict. “We didn’t know our new roommate was a junkie until I came home and found my electric guitar and all my speakers gone. He had stolen them, and I never saw him [or the gear] again.” Finding a Spanish guitar in the house, Woods continued to practice metal runs on it. “That’s when I thought, ‘This sounds like Spanish stuff I’ve heard.’” While researching Spanish guitar, he discovered flamenco. “I didn’t know about it until I needed to seek it out.” Woods planned to transfer acoustic techniques back to metal once he bought a new electric guitar. That idea was discarded when Woods fell under flamenco’s sway. At first, the self-taught guitarist gained proficiency by listening to records and copying what he heard. But that approach “hit a wall,” says Woods, who commenced years of intensive study under American-born flamenco master Marcos Carmona. “I learned the rasgueado—the stroke that fans out: pinky, ring, middle, index finger,” he says. “I learned the compas, all the different rhythmical forms in flamenco. I learned all of the tonalities, which [flamenco players] do in two different keys.” Spanning 20-plus years, Woods’ studies included a trip to southern Spain, where he soaked up flamenco culture. “I’m still learning,” he says. “I could spend my whole life learning.” One realization took hold of his imagination: music theory for metal and flamenco are similar, Woods says. “The harmonic minor scales and the Phrygian mode [present] in metal are also in flamenco,” he says, adding that flamenco, like metal, boasts aggressive playing, “Flamenco is not like classical guitar or fingerstyle. It unleashes a burst of virtuosity.” Woods says fusing flamenco and metal is “the perfect marriage.” Woods put that musical marriage to the test. Moving to San Francisco in 2004, the Seattle native formed the flamenco metal band Flametal. Releasing an album, The Elder, in 2005 and touring Japan, the combo consisted of

amplified acoustic flamenco guitar, electric guitar, bass, and drums, playing “the proper bulerias, seguiriyas, soleares, and fandangos.” Onstage, the lineup boasted two or three flamenco dancers. In addition to providing color and spectacle, the dancers were key to the music, Woods says. “As percussionists, professional flamenco dancers are better than a lot of rock drummers.” The dancers also supplied authentic palmas, “clapping with traditional flamenco rhythms,” Woods says. Flametal proved too wild for flamenco aficionados, and too experimental for metal fans. After five years and two albums, the band folded, but Woods kept the name alive to brand further projects. Moving to Los Angeles in 2010, Woods recorded a flametal set by himself. That album’s title, Heavy Mellow, pointed the way forward. With guitarist Luis Villegas and percussionist Mike Bennett on cajon, Woods formed the trio Heavy Mellow. Specializing in flamenco and Spanish guitar versions of the players’ favorite heavy metal tunes, the trio continues to gig in Southern California. Woods also connects with audiences through solo shows. Though he concentrates on flamenco forms, “once in awhile I’ll stick in a Dio song,” Woods says. “Out of everyone, there’s at least one guy in the back who throws up the heavy-metal horns when he recognizes the tune.” After a successful spring 2014 run, Woods rejoins classical guitarist Thomas Zwijsen this fall for the Master Guitar Tour, which takes the nylonstring power duo to Europe. “[Thomas and I] formed a friendship based on mutual respect,” Woods says. “We know how to [craft] creative arrangements, which stay true enough to the original tunes so people can recognize them.” Woods’ whirlwind of activity is augmented by the completion and publication of his instructional book, Metal Classics for Fingerstyle Guitar, as well as the online release of two new self-recorded albums—Flametallica and Flametal Priest, which showcase flamenco arrangements of songs by Metallica and Judas Priest, respectively. To capstone his industrious year, Woods is returning to his original plan to bring acoustic technique to electric guitar. “The album, called Electric Flamenco, will use what I learned playing flamenco, but on electric guitar, playing with the fingers and with no distortion,” Woods says. Though this approach might rile some flamenco fans, the guitarist is undeterred. “When you get right down to it, you have to use the instrument to its full capacity.” AG AcousticGuitar.com 39

SPECIAL FOCUS NYLON STRINGS, NO LIMITS

ROBERT BASS

A FEEL FOR NYLON

Jeremy Bass blends the lessons of classical, bossa nova, and folk By Kenny Berkowitz

40 November 2015

“W

ith nylon strings, you can really make the guitar sing,” says Jeremy Bass, who released a pair of fan-funded EPs earlier this year—the steel-string Winter Bare in April and the nylon-string New York in Spring in June. “The nylon gives you a different quality of sound and resonance, especially on the upper melody notes, with a richness you don’t get from steel. You’re playing treble with the tips of your fingers, just behind the fingernails, where the flesh is meaty. So you get a really lush, soft sound that enables your thumb to play a muted bass line and leaves the fingers free for chords and melody textures.

“That’s three things at once, and that’s not something I can do on steel.” The two albums couldn’t be more different. On Winter Bare, Bass has recorded his version of alt-country, inspired by Merle Haggard and Tom Waits, writing songs in the middle of the night as therapy after a 2013 divorce. That’s worlds away from New York in Spring, where the mood is lighthearted, the melodies buoyant, and the lyrics all about possibility: finding hope in flowers, birds, and the million ways to make the city your own, set to the lilting sounds of Big Apple bossa nova. It’s a tribute to the lasting inspiration of Luiz Bonfá, Antônio Carlos Jobim,

AcousticGuitar.com 41

SPECIAL FOCUS NYLON STRINGS, NO LIMITS

and Baden Powell, that ’60s generation of Brazilian guitar masters, crossed with the lyrical storytelling of Bass’ two other guitar heroes, Nick Drake and Paul Simon. “I knew I wanted to write songs, wanted to live in New York City, and wanted to get a master’s in classical guitar,” says Bass, who arrived via Wayland, Massachusetts, where he played rock as a teenager; Chicago, where he earned a bachelor’s in classical guitar; and Seville, Spain, where he spent a year studying flamenco. “I really admire Frederic Hand, who became my

teacher at Mannes [College of Music in New York City]. His sensibilities are really close to mine, because he has a deep love of classical music, especially Bach, but he also composes his own music, incorporating all sorts of sounds, even though he’s working in the context of a traditional classical degree. It was a really invaluable experience, but what I realized by the end of it was I didn’t want to be a classical guitarist, getting caught up in technique or in the interpretation of some canonical piece.

“I just wanted to create my own music.” That’s what he did. As musical director of the Secret City, a monthly cabaret series in Manhattan, Bass started giving himself a songwriting assignment to fit the theme of each show, including “style” and “spring,” which jump-started two of the songs on Spring in New York. He began working on rock covers to play between the sets of stand-up comedy, building a rotating cast of musicians good enough to perform after only two hours of rehearsal, and taking the opportunity to work on his own new material in front of a live audience, playing either steel or nylon. “It was a very conscious decision to record these albums on the instruments that were creating these two sounds,” says Bass, who recorded the winter album in summer and the spring album the following winter. “But it wasn’t, ‘I’m going to make a steel-string album’ or ‘I’m going to make a nylon-string album.’ It was, ‘This is the guitar I’m living with right now, and this is the music I’m writing. I’m living, eating, breathing this music. That’s what’s coming out of me, and that’s what I’m going to do. “So Winter Bare was written in complete despair, feeling incredibly lost, spending a lot of time by myself in one of the most difficult places I’ve ever been. And New York in Spring was pretty much the exact opposite, a celebration of art, life, and community.” ince the early years of the Secret City, the original collective has grown to include more than a thousand members, with Bass remaining at the center as bandleader. At the same time, he’s kept up his chops, spending 45 minutes each morning on pieces by Albéniz, Bach, Barrios, and VillaLobos, writing a poem every day, and publishing literary criticism in Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Nation, and Pleiades. “Playing nylon strings is still my favorite tactile sensation,” says Bass, who plays a nylonstring guitar by Aaron Green and another by German Vazquez Rubio. “The touch of the string on the part of the finger where the flesh and the nail meet—if you hit it just right, you get the perfect tone. I love electric guitar, but it’s a completely different beast, going through cords and pedals and coming out of an amplifier. It can do some great things, but it doesn’t have the resonance, the responsiveness of a classical guitar. Having that instrument right next to your body, and feeling the resonance of it, the way the soft strings feel underneath your fingers. “I can’t even imagine how many hours I’ve spent working on that.” AG

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42 November 2015

LL16R

Catch Yamaha L-Series on the road this summer with The Smashing Pumpkins’ In Plainsong - An Acoustic-Electro Evening tour! Monuments to an Elegy

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SPECIAL FOCUS NYLON STRINGS, NO LIMITS

WORLD BEAT Lawson Rollins is a musical tour guide with nylon-string guitar in hand By Kenny Berkowitz

44 November 2015

B

efore picking up classical guitar at 15, Lawson Rollins spent years as a drummer, keeping the beat in a series of rock bands. But all that changed the first time he heard Andrés Segovia, which led to John Williams, which led to the Chilean folk ensemble Inti-Illimani, which led to Paco Peña, which led to Antônio Carlos Jobim, which led to Miles Davis. And that led to exactly where Rollins is now: playing an acoustic world-fusion that embraces Latin, flamenco, Afro-Cuban, bossa nova, Middle Eastern, and classical music—sometimes in a single song. “I was attracted to the guitar, almost like a primal attraction,” says Rollins, talking from his home in San Francisco. “I finally took it up after checking out some Segovia records from the library and starting lessons. I learned some études by Fernando Sor, which are very beautiful and very playable, and within a few months, I was obsessed with classical guitar. I stuck with it for another two or three years, but by the time I was 18 or 19, I was more interested in fusing all these styles together, rather than

becoming a dedicated classical guitarist. I realized my passion was for composing, trying to do something that’s unique to me, and that’s what still drives me.” On Traveler (Infinita), his newest, best, and most fully realized album, he’s constructed a travelogue of all those influences, from “Berlin Bossa,” which surrounds Johann Sebastian Bach’s “Bourrée in E Minor” with one of Rollins’ bossa melodies, to “Café Paris,” which opens with Django Reinhardt and closes in some imaginary world between Gypsy jazz, klezmer, Middle Eastern music, and swing, courtesy of three members of Big Bad Voodoo Daddy. In between, there are echoes of Britain (“Across the Moors”), California (“Marching West”), Catalonia (“Barcelona Express”), Louisiana (“Beyond the Bayou”), and a futuristic, pan-global metropolis (“The Urban Trilogy”), complete with keyboard synths, electric bass, and drum programming. From start to finish, Traveler is an incredible journey across an enormously broad canvas, where the sound is impeccable, the compositions dynamic, and the technique dazzling.

Lawson Rollins, left, with Infinite Chill remixer/co-producer Shahin Shahida

commitment to the performance,” says Rollins, who’s been working on Infinite Chill for the last few years. “That’s definitely something I hope is taking place in my playing. In terms of the music itself, the last solo albums have a core interest in all these different styles, so I can blend sounds in a more seamless way. In the earlier albums, there was an excitement of exploring different worlds, and one song would be radically different from the next. There’s more consistency now, and a confidence in the melodies that comes from stripping them down, then building them back up.” AG “Every album needs a story, something that emerges over time,” says Rollins, who has released five albums since leaving the neoflamenco duo Young & Rollins in 2007. “I never start with a concept, which would feel contrived. At the start, I’m just grasping for ideas, trying to catch some momentum in the songwriting, and I don’t even title songs until I’m headed off to master an album. With Traveler, once the album was almost complete, there was an ‘aha’ moment when I suddenly realized the songs formed a kind of travelogue. It became apparent that the songs came from places I’d been, and from my own interpretation of being in those places, and that became the story.” he compositions begin their evolution in Rollins’ home studio, where he practices four hours a day, five days a week, keeping up his technique with standards like Agustín Barrios’ “La Catedral” and Francisco Tárrega’s “Recuerdos de la Alhambra.” As a composer, Rollins likes to alternate between two or three new pieces at a time, improvising over chord changes, playing on top of a beat from Pro Tools, or using an older piece from the classical repertoire to spark something new. He’ll keep refining the guitar parts, measure by measure, detail by detail, and once he’s satisfied with the home demo, he’ll go into a professional studio to record the song again with live session players. Over the years, his main guitars have remained the same: a Pedro Maldonado custom cutaway, which was the only guitar used on Full Circle (2013); the pair of Lester DeVoe flamenco blancas that color Traveler; and a classical SoloEtte travel guitar, which he takes on trips around the world. Now, having released Traveler, he’s gone back into the studio to finish his sixth solo album, which will be called Infinite Chill (The Remix Sessions). Co-produced by Shahin Shahida, Infinite Chill will be Rollins’ first venture into electronica, re-recording some of his older bossa nova compositions with new players and new electro-ambient settings. “As you mature and become more comfortable in your own skin, that maturity comes through in the conviction of the melodies and the

T

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51 Basics

Improve your accompanying skills

55 Weekly Workout Take a break from barrehopping

62 Acoustic Classic

PLAY

‘Fearless’— A dreamy Pink Floyd tune

Pete Huttlinger

HERE’S HOW

One Day at a Time

For guitarists, recovering from an illness or injury can be a long road BY PETE HUTTLINGER n November 3, 2010, I suffered a massive stroke. I awakened to find I was completely paralyzed on the entire right side of my body and couldn’t speak. Thankfully my wife, Erin, was there. She recognized the signs of a stroke and immediately called 911. The doctors operated and my recovery began. It was a very slow process. My right hand, which used to be stellar and would obey my every command, failed me completely. I found that I was unable to do an upstroke with a flat pick. I could not write nor could I feed myself with my right hand. Then just six months later, I suffered endstage heart failure. My days were numbered. I was life-flighted to Houston, Texas, where I had a heart pump implanted and spent the next four months in recovery—all without playing the guitar. Add all the time up and you’re getting close to a year without any meaningful guitar playing from me. The road ahead was long. I started out by first deciding that, “Yes, I do want to be a guitar player again.” That was the biggest hurdle I had to overcome. It physically hurt to play and, as far as I was concerned, I had had enough pain. My wife would put my guitar out on a stand or lean it on the couch or put it on our bed hoping that I would get the urge to play. But at first I didn’t want anything to do with it. I wasn’t mad at my situation—not once. I just didn’t know if I wanted to do all the work again. It turned out that given enough time, which wasn’t really all that long, I did want it and I still do. I had to start at square one (my left hand worked fine and I never forgot anything I had learned, so that was a big plus) and that meant coming up with a plan. I didn’t understand that I would have to revise that plan many times

KIM SHERMAN

O

AcousticGuitar.com 47

HERE’S HOW

over the next four years (I’m still in the middle of the plan), but I would adjust whenever I hit a roadblock. And there were plenty of roadblocks. I began by playing—badly—the simplest things I could remember only about 15 minutes at a time to start. I would fingerpick a little exercise on an open-D chord. I remember going back and forth between 3/4 and 4/4 to keep from going crazy—I hadn’t forgotten anything, I just couldn’t play anything . . . yet. Yet is the key word if you ever have to recover from anything.

Give yourself time. Then I would take the chords and move them up and down the neck: D, Em/D, F#m/D, G/D, A7/D, D. Repeat again and again. All while playing a simple eighth-note pattern. I love to play bossa nova tunes, so I would play the basic bossa nova pattern with just the chords to “The Girl from Impanema,” “Lucky Southern,” “One-Note Samba,” and “Wave.” I would get out my metronome and begin to play with a flat pick. Eighth notes at about 60 beats per minute were all I could handle— sometimes it was too much. I would play scales,

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Escape the expected. Experience graphite.

48 November 2015

1.800.788.5828 www.rainsong.com

melodies, fiddle tunes. For several months, I would see progress nearly every day. My plan was to mix up all this stuff, play as long as I could each day and try again the next day. Mixing it up was really the key for me. ‘PLAY WHAT YOU CAN TODAY’ But all was not good—at least not good enough for me. I used to be a player. I used to be a really good player. I played at the first three of Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Festivals. I played Carnegie Hall—three times. I played for LeAnn Rimes at Abbey Road Studios, toured and recorded with John Oates and John Denver and a lot of other great gigs. Now I was doing simple exercises—poorly most of the time. I had a hard time with alternate picking, and playing from one string to another was a nightmare. Friends would try to make me feel better by saying things like, “Now you know how the rest of us feel,” or “So you’re mortal after all!” I would laugh it off because I knew their intent, but I was not happy knowing how the “rest” felt. I did not want to be mortal. I wanted to be what I used to be. I wanted to be a really good guitar player again. Erin would hear me in our living room playing something, then suddenly I would curse loudly, put the guitar down, and walk away. I was frustrated. Then, 30 minutes or an hour later, I would go back in, grab my guitar, and try again. This happened multiple times each day for almost a year. But eventually things got more consistent. I made fewer mistakes. I started to enjoy learning again, just like I did when I was a kid. Tunes I thought were lost forever were coming back to me. The great Nashville fiddler Aubrey Haynie told me after I had the stroke, “You may not be the player you once were. You’ll just be different.” It took me a long time to realize what that meant and to accept it. Jazz guitarist Pat Martino told me, “Play what you can today. Don’t think about what you used to do.” That was perhaps the best advice I ever received. I learned to let go and rebuild. So now I’m a different player. After four and a half years I’ve got 90 percent of my chops back, which is more than enough for any session or gig. I’m working all the time and I’m a better person for all I’ve gone though. And being a better person is by far the greater gift. This article is adapted from Joined at the Heart, a new memoir about love and resilience, by Pete and Erin Morris Huttlinger. Petehuttlinger.com

PRS Acoustics A Culture of Quality

© 2014 PRS Guitars / Photos by Marc Quigley

Born in our Maryland shop, PRS acoustics are heirloom instruments with remarkable tone and exquisite playability. A small team of experienced luthiers handcraft all of our Maryland-made acoustic instruments with passion and attention to detail.

The PRS Guitars’ Acoustic Team.

THE BASICS

Rhythm Makeover

BY ADAM LEVY

Upsize your accompaniment skills with one simple concept

he guitar is built for accompaniment. If there’s a song to be sung, what better instrument is there to simultaneously provide the chordal structure and rhythmic underpinning? That said, there’s more to accompaniment than simply strumming basic chords. Let’s say someone is teaching you a new song and says, “It’s C for two bars, then F for two bars, G for two bars, then back to C.” Any competent player can handle that. What separates great accompanists from average-Joe strummers is that the pros know how to put just enough spin on things to make such wellworn chord progressions sound fresh. One surefire way to move beyond accompaniment clichés is to introduce accents into your strumming patterns. First, try Ex. 1a, a straightforward groove played with alternating down/ up pick strokes. (Set your metronome to a moderate click, about 112 bpm, and let the chords ring out as long as possible in this example, as

well as all of the others.) Steady-eighth strumming patterns like this can be useful at times but may become tiresome to the listener because they’re so predictable and insistent. You can make this pattern more interesting by accenting a few of the beats, as shown in Ex. 1b, implying a grouping of 3-3-2. The asymmetry gives this one-bar pattern a bit of swagger. Even this figure can lose its charm, however, if repeated over and over. Ex. 1c illustrates another variation. It’s more spacious, as you’ll hear, because it repeats every two bars instead of every one. The eighth-note accent grouping is now 3-3-3-4—asymmetrical, once again. You can do more with the 3-3-3-4 pattern by modifying the chord ever so slightly on each of the accented beats. Ex. 2a shows one way to do that, with alternating C and Cadd9 shapes. Ex. 2b shows another possibility, with the same two chords voiced higher up the neck. Ex. 2a might work best in a solo setting, where

T

Ex. 1b

Ex. 1a

C

What separates great accompanists from average-Joe strummers is the pros know how to put just enough spin on things to make well-worn chord progressions sound fresh.

Ex. 1c

C

x 32 0 1 0

low-register chords are effectively supportive. In an ensemble setting—with other guitarists, or even a full band—Ex. 2b could be a better option. Its higher register may help keep your guitar from getting buried in the mix. Even with the rhythmic variety that accents can provide, strumming lots of eighth notes

C

x 32 0 1 0

x 32 0 1 0

> > > . .> > > > > 4 . . . Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û .. . . . . . &4 Ex. 2b

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0 1 0 2 3

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. . . .

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 7 10

0 8 7 10

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0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

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C add9 x 32 0 4 0

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CAcousticGuitar.com

x 32 0 1 0

51

Ex. 1b

Ex. 1a

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VIDEO LESSON ACOUSTICGUITAR.COM

Ex. 1c

C

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applications and > with the> arpeggios> rolling. low >to high instead > > > can be >easily adapted .to fit a Û Ûto Ûlow.Û(Note Û Ûthat. all.. ofÛ theÛ accents Û Û areÛ Û variety Û Û ofÛmusical Û Û settings—your Û Û Û Û own Û . tunes, & 44 .. Û Û Û Û Û Û Û Û .. .. Û Ûof high musicians. Ex. 4b is essentially the same, but

may be too heavy-handed in a full-band context. When that’s the case, try converting some of the eighths into quarters, as shown in Ex.s 3a and b (based on Ex.s 2a and b, respectively). In both of these situations, the guitar part breathes a little more while the accents remain Ex. intact. 2a Strumming only wayCto accompany, C 1 isn’tCxthe add9 C32add9 x 32Using x 32 0 1 0broken xinto 32 0 4 0 0 0 040 of course. arpeggios—chords melodic patterns—is another useful tool. Ex. 4a employs the same 3-3-3-4 groupings you’ve been playing in the previous examples, but here you’ll pick single notes. This produces lighter guitar textures, which—once again—may be particularly effective in a setting with multiple

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in the same places.) cover songs, or anything else. Work with this The 3-3-3-4 accent grouping will suit a material a little bit every day, craft new variavariety of grooves, but it’s not a rhythmic tions, and you’ll soon see your accompaniment panacea. If you try it out at your Ex. 2b next recording skill set growing and growing. session and it doesn’t feel quite C C 1or band practice xx C Cxxadd9 C add9 C x 32 0for x 32 0Adam x 32 0 1guitarist 412 0 432 0 10 40 0 0 right the song at hand, the pattern Levyx 32 is0an itinerant and 8 fr. 7may fr. need a small tweak—like you’ll find in Ex. 4c. songwriter based in Los Angeles, where he is Here, the original pattern (Ex. 4b) has been department chair of the guitar performance displaced by one eighth note so that it begins program at Los Angeles College of Music. on the and of beat 1. Ex. 4d offers another His guitar work has appeared on recordings subtle twist, with the pattern beginning on beat by Norah Jones, Tracy Chapman, Amos Lee, 2 this time. among others. adamlevy.com

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œœ . . œ>œœœ œœœœ œœœœ œ>œœœ œœœœ œœœœ œ>œœœ œœœœ œœœœ œ>œœœ œœœœ œœœœ œ>œœœ œœœœ œœœœ œœœœ . . œœ . . œ

0 1 0 2 3

0 1 0 2 3

0 1 0 2 3

. . . .

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 7 10

0 8 7 10

0 8 7 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 7 10

0 8 7 10

0 8 7 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

0 8 9 10

. .

Ex. 3b

Ex. 3a

C

C add9

x 32 0 1 0

C

x 32 0 4 0

œ & .. œœœœ > B

œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœ œœ œœ œœ > >

This 3-3-3-4 concept has many possible

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Ex. 4a

C

x 32 0 1 0

œœœ œœ >

œœ œœœ

œœœ œœ

œœœ œœ

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0 3 0 2 3

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C add9

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x 32 0 4 0

j œœ œœ œ

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œœœ œœ >

0 1 0 2 3

C

C

0 3 0 2 3

j œœœ œœ 0 3 0 2 3

C add9

x 32 0 1 0

C

x 32 0 1 0

xx 432 0

œœ œœ œ > 0 1 0 2 3

C

x 32 0 4 0

C add9

x 32 0 1 0

œœ . . œ>œœœ œœœœ œœ . . œ

> œœœœ œœœœ œœœœ

œ>œœœ

œœœœ J

0 1 0 2 3

0 1 0 2 3

0 8 7 10

0 8 9 10

0 0 8 8 9 7 10 10

. . . .

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0 8 9 10

Ex. 4b

C

x 32 0 1 0

0 8 7 10

C add9

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C

x 32 0 4 0

C

x 32 0 4 0

œœ œœœ

C

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0

0

3

0

2

0

2

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Ex. 4c

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C add9

x 32 0 1 0

C

x 32 0 4 0

C add9

x 32 0 1 0

0

2

2

C

x 32 0 1 0

0

3

Ex. 4d

C

x 32 0 4 0

. .1 . .

0

2

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0

3 2

C

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0

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0

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52 November 2015

0

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WEEKLY WORKOUT

A Break from Barre-hopping

BY JEFFREY PEPPER RODGERS

Boost your rhythm playing with these movable, versatile chord shapes

arre chords are essential on the guitar, providing a set of shapes that you can move around the neck to form any chord. Yet they also can be—let’s face it—a drag. They tire out your fretting hand when you need to hold them for long stretches, they can be cumbersome when you need to change chords quickly, and sometimes they just sound clunky. Fortunately, there are alternatives to barre chords that are also movable but are leaner, lighter sounding, and easier on the fingers. Those chords are the focus of this Weekly Workout.

B

WEEK 1 Week One Ex. 1

G

G/D

13 x 2 xx

G/B

x3 4 2 1 x

3 x 1 4 xx

& 44 ˙˙ ˙

˙˙˙ ˙

˙˙ ˙

4

3 4 5 5

7 5

B Ex. 2

5 3

D

13 x 2 xx

# œ. & # œœ .. 11

B

12 10

7

G/D

10 fr.

2 x 1 4 xx

5 fr.

9 fr.

œ œ .. œ œ œ œ. J

The chord shapes in this lesson all use just three or four strings, with no open strings but no barres either. We will cover a range of chord types—major, minor, seventh, ninth, major seventh, sixth, and diminished—and put them to use in short progressions inspired by songs from the repertoires of the Allman Brothers, Eric Clapton, John Mayer, the Beatles, and more. These chords fit naturally in a blues or swing setting, but are also useful for creating punchy rhythm parts in any style of music and in any key.

G

x4 3 1 2 x

7 fr.

˙˙ ˙˙

˙ ˙ ˙

8 7 9 10

12 9

A/C #

3 x 14 xx

G/D

2 x 1 4 xx

10

D

x1 3 x4 x

7 fr.

12 9

9 7

9 7

10

10

9

9

Cm

7

7

7 5

7 5

x 13 x 2 x

10 fr.

˙ ˙˙

b˙ ˙ ˙

12

4

12 10

5 3

Bm

5 fr.

j j j œœ ‰ œœ ‰ œœ ˙˙ œ ˙ œ œ

12 9

9 fr.

G

x 13 x 4 x

3 x 1 4 xx

13 x 2 xx

Cm

3 x 1 4 xx

Cm

5 fr.

421 xxx

˙ ˙ ˙

5 fr.

G/D

8 10 10

D

x3 4 2 1 x

x 4312 x

œ. œœ ..

j œ œ. œ œ .. œ œ

j j j œœœ ‰ œœœ ‰ œœ ˙˙ œœ ˙˙ œ œ

7 4

6

6

7 5

7 5

3 4 5 5

7

8 fr.

b ˙˙ ˙

5 6 8

8

5 fr.

C m/G

x 341 xx

b ˙˙˙

8 5

A

4 fr.

WEEK ONE First up is a set of movable major and minor chords. Ex. 1 shows a series of voicings of G major and C minor; you can move these shapes up and down the neck to get other chords. For instance, move a G major shape up two frets to play A major, move it down two frets to play F major, and so on. In all these chord diagrams, you’ll see muted strings, marked with X’s. Use your fretting fingers for muting—just touch the unwanted strings lightly so they don’t ring. For

3 4 5 5

3 2 4 5

3 2 4 5

AcousticGuitar.com 55

WEEKLY WORKOUT

BEGINNERS’

TIP 1

Notice that many of these movable shapes are simplifications of barre chords you already know—with fewer strings and no barre.

instance, in the first G shape in Ex. 1, lean your ring finger against the fourth string to mute it, and mute the top two strings by resting your index finger on them (not pressing down). For the G/D in measure 1, mute the first string with the pad of your index finger, and also touch the sixth string with your ring finger. Muting the strings in this way allows you to strum all six strings—you’ll hear the fretted notes along with a percussive scratch on the muted strings. Not all of the chords in Ex. 1 have the root in the bass. Some have the fifth of the chord in the

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56 November 2015

bass (G/D, Cm/G) or the third in the bass (G/B). These inversions can provide a nice change-up from standard root-based chord voicings, as you’ll hear in the examples that follow. In Ex. 2, try out some of these movable major or minor shapes in a short progression in the key of D. You can play this with a pick or fingerstyle—both work well (playing fingerstyle allows you to pick only the fretted strings, so you don’t need to worry as much about muting). Throughout, the chord shapes are grouped in the same area on the neck to provide a smooth route through the progression; you start high on the neck, move down to the middle, and wind up around the third fret.

There are alternatives to barre chords that are also movable but are leaner, lighter sounding, and easier on the fingers. WEEK TWO This week, get bluesy by working with the seventh- and ninth-chord shapes shown in Ex. 3. The first G7 in measure 1 is a sweetsounding voicing that requires much less muscle than a barre-chord G7 would; take out the B string to get the second G7 shape, which is even easier to fret and move around. That three-string G7 actually doesn’t have all the notes of a G7—there is no D note. Other chords here are missing notes too—in fact, there is no G in the two G7/D shapes, the G7/B, the G9/B in measure 4, or the G9/D in measure 5. It might seem strange to call these G chords when they don’t even have G’s in them, but in context your ears fill in the root. Now try out some of these new shapes in Ex. 4, based on T-Bone Walker’s slow blues “Stormy Monday,” as played by the Allman Brothers. The example is built around G7 and C7 chord shapes, with some embellishments: in measure 1, slide from the third to the fifth fret and back again on the B and D strings, then do the same thing in measure 2 on the C7 (this time sliding up and down on the high E and G strings). In the second half of measure 3, move the G7 shape up a fret for a G#7, then shift back down to G7 for measure 4. Ex. 5 uses part of the progression from another classic blues song: “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out,” written in the ’20s by Jimmy Cox and famously covered by

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WEEK 2

WeekTwo Two Week Ex. 3 Ex. 3

GG 77

GG 77

x 243 x x 1 x1243

x 34 x xx x 2 x234

˙ && ˙˙˙ ˙˙ ˙˙

˙˙ ˙˙ ˙˙

33 44 33 33

44 33 33

BB

Ex.4 4 Ex.

GG 77 x 3 x2 34 21 4x1 x 8 fr. 8 fr.

˙ ˙˙ ˙˙ ˙ 88 1010 99 1010

GG 77

7/D GG 7/D

7/B GG 7/B

7/D GG 7/D

9/B GG 9/B

x 13 x xx x 9 fr. 2 x213

x 1 x3 1x34 xx4 x

x 2 xx214x 14 x x 4 fr. 4 fr.

1 324 x 1 x324 x x

9 fr.

˙˙ ˙˙ ˙˙ 1010 99 1010

˙ ˙˙ ˙˙ ˙

˙˙ ˙˙ ˙˙

˙˙ ˙˙˙ ˙˙ ˙

33 33 22

66 44 55

3 2 3 2

CC 77

x 243 x x 1 x1243

GG 99

x 213 x 213 x 4 x 4 9 fr. 9 fr.

˙ ˙˙ ˙˙ ˙ ˙˙

1010 1010 99 1010

3 2 3 2

#7#7 GG

GG 77

x 213 x 213 x4 x4

GG 77

x 243 x x 1 x1243

9/D GG 9/D

x 2134 x 134 x 2134 x x 9 fr. 2 x2134 x x 9 fr. 9 fr. 9 fr.

˙˙ ˙˙ ˙˙ ˙˙

˙˙ ˙˙ ˙ ˙˙ ˙

1010 1010 99 1010

1010 1010 99 1010

GG 77

x 243 x x 1 x1243

x 243 x x 1 x1243

j j œ œ œj œ œ œœ œ œ œ œ ‰ œ .œœ .. œ œœ # œ# .œ .. œ œ œ .œœ .. œ œ# œ# œn œn .œ . œ œœ ‰ # #1212 œ œœ œj œœj œ œjœ œ œ œ œ ‰ œ œ # j j œ œ œ œ œ œ ‰ & 8 j j œ & 8 n œn œ jœ œœ œ œ j œ œœ œ # œœ œœ jœœ œ J œ jœœœ œœœœ œœ‰ n œœn ..œ . œœ œ # #œ ..œ . œ œ n œœn ..œ . œ œ# #œ œn nœ .œ . œœ œ‰ œ. . œ Jœ œ œ œ œ. œ œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ .œ . œ œ œ œ # œ# .œ . œ œ œ œ œ .œ . œ œ œœ . 3 3 3 35 5 3 3 44 3 3 3 35 5 3 3 3333 333

BB Ex.5 5 Ex.

CC

2 xx x 2 xxx 13 13 8 fr.

8 fr.

4œ œ &&44 4 œœ œœ

33 4 44 4 3 33 3 33 3

7/B EE 7/B

AA 77

x 13 xxxx 6 fr. 2 x213

x 34 xxxx 5 fr. 2 x234

6 fr.

œ œœ œ# œœ œœ œ # œ œ œ

3 3 3 35 5 3 3 33 3 3 3 35 5 3 3 3 33 3 22 2 22 2 3333 3 3 3 33 3

5 fr.

œœ œœ œœ

Eric Clapton. Notice how well these three-string chord shapes fit together as you move from C to E7/B to A7. Strum this in a percussive “choked” style, cutting off each chord quickly (shorter than the quarter-note duration shown) by loosening your fretting fingers right after you 9 9 9 this 9 7 7 control 7 7 over strum. Having kind of easy 66 66 10 10 10 ring10 how long notes is one of the big benefits of 8 8 7 8 8 7 77 using chord forms with no open strings.

BB

WEEK THREE This week, work with one more set of movable shapes, for the jazzy major seventh, major ninth, sixth, minor seventh, and diminished chords. Play through the shapes in Ex. 6. With the Gmaj7 and Gmaj9 in measure 2, you can also move the bass note from the fifth string to the sixth at the same fret in order to put a D in the bass instead of the root. In measure 3, the second G6 is just a reduction of the first. The last chord in this series, Cdim, may look familiar: it’s the same shape used for the E7/B in Ex. 5, just one fret higher. In fact, this Cdim shape could be considered an F7/C. Similarly,

33 44 33 33 3

DD mm

x 13x 13 x 2 xx2 x 5 fr. 5 fr.

3 4 3 3

3 4 3

44 55 44 3 3 44 4

4 5 4 4

7/E AA 7/E

x 2 xx214x 14 x x 6 fr. 6 fr.

G9/Bœ shape œ œ œœ4, could œ œœ also# œœ# œœ œbeœ called # œœ#the œœ œ a Bm7 œœ œin5.Ex.(Jumping œœ4,œœmeasure œœ ahead œœinœ the œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ lesson,œ you can œ see œthis shape in Ex. 10,   measure 12, as a C m7 5.) Sometimes the same chord shape can serve different purposes, and 6 of 8 8 have different names, depending 6 6on the6 key 6 6 6 6 6 the 6 6 6 66 function 5 chord’s 5 5 song 5 5 and5 the 55 77 7in7 the 5 5 5 5 77 progression. 55 55 55 55 In Ex. 7, practice moving between a Gmaj7 and a C9/G; this is the main chord change in the off-the-beaten-track Pink Floyd tune “San Tropez.” The pattern in Ex. 8, Gmaj7 to Dmaj7, is similar to what John Mayer uses in “Clarity”; play fingerstyle and for the backbeat percussion (marked with X’s in the notation) use your fretting hand to lightly slap the strings. Finally, in Ex. 9, try out a classic swing-style turnaround that, in numbers terms, goes from I (in this case, G6) to Idim (Gdim) to ii (Am7) to V (D7/A). Your fingers remain on the sixth, fourth, and third strings throughout and only move a couple of frets—it’s a very efficient pattern.

4 5 4

33 33 44 33 44 33 33 44 33 4 3 3 4 3 3 3

33 44 33 3

DD mm

x 13x 13 x 2 xx2 x 5 fr. 5 fr.

œœ œœ œœ

œ œœ œ œœ œ œœ œ œœ œœ œ œœ œ œœ œ œœ œ BEGINNERS’

88 66 77

For Ex. 4, count the 12/8 6 6 in groups 66 6 6three:6 6 time of 17 27 3, 2 7 27 3, 3 2 73,74 2 3.7 7 55 55 55 55

TIP 2

BEGINNERS’

TIP 3

For additional practice with major seventh chords, check out ’70s hits by America like “Tin Man,” which mostly moves between Gmaj7 and Cmaj7.

AcousticGuitar.com 57

œ œ .

œ œ œ

3 3 5 4 WEEKLY WORKOUT 3 3 5

B

3

Ex. 5

3 4 4 3 3

3

3

3

C

13 x 2 xx

3

3 3

E 7/B

2 x 13 xx

8 fr.

œ. œ œ #œ. œ œ œ. œ

.

3

3

5

3

3

3 2 3

3

5

3

3 3 2 2 3 3

3

3

A7

2 x 34 xx

6 fr.

œ #œ œ

œœ œ

# œœ œ

œœ œ

œœ œ

œœ œ

9

9

10 8

10 8

7 6

7 6

6 5

6 5

6 5

6 5

7

7

5

5

5

5

WEEK 3Three Week Week Three Week Three Ex.Three 6 Week Ex. 6 G maj7 G maj7 G maj7 G maj9 G6 Ex. 6 x 1324 x x 2 14 x x G maj9 x 2143 x 1 x 342 x GGmaj7 GGmaj7 GG626x143 x Ex. 6 GGmaj7 maj7 maj7 maj7 G maj9 10 fr. 9 fr. 9 fr. x x 2143 x x 143 x 342 x 14 x x 2G Week Three G1 x1maj7 Gx1324 Gx2xmaj7 x 342 x xmaj7 x fr. 132410 2 14 x9x fr. Gxmaj9 21439x fr. 2 x6 143 x x 1324 x 10 fr. x 2 14 x x 9 fr. x 2143 x 9 fr. 1 x 342 x 2 x 143 x 10 fr. 9 fr. 9 fr. Ex. 6

&˙˙˙˙ # ˙˙˙ & && ## ˙˙˙# ˙ ˙ ˙ & # ˙˙˙ 3 ˙343 44 3 44 4 B BB 34343 3 B Ex. 7443 Ex. G maj7 Ex.77 Ex. B 7 G3maj7x x G maj7 G maj7 1 x 342 x

1 342 1 x 342 x x 342 x 1maj7 1 x 342 x

x 2143 x

G6

˙ ˙˙˙˙˙˙ ˙ ˙˙˙ ˙ ˙343

2 x 143 x

10 11 10 10 9 11 10 11 10 9 119 10 910 10 11 9 10

11 9 11 11 10 9 119 10 910 10 11 9 10

œœ œ œ 3 4 4

œ œœœœ œœ œ œœœ œ œœœœœœœ œ œ œ œœœ 3 œœ œœ œ3 4 œ œ4434 4 œ 334434 3

4 4 3 44 3 34 4 33 33 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4

1 34

34 x x G1 x1maj7 x 34 x x

3

3

1 x 34 x x

G maj7 #

# #x xx œœ & # & œœ œœ && œœœœ œœœœ # œœ œœ & œœ œœ œ4 44œ4 B444 444 BB 4343 34343 B 43 43 4 4 B 3 3 1 34

58 November 2015

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43 4 43 3 44 44 4 4 3 4 4 33 3 3 3 4 4 4 4

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˙˙ ˙ ˙

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¿¿ ¿

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x 2 14 xx 4 fr. 4 fr.

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66 44 6 55 4 5 6 4 5

6 4 66 5 44 6 55 4 5 6 4 5

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A 7/E

44 5 6 55 4 5 6 4 5

3

3 4 3

3

3

Dm

x 13 x 2 x

6 fr.

5 fr.

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6

6

8 6

6

6

6

7 5

8 6

6

7 5

7

7

7 5

7 5

7 5

7 5

C m7 C m7 C dim C dim x 2 x 34 x C m7 x 2314 x C dim 2 x 34 xx 2 x 13 xx CCm7 CCdim m7 C m7 dim C dim 8 fr. 7 fr. xC x 34 xx x 2314 x 2 xm7 34 x 2C 2 x dim 13 xx C C x 2 x 34 x x 34 xx xdim 2 m7 2314 x 2 x 13 xx 8 fr. 7 fr.

x 2 x 34 x

b b ˙˙ b ˙ b ˙ b˙ b b ˙˙˙˙ ˙ ˙ b b ˙˙ ˙4 43 C m7

˙˙ ˙

x 2 x 34 x

3 992 x 134 x x 2 x 134 x 134 x 29 2 x 134 x

C 9/Gœ

b œbœœœœ b œœ œœ b œœ œ33 œ323 3

b œ œœ œ œœœ œ œœœ œœ 3 œ 3 œ 2 3 œ33233

2 x 134 x

2 x 34 xx

8 fr. 8 fr.

˙ ˙˙˙ 8˙fr. ˙˙˙ ˙ ˙ ˙˙˙ ˙ 8

C m7

b˙ b b˙˙b ˙˙ b b ˙˙ ˙ b b ˙˙˙˙˙˙ b˙ b ˙˙˙ 4 2 4 C dim

x 2314 x

3

8

œœ œ œœœœœ œ œœœ œœ 3 œ 3 œ 2 3 œ33233

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œœ œœœœœ œœœ œœ 3œ 3œ 23 œ33233

2 13

2 14

2 13

7 fr. 7 fr.

˙ ˙˙˙ 7˙fr. ˙˙˙ ˙ ˙˙˙ ˙ 8

C dim

2 x 13 xx

88 7 77 8 8 7 88 8 7 8

œœ œ œœœœœ œ œœœ œœ 3 œ 3 œ 2 3 œ33233

œœ œ œœœœœ œ œœœ œœ 3 œ 3 œ 2 3 œ33233

œœ œ œ 3 3 2

32 3 3 3 22 3 22 3 2 33 33 33 3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 A m7 D 7/A xx D 7 2 x 343 2 x 13 xx3 m7 /A 3 AA 3 m7 7 x 34 xx xD xx/A 2A 2D 13/A x 34 xx xx 2 m7 2 x713

# ## # x x x9 x xx x xx Ex. # G6 G dim A m7 ¿ x xx œ œx xx œ œ x xx œœ ¿¿ œœ œ œœ œ œœ n œ œœ œ œœœ œœœ œœ œ œœ œnn œœœn œ # œ œœœœ œ œœœ œœœœ œœ œœ # # œ œ œœ œœ œœœ œœœ #n œœœ œœœ œœ œœ ¿¿ œ 4 œ 4# œ 4 œ 4 œ 5 œ ¿ 44242 2 44242 2 44343 3 44343 3 55555 555555 2 14

2 x 13 xx

4 24 4 3 42 2 4 33 4 3 4 2 4 3

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TheWORLD’S LARGEST COLLECTIONof theFINEST CLASSICAL and FLAMENCO GUITARS IN ONE SHOWROOM

Visit GuitarSalon.com for Videos, Articles, Player Profiles, Luthier Biographies and More (877) 771- 4321

WEEKLY WORKOUT

LISTEN TO THESE

BEGINNERS’

TIP 4

In Ex. 10, strum all the quarter notes with downstrokes. For the eighth notes (measures 8, 18, 19) use a down-up strum.

Allman Brothers Band At Fillmore East Capricorn

Eric Clapton Unplugged Reprise / Duck / MTV

WEEK FOUR To wrap up this workout, play a longer progression that uses a variety of chord shapes covered in the previous weeks. The inspiration for Ex. 10 is the Beatles’ “Honey Pie,” written by Paul McCartney as an homage to the vaudeville songs he and John Lennon loved growing up. The example uses a lot of string percussion on the backbeats, in big-band swing style; the basic pattern is to strum on beats 1 and 3 and loosen your fretting hand to get snare-drumlike snaps on beats 2 and 4. In measures 7 and 8, play a turnaround similar to the one in Ex. 9, in this case going from I (G6 and then G/B) to bVI (Eb7/Bb) to V (D7/A). In measure 9, there’s a long but quick slide up the neck to the F# at the ninth fret that launches into the second section of the song. In measure 18, jump back to the top for one last run through of the first section. Add a clarinet (or kazoo!) solo over these changes and you’ll really have the sound dialed in.

Look for groups of chord voicings that are close together on the neck, so you can move easily from chord to chord. As you are working on your own songs and arrangements, if you feel boxed in by barre chords, try substituting these movable shapes. Look for groups of chord voicings that are close together on the neck, so you can move easily from chord to chord, and try the progression in a few locations—below the fifth fret, around the middle of the neck, and up high. You are bound to discover some fresh sounds, and your fingers will no doubt appreciate the break from barre hopping. AG 60 November 2015

WEEK 4 Week Four Ex. 10

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AcousticGuitar.com 61

ACOUSTIC CLASSIC

Acoustic ‘Meddle’ Pink Floyd’s ‘Fearless’ has become an indie-folk fave

Pink Floyd Meddle Harvest

BY ADAM PERLMUTTER

he original recording of Pink Floyd’s “Fearless,” from the rock group’s 1971 album Meddle has a dreamy atmosphere thanks to layers of electric guitars, with their volume swells, intertwined with a meandering electric bass line. But as you’ll see in this arrangement, the song, which has been covered by such singersongwriters las Tom Freund and Mary Lou Lord, works just as well as a standalone strummer. “Fearless” was written in open-G tuning. In case you’re not familiar with this tuning, in which the open strings form a G chord, start out in standard and then lower strings 1 and 6

T

62 November 2015

down by a whole step, to D from E, and string 5 down by that same interval, to G from A. Though the original Pink Floyd version clocks in at more than six minutes, it shouldn’t be overly difficult for you to learn the song, as it contains lots of repetition. The tune is played with basic 16th-note strumming throughout. Keeping your pick hand moving in continuous up-and-down movement should help you cop the proper groove. A potential trouble area is bar 2 (and elsewhere in the song), where notes from the D major scale are played in octaves along strings

3 and 5, with syncopation. The good news is that you can use one fingering—your second finger on string 5 and your third on string 3— to play all of the octaves. The key to nailing this part is properly articulating the rhythms. If needed, learn the measure very slowly, counting, “One-ee-and-uh, two-eeand-uh,” etc. throughout, so that you can clearly see where the notes line up in relation to the beat. Also, as indicated by the accent marks in standard notation, be sure to give the octaves a bit of extra emphasis, so that they stand out amidst all those ringing open strings. AG

FEARLESS

WORDS AND MUSIC BY DAVID GILMOUR AND ROGER WATERS

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FEARLESS

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64 November 2015

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AcousticGuitar.com 65

ACOUSTIC CLASSIC

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A Bluegrass Reverie

40 years down the road, ‘Midnight Moonlight’ is still a howl

Peter Rowan

BY ADAM PERLMUTTER

uring his three-decade run with the Grateful Dead, guitarist Jerry Garcia participated in a handful of side projects, often revisiting his acoustic roots. One such project, Old & in the Way, was a bluegrass super-group with guitarist (and ex-Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys member) Peter Rowan, mandolinist David Grisman, fiddler Vassar Clements, and bassist John Kahn. The ensemble was short-lived, but enduring, becoming a major mover in the progressive-bluegrass movement. Its 1975 selftitled album was the top-selling bluegrass album of all time until the soundtrack to the 2000 movie O Brother, Where Art Thou took that honor.

D

66 November 2015

Rowan penned the track “Midnight Moonlight,” and it is both a great song and, with its extended solo section, a showcase for the quintet’s virtuosity. The tune kicks off with a descending melodic line on banjo, harmonized in diatonic thirds above on the mandolin. This part, arranged here for guitar, also appears in the interludes and the outro. As for the basic accompaniment pattern, try the boom-chuck, notated here for a portion of the verse, with roots and fifths (“booms”) on beats 1 and 3 and chordal strums (“chucks”) on 2 and 4. Play the pattern using downstrokes exclusively, and feel free to toss in an upstroke eighth-note strum

here and there on the “ands” of 2 and 4. Note, too, the bass-note walk-ups between the A and E chords and the D and G. Be sure to maintain a consistent rhythm as you transition between strumming the chords and picking the walk-ups. The solos are built on the repeating progression of A to C, with each chord occupying two measures. If you’re new to soloing, try sticking to notes from the A major scale (A B C# D E F# G#) for the A chord and the C major scale (C D E F G A B) for the C. Start at a slow tempo, increasing it as you gain confidence in toggling between the chords. AG

MIDNIGHT MOONLIGHT

Chords

WORDS AND MUSIC BY PETER ROWAN

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2. If you ever feel sorrow

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©1975, 1978 UNIVERSAL - SONGS OF POLYGRAM INTERNATIONAL, INC COPYRIGHT RENEWED. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY PERMISSION REPRINTED BY PERMISSION OF HAL LEONARD CORPORATION

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ACOUSTIC CLASSIC

Billy Joe Shaver

Game Theory

On ‘Checkers & Chess,’ outlaw-country artist Billy Joe Shaver casts an eye on class differences BY ADAM PERLMUTTER

he original outlaw-country musician, Billy Joe Shaver, might not have achieved the notoriety of his cohorts Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings. But he’s always been a brilliant songwriter, as can be witnessed on such classics as “Good Christian Soldier,” “Willy the Wandering Gypsy and Me,” and, more recently, on “Checkers & Chess,” from the 2014 album Long in the Tooth (Lightning Rod). The song is a wry commentary on class differences from a true American honky-tonk hero. The original recording features two electric guitars, panned left and right, playing interlocking chordal stabs, while an electric bass lays down the classic root-fifth lines. A good option for a single acoustic guitar would be to play a time-honored accompaniment with a

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root-fifth bass pattern on beats 1 and 3 and chord strums on beats 2 and 4. To learn the song, first make sure that you’re familiar with the chord frames shown to the left of the notation. Then take a stab at the accompaniment pattern depicted in notation in tab. Hold down each chord shape for a full measure, while picking and strumming all in downstrokes, squarely on each beat. If you feel at all unsure in playing this passage, use a metronome, and be sure to lock in tightly with the clicks. Take things as slowly as needed to play the pick-hand part cleanly and with a consistent drive. After you’re comfortable with the four bars shown here, extend the pattern to the remaining chords, and you should be able to polish off the song pretty quickly. AG

CHECKERS & CHESS

WORDS AND MUSIC BY BILLY JOE SHAVER AND RAY KENNEDY

Billy Joe Shaver

Long in the Tooth Intro/Basic Accompaniment Pattern Accompaniment Pattern Intro/Basic Accompaniment Pattern Lightning Rod

Chords Chords Chords

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Chorus E C #7 # E B F7 B7 I’m playing checkers while they’re playing chess E A E A B Intro Repeat Chorus They make the big moves that make me a little less ##m A B E C #m # A B Intro E C7 2. The day we’re Repeat born we’re all bought and sold m Chorus F #7 B7 E Interlude # Even when I win #and beat the pants off of the best Some cut from the cloth straight from the king’s robe Cm #A77# B 77 E # A B 7 A B E E The rest of us Interlude can’t even be pawns F7 B7 7 Chorus E C #7 I’m still playing checkers while they’re playing chess But we wear a soldier’s uniform A B and die for their cause # E B F7 B7 Chorus E C #7 I’m playing checkers while they’re playing chess E A E # # # Cm A Repeat Chorus m m E# B F #7 B7 A m B 1. I learned all the rules to their game ##7 I’m playing checkers while they’re playing chess E A E # #7make the big7 moves that make me a little less They #777 7 E7 B7 Tag A B A B E C #7 2. The day we’re born we’re all bought and sold # Fair and square you winthe or big losemoves ’em just sameme a little less A B E C7 Theyplay make thatthemake Even when I win and beat the pants off of the best Some cut from the cloth straight from the king’s robe # C #m A A I’m still playing2.checkers while they’re playing chess and sold B E C7 The day we’re born we’re all bought A B E The rest of us can’t even be pawns # 6 Nothing’s fair in this world of lying shame # Even when I win and beat the pants off of the best # from the king’s robe7 F 7 B7 E9 Some cut from the cloth straight 7 I’m still playing checkers while they’re playing chess But we wear a soldier’s uniform and die for their cause F #7 B7 A B E The rest of us can’t even be pawns #7 ##77 7 #7 a soldier’s uniform The rich man steals the money the poor man takes the playing blame chess I’m still playing checkers while they’re 7 But we wear and die for their cause ##7Chorus C #m A Repeat #77 1. I learned all the rules to their game C #m A Repeat Chorus E B7 Tag 1. I learned all the rules to their game Fair and square you play win or lose ’em just the same A B E C #7 E B7 Tag # Cm A I’m still playing checkers while they’re playing chess Fair and square you play win or lose ’em just the same A B E C #7 6 Nothing’s fair in this world of lying shame #7 ## B7 # F E # 9 checkers while they’re playing chess Cm A 7 I’m 77still playing F #7 B7#7 Nothing’s fair in this world of lying shame F #7 B7 E69 The rich man steals the money the poor man takes the blame F #7 B7 #mrich man steals the money the poor man takes the blame The ##m

Intro Intro A A F F

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Repeat Repeat Chorus RepeatChorus Chorus

BJ SHAVER MUSIC (BMI). ©2014, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. PRINTED BY PERMISSION

Interlude Interlude Interlude A Intro Intro AA Chorus BB Repeat Repeat ChorusB Repeat ChorusRepeat Chorus ##7 Chorus E C #777 Chorus AE B E C A B E C E C E C C EF B F B E B FE B EB E FF BB7777 Interlude Interlude Interlude E B Interlude I’m playing playing checkers checkers while while they’re playing playing chess E A E I’m E EB A A I’m playing checkers while they’re they’re playing chess chess A EB AA B E B A AChorus B A B Chorus A EE C C C##77 B E C E They make make the the big big moves moves that that make me a little less They E E B make FF B B B77 They bigBmoves that make me me aa little little less lessF B make the B F A checkers B they’re E chess C 2. The A B E C I’m playing while I’m playingplaying checkers whileplaying they’re 2. day we’re bo EE Eday A EEbo Awe’re A B E playing chess C E A E E A 2. The The day we’re bo heckers while they’re chess Even when when II win win and and beat beat the pants of the best Some cut from th Even off A B the AEven B off Some when beat the pants pants off of of the the best best Some cut cut from from th t B I win and A B E The rest of us can Amake B Theymoves make the big moves make memake less They the moves a littleE The ca less A Ba littleme Eless The rest rest of of us us can ca e big that make mebig athat little lessthat I’m still playing checkers while they’re playing chess But we wear a so I’m still playing checkers while Ethey’re chess B E playing EC while A still B checkers But wear aabo so 2.born The day born we’re 2. The day we’re 2.we’re The day we’re bo I’m they’reCplaying playing C chess But we wear sa B A 2. The day we’re we’re all we bought and I win andIbeat the off pants of the off best when winofand beat of the best cutSome from the cloth st bestSome cut from Some cut from th Some cutfrom fromthe winEven and when beatEven the pants off thepants best the the cloth straight AB E CA Repeat Chorus A C AcousticGuitar.com 69 even A m E Repeat Chorus The rest ofThe uspawns can’t rest of The rest of us us ca cab C m A Repeat Chorus B EB The rest of us can’t even be 1. I learned all the rules to their game

74

Guitar Guru The old vs. the new

76

New Gear Phoenix’s dazzling Nylon String OM

78

New Gear Recording King goes for vintage vibe

AG TRADE

SHOPTALK

Building the Dream

Sturgill Simpson, and his custom Martin

Rising country star Sturgill Simpson gets an exceptional Martin dread BY MARC GREILSAMER

on’t look now, but Sturgill Simpson has taken the country-music world by storm. Few country artists in recent memory have generated the kind of excitement that Simpson has, thanks to his finely crafted songs and exhilarating, hard-edged performances. Adding to the enthusiasm, Simpson recently acquired a custom Martin dreadnought that has acousticguitar aficionados all abuzz. “They made me the guitar of my dreams,” Simpson wrote on his Facebook page this past spring. “There are no words. I am completely humbled. . . . It goes without saying we’ll be spending a lot of time together . . . .” The guitar in question is a 12-fret dread with torrefied Adirondack spruce top and nonscalloped Adi bracing, mahogany back and sides, slotted headstock, 17/8-inch nut width,

D

straight bridge, no pickguard, single-ring rosette, and ultra-thin lacquer finish. “It is a well-thought-out masterpiece,” says Chris Thomas, director of artist relations at Martin Guitar, “with a strong emphasis on tone and functionality, more so than pearl inlay and exotic woods.” According to Thomas, Simpson was inspired by the Ditson 111 reissue that Martin did back in 2007, and he cited that particular model when they sat down to finalize the design. “Sturgill knew exactly what he wanted, right down to the level of ‘roasting’ for the Vintage Tone System (VTS) for the Adirondack,” Thomas explains. (For those curious, the spec sheet calls it an “M-2 grade roast.”) “Having one of the first VTS systems coming out of the Custom Shop since torrefaction was

introduced in 2014, Sturgill is a great example of a player who has embraced this process of ‘pre-aging’ the top wood and braces to replicate an acoustic guitar from the ’30s or ’40s that has aged naturally.” Since the day he received his custom Martin, Simpson has spent a lot of time with his new companion, which has accompanied him on stages from the Newport Folk Festival to Conan O’Brien’s TV show. “The design comes from a deep appreciation for traditional bluegrass and country music,” Simpson says, “in both of which the Martin dreadnought sound plays a historical and paramount role.” If you haven’t yet been bitten by the Simpson bug, he’ll be on his “Living the Dream” tour through November, including a sold-out threenight run at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium. AcousticGuitar.com 71

SHOPTALK

Cole Clark AN3EC-BB

ANGELFOTO

SANTA CRUZ REVEALS NEW STRING LINE

IMPORTANT IMPORTS At the recent Summer NAMM in Nashville, three significant international brands announced new US distribution arrangements for their acoustic guitars. Australia’s Cole Clark, whose products combine traditional construction techniques with modern designs, has a new exclusive US distribution and marketing agreement with Musiquip Inc., with the hopes of making its guitars easier to find throughout North America. Cole Clark’s steel-string guitars are distinguished, in part, by their integral neck construction, or “neck-through” design, in which the one-piece neck is extended all the way to the soundhole. “We make a guitar the way the Spanish have been making nylon-string guitars for 300 years,” says Cole Clark CEO Miles Jackson. As for his company’s unique pickup system, which combines under-saddle piezos for the bottom end, a face-sensor system for the midrange, and a condenser mic for the highs, he says, “We, and our artists, believe that we 72 November 2015

have the most realistic, true acoustic-guitar sound amplified.” Jackson also affirmed the company’s strong commitment to sustainability and native Australian tonewoods. Meanwhile, Faith Guitars, based in Shropshire, England, has been producing quality instruments for more than a decade, based largely on the designs of world-renowned luthier Patrick James Eggle. At Summer NAMM, Faith Guitars announced its partnership with Connolly Music for distribution in the United States. In the world of nylon-string guitars, the Ortega Guitars brand was officially launched in the United States. Ortega’s instruments are available in a wide range of styles and price points—it also offers mandolins, ukuleles, banjos, and acoustic basses. Of particular interest is Ortega’s unique 12-hole bridge, which helps with tuning stability, tonal clarity, and ease of string changing. —M.G.

Also at Summer NAMM in Nashville, Santa Cruz Guitar Co. unveiled its new line of Parabolic Tension Strings. The decade-long project is based on the idea that tension, rather than gauge, is what determines each string’s optimal relative volume; therefore, tension-based string sets will be most effective at driving complex acoustic tones and will allow for more control over the guitar’s overall sound. “A string’s tension determines its amplitude; its gauge does not,” explains SCGC head honcho Richard Hoover. “The relative amplitude between strings (EQ) is what we want to control, as this determines the guitar’s feel and allows us to maximize the full potential that we built into the instrument.” SCGC turned to longtime friend and legendary acoustician Roger Siminoff for help in developing the new product. Siminoff ’s Straight Up Strings for banjo and mandolin, which are engineered with compensated down pressure for optimum balance based on saddle location, served as an inspiration. By precisely manipulating the strings’ core-to-wrap ratios, Santa Cruz is able to accurately manage individual string tensions, creating a supremely balanced sound output that, the company claims, simply can’t be matched by traditional gaugebased strings. “Buying strings by gauge is like accepting where your car’s manufacturer sets the rearview mirror,” Hoover adds. “Santa Cruz strings are instead made to precise tensions, giving SCGC complete control over the sound and feel of their guitars.” All of SCGC’s production models will be fitted with these strings going forward. In addition, customer demand for the “strings that came with my new Santa Cruz guitar” spurred the company to introduce and sell individually packaged sets of low- and mid-tension strings. —M.G.

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1933 Martin 12-fret D-28

GUITAR GURU

Antique Mystique Do vintage guitars live up to their reputation? BY DANA BOURGEOIS

Q

I’m curious about the mystique of old guitars. I know that a mid-’30s Martin D or OM is a highly sought after and expensive guitar, and I understand the value of such an instrument as a piece of antique “historical furniture,” but I have never actually played one. On the other hand, I have played and owned some great contemporary instruments that cost less than $5,000. Is there really much difference, tonewise, in an 80-plus-year-old guitar and a well-played fiveor ten-year old guitar, or is it just a case of the “emperor’s new clothes”? Fred Finke Thornton, Colorado

GOT A QUESTION? Uncertain about guitar care and maintenance? The ins-and-outs of guitar building? Or a topic related to your gear?

74 November 2015

A

The short answer is that the best vintage guitars sound pretty dang amazing. On closer inspection, though, the picture can be more complicated. Vintage guitars simply have their own sound. It’s the real deal if you play roots-influenced music. If your music is decidedly nonrootsy, maybe not. And not all vintage guitars sound equally good. Those that are structurally compromised or have been poorly repaired can sound downright disappointing relative to their price tags. Many mid-’30s guitars have imprecise fret and saddle locations and may not play in tune like modern guitars, requiring frequent retuning on a song-by-song basis and a sophisticated playing technique. A vintage instrument that doesn’t get played a lot may require a break-in period each time it’s played—or maybe just sometimes—taking a while to achieve optimum tonality, then sometimes losing fullness again, like an over-oxidized wine. The sound of an older guitar, with a rich, complex voice that easily saturates a room or barks out in a parking lot pickin’ session, can be vexingly difficult to accurately capture in the studio without Alison Krauss’ recording budget, or impossible to amplify and mix without equipment more valuable than the guitar itself (not to mention a sound engineer

Ask Acoustic Guitar’s resident Guitar Guru. Send an email titled “Guitar Guru” to editor Marc Greilsamer at [email protected], and he’ll forward it to the expert luthier.

who knows how to use it). And, by the way, don’t even think about replacing those wornout original tuners. But, yes, vintage guitars can sound truly fantastic. As a player, I find that nothing gives me more sheer pleasure than test driving, and sometimes owning, a top-notch vintage Martin or Gibson. I have, in fact, devoted a career to attempting to reproduce the inimitable ideal of these amazing guitars. But, for me, the pleasure of playing the real thing is often short-lived, perhaps because I’m not enough of a player to make a truly great vintage guitar sound like I know it can. And perhaps, living inextricably in the world of contemporary guitars, I’m like a guest in the Hotel California who can check out any time I like, but can never leave. It’s a good thing to have satisfying, wellplayed, five-to-ten-year-old, $5,000 contemporary guitars—hopefully, they will serve as a seed crop for future vintage markets. Consider that when I started playing, there were no vintage guitars, only used ones. Classic guitars from the ’30s and ’40s could be found on the walls of many music stores—and at affordable prices. As the vintage market developed, though, these instruments slowly but surely became valuable and rare. The guitar world is now at a point where a great many players, like the questioner, have never experienced playing (let alone living with) the actual instruments on which our American musical heritage was forged and that serve to inspire so much of the contemporary acoustic-guitar market. To the uninitiated, I recommend seeking opportunities to experience these amazing instruments while they are still available outside museums. You might find the best ones out of your price range, but you can at least judge for yourself how the emperor’s vintage clothes compare to his new ones. Dana Bourgeois is a master luthier and the founder of Bourgeois Guitars in Lewiston, Maine.

If AG selects your question for publication, you’ll receive a complimentary copy of AG’s The Acoustic Guitar Owner’s Manual. Dana Bourgeois

AcousticGuitar.com 75

NEW GEAR Beveled armrest

Solid Engelmann spruce top with asymmetric fan bracing

Lap of Luxury

The Phoenix Guitar Co.’s Nylon String OM dazzles and delights BY ADAM PERLMUTTER

ot long ago, luthier George Leach, who builds steel-strings, nylon-strings, and archtops in Southern California under the name Phoenix Guitar Co., received a generous billet of Amazon rosewood, large enough to make the backs and sides of two guitars. To commemorate his 25th anniversary in business, Leach used this precious tonewood to craft a pair of nylon-strings—an OM-sized crossover and a more traditional model called the Jazz Classical—treating each to his fanciest structural and cosmetic options. I put the OM-sized crossover through its paces and was dazzled by this lavish custom offering.

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SMART HYBRID The typical crossover guitar—a nylon-stringed instrument borrowing aspects of steel-string design—is electro-acoustic and therefore engi76 November 2015

neered for amplified performance, but the Phoenix crossover is strictly acoustic. It’s slightly smaller than the steel-string OM body size and has a 14th-fret neck-to-body junction, as opposed to the customary 12-fret design of a classical guitar. At 17/8 inches, the nut is slightly wider than that of a standard OM, but narrower than a classical nut. (It can be custom-ordered with anywhere from a 13/4-inch to a two-inch nut.) The anniversary model boasts features seen with increasing frequency on both high-end nylon- and steel-string guitars. There’s a bevel on the lower bass bout and one on the rear of the guitar as well, for comfort at the points where a player’s forearm and ribcage meet the guitar. The upper bout features a soundport—a sort of supplemental soundhole that directs the guitar’s sound at the player’s ears. In addition to the richly colored rosewood used for the back and sides, the guitar is built

from a selection of the choicest tonewoods. (It’s also available with a variety of other wood combinations.) The asymmetrically fan-braced soundboard is top-grade Engelmann spruce, a species known for its richness of sound, and the neck is a five-layer sandwich of African mahogany, flamed maple, and walnut. DESIGN AND EXECUTION The crossover OM’s design is opulent, but not overly so. Inlaid on the headstock in abalone is a bird whose tail extends to the ninth fret—the rest of the fretboard, in contrast, has a spare modern look. A mosaic rosette of geometric shapes echoes some of the natural hues found in the instrument’s various woods while introducing a subtle prism of other colors into the design. It’s evident that the guitar was put together with great care and precision. The fretwork is

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Right Five-piece neck Far right Mosiac rosette

17/8-inch bone nut

Ebony fretboard

BODY Modified orchestra model size with Venetian cutaway Solid Engelmann spruce top with asymmetric fan bracing AT A GLANCE

PHOENIX GUITAR COMPANY NYLON STRING OM 25TH ANNIVERSARY

NECK Five-piece African mahogany, flamed maple, and walnut neck with ebony fretboard

EXTRAS D’Addario EJ46C Pro-Arte Composite, Hard Tension strings Cedar Creek hard-shell case

Solid Amazon rosewood back and sides

650mm (25.6-inch) scale length

Limited lifetime warranty

Amazon rosewood bridge

17/8-inch bone nut

Side soundport

Premium 16:1 Gotoh tuners

PRICE $9,500 as reviewed (base price from $3,500)

Shellac and water-based gloss lacquer finish

Shellac and water-based lacquer finish, sanded to satin

Made in the USA phoenixguitarco.com

impeccable and so are the notches on the bone nut and saddle. The body’s finish—a clear coat of lacquer over a light treatment of blonde shellac—is rubbed to a brilliant luster, while the neck’s finish, of the same basic composition, is sanded out for a satin-like feel. All of the inlay work shows a sharp attention to detail, and inside the guitar, things couldn’t be cleaner. The neck on the crossover will definitely appeal to the player who favors a high-performance modern profile. It’s got a fairly shallow C shape, which, in concert with a radiused fretboard and a silky low action—not to mention the semi-gloss finish—makes it terrifically comfortable to play. The guitar intonates perfectly, and there are no dead spots on the neck—even the notes at the highest frets, easily accessible by the Venetian cutaway, sound strong and clear.

LUSH LIFE Overall, the crossover has the warmth and complexity characteristic of a well-built classical guitar. No register is stronger than another, and there’s lushness to the guitar’s sound—notes seem to hang around, mist-like, even after the fretting fingers are removed from the strings. It’s also a bit punchier than the typical nylon-string, perhaps due to the neck’s maple centerpiece. And a great timbral range can be had when plucking closer to the fretboard versus the bridge. Given the instrument’s complex sound, fingerstyle jazz works particularly well on the guitar, as does bossa-nova accompaniment. Arrangements of Billy Strayhorn’s “Lush Life” and Antônio Carlos Jobim’s “One Note Samba” both benefit from the instrument’s sweetness and its clarity, the individual members of extended chords easy to parse.

And though it’s not intended as a proper classical guitar, it feels satisfying to play old and contemporary repertoire alike on the crossover. With its luxuriousness in terms of build, playability, and sound, Phoenix’s Nylon String OM 25th Anniversary model just might be the ultimate acoustic crossover guitar—an ideal instrument for a steel-string fingerstyle virtuoso looking for a fresh sonic palette. At $9,500, the instrument will only be in reach of a very select group of players. But with a base price of $3,500 for a mahogany version or $4,500 for rosewood—that’s less than the cost of many highend production models—the standard model is a hard-to-beat value for a fine handmade guitar. Adam Perlmutter transcribes, arranges, and engraves music for numerous publications. adamperlmutter.com AcousticGuitar.com 77

NEW GEAR

Little-Bitty Blues Machine Recording King’s Harmonella Single 0 offers a modern spin on a vintage vibe BY ADAM LEVY AT A GLANCE

RECORDING KING RPH-07 HARMONELLA SINGLE 0 BODY Single-0 size Solid spruce top with scalloped X-bracing Whitewood back and sides Matte sunburst finish

If you’re into smallish flattops with ear-grabbing tones and pawnshopchic looks, this budget beauty is right up your alley.

Floating rosewood bridge Metal tailpiece NECK Nato, with 12 frets clear of the body Rosewood fretboard with stenciled position markers 25.4-inch scale length 111/16-inch nut width Vintage-style tuners with plastic oval buttons EXTRAS D’Addario EJ16 phosphor-bronze light (.012–.053) Guardian vintage-style hard-shell case Limited lifetime warranty PRICE $266.99 list; $199 street Made in China recordingking.com 78 November 2015

he Recording King label has its origins in the 1930s, when the department store and mail-order retailer Montgomery Ward sold archtop and flattop guitars under that name. Over the years, some notable players have taken a shine to the old Kings, including fingerstyle iconoclast John Fahey. (You can read more about Fahey’s guitar in AG, October 2001.) The name has been revived in recent years and is one of several lines distributed by the Music Link, which also handles Johnson, the Loar, and other familiar acoustic-instrument brands. Recording King now makes guitars in many sizes and shapes—including dreadnoughts and 12-fret 000 models—built from a variety of traditional and nontraditional tonewoods. One of Recording Kings’ most intriguing series is the

T

recent Dirty Thirties line. Despite the name, not all Dirty Thirties instruments are built to replicate guitars from the Great Depression era. In fact, this RPH-07 Harmonella Single 0 actually has more in common with Stella and Harmony guitars built in the 1950s and ’60s. BARK & BITE The Harmonella Single 0’s lower bout is 13.5inches wide, as is typical of acoustic guitars with the single-0 designation. As such, it sets fairly easily in the lap and will leave the picking and strumming hand in a comfortable playing position for most average-sized folks. The Harmonella’s 12-fret neck gives it a condensed overall look and feel. You’ll never strain to reach first-position chord shapes, despite its OM-style 25.4-inch

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scale length. Playability aside, long-scale instruments such as this tend to have a little extra sparkle in the upper overtones. (If you absolutely can’t live without easy access to frets 13 and 14, Recording King does offer a Harmonella 14-fret Triple 0 model, with the same scale length.) The neck profile is a contemporary C shape— neither slender nor chunky. The bone nut’s width is 111/16 inches, with string spacing at the rosewood bridge spanning 21/8 inches, so the Harmonella will comfortably accommodate a variety of flatpicking or fingerpicking techniques. The vintage Harmony and Stella flattops on which the Harmonella is modeled typically featured ladder-braced tops, a bracing pattern that gave those instruments a focused, midrangeforward tone. The Harmonella, however, has scalloped X-bracing beneath its solid spruce top, which helps to broaden the guitar’s harmonic and dynamic range. Big bottom? No. Loads of mids with clear and biting treble? Oh, yes. Think for a moment of Robert Johnson’s recording of “Sweet Home Chicago” or “Cross Road Blues,” and you’ll have a good idea of what this guitar sounds like. THOROUGHLY MODEST The Harmonella has stencil-painted fretboard position markers, no fretboard binding, plainJane body binding, no pickguard, no rosette, and is satin-finished top to bottom. There is, literally, nothing fancy about it—and therein lies its charm. It’s not designed for bling; its looks echo the student-grade models sold via department-store catalogs long ago, many of which found their way into the hands of famed postwar bluesmen and folksingers. That’s the vibe that Recording King is going for, and they’ve pretty much nailed it. If you’re in search of an ultra-versatile instrument that covers the full frequency spectrum, the Recording King Harmonella Single 0 is probably not your dream guitar. If, however, you’re into smallish flattops with ear-grabbing tones and pawnshop-chic looks, this budget beauty is right up your alley (street price less than $200). Mount a magnetic pickup in the soundhole, and you’ll have yourself an unstoppable blues machine. AG AcousticGuitar.com 79

NEW GEAR

AT A GLANCE

GRACE DESIGN FELIX PREAMP BODY Two-channel preamp with ¼-inch mono and TRS inputs and one XLR mic input Up to 62 dB of gain 48-volt phantom power 12-volt bias power for internal guitar mics, routable to any input source EQ controls including gain, shelving bass and treble, fully parametric midrange control, and high-pass filter Dual DI outputs selectable between individual channels and mix mode Amp, tuner, and headphone outputs Effects insert Boost switch with adjustable gain Mute switch AB channel selector switch Three selectable input impedances per channel AC power, 120-240 volts, 50-60 Hz DIMENSIONS 3.2 lbs; 9.5 x 5.5 x 3 inches PRICE $1,095 list; $995 street Made in the USA gracedesign.com

80 November 2015

No Compromise

Grace Design’s flexible, feature-rich Felix preamp delivers studio-quality sound BY DOUG YOUNG

reamps or DIs are a key part of many performers’ signal chain. These devices can range from simple, passive transformers to battery-powered stomp boxes to feature-laden preamps that act as a control center for managing your tone and routing your signal to amps, PAs, monitors, and more. Grace Design is known for building highend, no-compromise studio gear, and its new preamp, humorously named Felix, fits in the control-center category, with an added focus on pristine audio. With Felix, they have started with one of their classic studio preamp designs, the Grace m101, and created a two-channel stage preamp with a host of options for EQing, mixing, and routing, all wrapped up in a rugged, road-worthy package.

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A LOT TO DISCOVER Grace describes Felix as a preamp/EQ/blender, which sums up the device’s core features, though there’s a lot more to discover. Felix’s dual-channel design offers both a ¼-inch input

jack for a guitar pickup and an XLR mic input with optional 48-volt phantom power in Channel 1. Channel 2 provides a single ¼-inch unbalanced input, but using a TRS (stereo) cable routes a stereo guitar pickup system to both Channels 1 and 2. Channel 1 provides up to 62 dB of gain, enough for even low-output microphones, while Channel 2 provides up to 36 dB. Both channels offer the same set of EQ controls: gain, shelving bass and treble controls, a fully parametric midrange control, and a highpass filter to remove unwanted low frequencies. Felix is extremely configurable: You can alter many features using a small bank of DIP switches on the side of the unit, while other options require changing internal jumpers inside the box. For example, the high-pass filter control doubles as a feedback-fighting notch filter. The bass control can be configured for a corner frequency of 125 Hz or 250 Hz, while the parametric midrange control can be set to cover a range of 70 Hz-880 Hz to focus on lower mids, or 670 Hz-8 Khz if you need to control upper mids.

Grace’s approach allows Felix to accommodate many different needs in a fairly compact package. On the output side, Felix provides a pair of XLR DI outputs, which can be switched individually between channels or offer a mix of both channels. There are also unbalanced amp, tuner, and headphone outputs, all of which produce a blend of the two channels. A mix control determines the relative level of each channel, and a volume control affects the level of the amp, headphone, and tuner outputs (but not the DI outputs). Guitarists who favor passive pickup systems know that a preamp’s input impedance can affect their tone, and Felix offers three options per channel. Channel 1 can be set to 10 kohm, 1 mohm, or 10 mohm, while Channel 2 offers 330 kohm, 1 mohm, and 20 mohm. Passive piezo pickups generally work best with the higher impedances, while some magnetic pickups may sound better at 1 mohm, or even 330 kohm; effect pedals, electronic keyboards, and so on may work best with the lower impedance settings. But you can experiment to find which setting works best for you. Felix can be used as a foot pedal or standmounted for easy access to controls. Using it on the floor provides access to three footswitches: mute, boost switch, and AB switch (to toggle between inputs). When mounted on a mic stand, Felix supports an external footswitch to control the boost and mute functions. The product comes with a well-written and occasionally humorous manual full of tips for taking advantage of all of the controls, which is worth browsing online to learn more about how Felix would fit into your setup. TEST DRIVE I tested Felix with a variety of pickups, listening directly over studio monitors as well as through an amplifier and a PA system. In spite of the extended feature set, Felix is quite straightforward to use. (I got the basics working without even reading the manual.) Using a D-Tar Wavelength undersaddle pickup installed in a Martin OM, I found the sound to be clean and clear. The EQ controls, especially the sweepable midrange, are very effective for adjusting my tone. A pair of passive pickups—a K&K Pure Western Mini soundboard transducer and a Barbera passive undersaddle pickup—provided an opportunity to explore Felix’s selectable input impedances. Passive piezo pickups are notoriously finicky about impedance, but Felix

Your Guitar is Worth it.

makes them easy to accommodate. I also appreciate the high-pass filter control, which easily cleans up some of the low mud that soundboard pickups tend to produce. Felix offers excellent support for dual-source pickups and works perfectly for a passive K&K Pure Western paired with an internal electret microphone. There are surprisingly few preamps on the market that accommodate this type of setup, but Felix not only provides the required power for the microphone, but can be configured to support various cable schemes. The high-pass filter was also very effective at taming the inherently boomy internal mic. The XLR input with 48-volt phantom power also allowed me to use an external mic, the clip-on DPA 4099. Another option would be to use a stand-mounted mic for guitar or vocals. Given that Felix is based on Grace’s studio designs, I also tried using it as a studio preamp. Recording with a Schoeps condenser mic, Felix easily held its own with my high-end studio preamps. WELL WORTH THE COST It’s difficult to identify any serious shortcomings for Felix. I wish the effects insert worked on each separate channel instead of applying only to the mix, and some may be intimidated by the idea of opening up the device to change the internal jumpers. But most guitarists will use the device as-is, or set up the configuration only once, and Grace’s approach allows Felix to accommodate many different needs in a fairly compact package. Although the preamp/DI field is crowded, Felix stands out for its studio-quality sound, excellent EQ, and extreme flexibility. The device is built like a tank, more than ready to handle rough road treatment. Guitarists who use dualsource pickup systems will be very pleased with Felix’s top-notch support of dual channels and both internal and external mics, and the variable impedance options ensure a good match for almost any pickup, including passive magnetic or piezos. Last, but not least, Felix’s routing options easily accommodate the most complex stage setup, while still being straightforward and easy to use. Felix is clearly at or near the top of the price range for guitar stage preamps, but it has the features and the quality to more than justify the cost. AG

Your Strap. Your Style.

AcousticGuitar.com 81

ON TOUR NOW!

Quality is laced throughout IT’S NEVER TOO LATE, the first studio album featuring Emmanuel completely solo since 2000. He frequently threads three different parts simultaneously into his material, operating as a ope one-man band who handles the melody, the supporting chords, and the bass all at once. A friend and follower of the late Chet Atkins – who christened Emmanuel a Certified Guitar Player - Emmanuel easily skates between bet musical styles, playing with blues, jazz, country, and folk on this album. 

TICKETS & INFO AT TOMMYEMMANUEL.COM

82 November 2015

PRESENTED BY

MATON GUITARS

ALBUM INFO AT CGPSOUNDS.COM

84

Playlist Tommy Emmanuel returns to soloacoustic format

84

Playlist Jeff Tweedy produces Richard Thompson

86

Playlist Banana revisits the Youngbloods

PLAYLIST

MIXED MEDIA Dave Rawlings Machine Nashville Obsolete Acony

David Rawlings

New Mourning The Dave Rawlings Machine delivers a stark and stunning masterpiece BY MARC GREILSAMER

or two decades, the partnership of David Rawlings and Gillian Welch has been pulling off one of the great magic tricks in modern roots music: Somehow, they’ve been able to straddle the line between raw authenticity and artistic refinement in ways that are endlessly rewarding. Their beguiling music, while steeped in country and folk traditions, is presented with a grace, elegance, and sophistication that seems to elevate it from the back porch to the theater—without sacrificing the emotional intensity and grittiness that defines roots music at its most penetrating.

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By the time you get to the end of Nashville Obsolete, the second release billed to the sarcastically named Dave Rawlings Machine (and first since 2009), you might be left with the distinct impression that you’ve just listened to an alltime classic; you can just feel it in your bones. Tasteful, thought-provoking, understated, and unhurried, the album’s seven all-original tracks burrow into your brain, its largely hushed tones commanding full attention. It’s an evocative, meticulously crafted work that perfectly captures the “relaxed gravitas” of the Welch/Rawlings team.

To his great benefit, Rawlings lets these songs stretch and breathe, the deliberate pacing providing depth and presence, along with a majestic, almost cinematic element. Acoustic guitars provide the foundation, but they are often delicately embellished by fiddle, mandolin, and, on three songs, a string section. Although much of the lyrical content comes in the form of plainspoken, vividly detailed storytelling, it retains an obtuse, inscrutable, and mysterious quality that enhances the overall impact. Two songs immediately stand out among the fare. The album’s centerpiece is a gorgeous, gently ambling 11-minute epic called “The Trip,” which features a fair bit of spoken-word recitation and some absolutely exquisite soloing by Rawlings on his trademark instrument, the ’30s-vintage small-bodied Epiphone Olympic archtop that is so central to his sound. “Pink is the color of my true love’s dress,” Rawlings says, “and black is the color of her heart.” Its chorus—“take a trip wherever your conscience has to roam, it’s much too hard to try to leave a lie at home”—epitomizes the kind of metaphysical musings that seem to inspire much of the songwriting. The closing “Pilgrim (You Can’t Go Home)” is a thoroughly engaging eight minutes of timeless, gospel-infused enchantment featuring some of Rawlings’ most moving and vulnerable vocal work, along with his own mandolin flourishes, and spine-tingling three-part harmonies (with Welch and Willie Watson). The relatively lighter, more playful tracks (at least musically) that balanced out the Machine’s debut, Friend of a Friend, are in short supply, but the two that are here provide a welcome respite from the more elegiac ruminations. (“Candy,” in particular, feels like a sequel of sorts to the first album’s “Sweet Tooth.”) Still, it’s the brooding tracks, like the dark, slowly creeping “Bodysnatchers,” with haunting fiddle work by Brittany Haas, that represent the emotional core of the album. All in all, this is a powerful, bracing work of art. It ain’t whiskey in the jar; it’s more like a single malt on the rocks—it may go down smooth, but it still burns your belly. AcousticGuitar.com 83

PLAYLIST

As a college student, Corey Harris traveled to Cameroon to study African linguistics while soaking up ancient sounds in the homeland of slaves who centuries earlier had carried that West African music to the Deep South. Harris’ 1995 debut, Between Midnight and Day, paid tribute to the West Africaninfluenced country blues that took root in the Mississippi Delta. In addition to three Deltastyle blues originals, the album included songs by such blues legends as Charley Patton, Bukka White, Sleepy John Estes, and Mississippi Fred McDowell. Harris—singing and playing solo acoustic with a National steel and a metal slide in hand— wasn’t the only young bluesman plowing that fertile soil: A year earlier, Keb’ Mo’ had released his self-titled country-blues debut on the then-recently rejuvenated Okeh label, and Kelly Joe Phelps emerged with his mournful debut, Lead Me On (Burnside). In 1996, Alvin Youngblood Hart delivered his gritty Big Mama’s Door (Okeh). But arriving five years after a Robert Johnson box set had sold 500,000 copies, Between Midnight and Day signaled that the country-blues revival was in full bloom. —G.C.

Corey Harris Between Midnight and Day Alligator

84 November 2015

Richard Thompson

Tommy Emmanuel

Still Fantasy

It’s Never Too Late CGP

Guitar wizard returns to form with help from producer Jeff Tweedy In 1996, Richard Thompson released You? Me? Us?—a two-CD album that featured a disc of “voltage enhanced” tracks and a second disc of “nude” tracks. It was a clever way to showcase both his electric and acoustic chops. On Still, producer Jeff Tweedy of Wilco has found a way to merge Thompson’s plugged and unplugged skills on tracks that often find the guitar virtuoso using one or the other as a foundation while shifting subtly between them within a single song. That approach gives Thompson’s acoustic playing plenty of opportunities to shine, whether comping or soloing. It’s most obvious on “Pony in the Stable,” a masterful display of Celtic-folk wizardry from a musician who helped define the genre as a member of Fairport Convention. He also turns tender on the hushed guitar ballad “Josephine,” a track that showcases his celestial fingerstyle acoustic playing. “Where’s Your Heart” again delves into the deep recesses of the soul, while “Dungeons for Eyes” is a bitter meditation that would be right at home on 1994’s acclaimed Mirror Blue. Thompson closes with the virtuosic “Guitar Heroes,” a playful tribute to such idols as Chuck Berry, Dale Hawkins, Django Reinhardt, and Les Paul. It finds the celebrated guitarist—tongue planted firmly in cheek—mimicking a variety of styles from surf and rockabilly to Gypsy jazz and the lounge favorite “Caravan.” Recorded beautifully at the Loft studio in Chicago, Tweedy’s sonic headquarters, Still is one of Thompson’s best albums in years. —Greg Cahill

Fingerpicking legend Tommy Emmanuel showcases his all-embracing approach In his later years, the country-guitar virtuoso Chet Atkins anointed himself a CGP (Certified Guitar Player) and also extended the honor to four others, including the Australian fingerstyle wizard Tommy Emmanuel. Though the designation was intended as whimsical, it’s easy to understand why Atkins chose to embrace Emmanuel—his deft polyphonic style built largely on Travis picking—in this highly select cohort. The full depth of Emmanuel’s approach is apparent on It’s Never Too Late, his first album of solo acoustic-guitar pieces since 2000’s Only. (He’s joined by the guitarist Tom Williamson on only one track.) Given equal footing are barnburners like “The Bug,” which combines a Trav i s - p i c k e d b a s s l i n e w i t h a T i n Pa n Alley-sounding melody, and sophisticated ballads like “The Duke” (not to be confused with the Dave Brubeck composition of the same name). At all tempos, the guitarist’s use of contrapuntal devices feels effortless, as always. The album also reflects Emmanuel’s catholic taste in music. He references everything from the country blues on “One Mint Julep” to the Spanish classical repertoire, paired with Travis picking, on “El Vaquero” to contemporary R&B with a driving swing feel on “Hope Street.” The effect never seems glib; it’s clear that Emmanuel has a deep knowledge of all styles, and he synthesizes them with cleverness and warmth, to say nothing of unpredictable, and sometimes dizzying, harmonic work. Most of the tracks on the album were recorded by Kim Person, in Emmanuel’s adopted hometown of Nashville, while three

Tommy Emmanuel

were tracked in Los Angeles by Marc DeSisto, who also mixed and mastered the album. Overall, both engineers did a fine job of capturing Emmanuel, playing mostly Yellow Mouse and Orange Mouse, his signature-model Maton EBG808’s. Wisely, no effort has been made to attenuate the guitars’ transient sounds—there’s string noise, the occasional buzzing when Emmanuel really digs into the guitar, and he can sometimes be heard singing along, kind of like the jazz pianist Keith Jarrett. As beautiful as It’s Never Too Late is, it’s not quite a perfect album. After hearing so much guitar, one craves some rests within the pieces, but these are hard to come by. In addition, some might quibble with the occasional light effects processing, which, though subtle, detracts a bit from a more natural acoustic sound. Still it’s a delightful record from a CGP—essential listening for any fan of contemporary fingerstyle guitar. — Adam Perlmutter

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Guitars in the Classroom trains, inspires, and equips classroom teachers to make and lead music that transforms learning into a creative, effective, and joyful experience for k-12 students from coast to coast and beyond.

Bobby Long Ode to Thinking Compass

Banana and friends offer lively tribute to ’60s heyday In the ’60s, the Youngbloods—vocalist and bassist Jesse Colin Young, guitarist and vocalist Banana (b. Lowell Levinger III), guitarist Jerry Corbitt, and drummer Joe Bauer—scored an enduring hit with songwriter Dino Valenti’s hippie anthem “Get Together.” Levinger, a dealer of rare stringed instruments, pulled together the three surviving Youngbloods (Corbitt had just died as the project was about to begin) to revisit some of the band’s best-known songs, including the jug-band favorite “Grizzly Bear,” Young’s “Darkness, Darkness,” Levinger’s own “Hippie from Olema,” and, of course, Valenti’s “Get Together.” He also brought along such friends as guitarists Ry Cooder and Duke Robillard, mandolinists David Grisman and Sharon Gilchrist, fiddlers Darol Anger and Blaine Sprouse, and singers Dan Hicks, Peter Rowan, and Maria Muldaur.

Contemporary British folkie delivers biting, savvy collection Bobby Long has a lot on his mind. With his third full-length album, Ode to Thinking, Long builds accessible folk-based songs on cyclical acoustic riffs coupled with corkscrewing, literate wordplay delivered in a raspy croon. After composing a university thesis on the social impact of American folk music, the 29-yearold Briton put theory into action and decamped to New York City to become a singer-songwriter. Whereas Long’s 2011 debut, A Winter Tale, showcased an ambitious artist adrift in allusion and alliteration, and the 2013 follow-up, Wishbone, submerged Long’s knotty guitar in a wash of barband bombast, Ode to Thinking gives full rein to his handcrafted playing and sardonic lyrics. Producer Mark Hallman laid down bass, rattle-trap drums, and other instrumental shadings, like the wailing rail-yard harmonica on the Americana gothic “Kill Someone” and wheezing café accordion on the Gypsy carnival two-step “The Song the Kids Sing.” As a result, this is Long’s best batch of songs to date, walking a fine line between the pleasure provided by his ringing choruses and chiming, chugging Gibson J-200, and the unease evoked by tunes like “That Little Place,” where a visit to an old homestead turns dark and turbulent. Conflicted and clouded thoughts churn beneath the surface of Long’s full-bodied melodies and full-blooded vocals. At times, his immersion in mordant Americana shades into melodrama, but that only adds to this set’s bite. Long is an observer and outsider who sees an America where tradition is laced with venom, and the rustic clapboard hides a rusty nail. —Pat Moran

A high-spirited homage to high times

Thanks to Martin Guitars and the C.F. Martin Foundation, Oriolo Guitars, the Bill Graham Foundation, and D'Addario & Co. for helping us launch the latest round of GITC programs!

Please visit

to learn more and check out GITC's first publication: The Green Songbook Available now from Alfred Music Publishing at www.GreenSongBook.com.

86 November 2015

Lowell Levinger Get Together: Banana Recalls Youngbloods Classics Grandpa Racoon

Given Levinger’s own collection of vintage acoustic guitars, he plays a number of them, including a 1928 Gibson Nick Lucas model, a 1931 Martin OM-18P (converted from a plectrum guitar to a five-string tenor), and an 1898 Howe Orme Cello Mandola (also converted to a five-string tenor). The result is a high-spirited homage to high times, all steeped in the folk, jug-band music and progressive bluegrass that blossomed in the West Marin community that inspired the Youngbloods and still serves as home to Levinger. —G.C.

beppe gambetta tony mcmanus

On Round Trip, these two master guitarists are together for the first time with a series of acoustic duets that deftly illustrate their individual virtuosity and innate ability to blend numerous musical traditions. The result is stunning new music. borealisrecords.com

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21 SONGWRITING TIPS FROM THE MASTERS Ex. 1a

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SONGWRITING BASICS FOR GUITARISTS • 21 Songwriting Tips from the Masters

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GREAT ACOUSTICS

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Guy Clark builds a nylon string for Lyle Lovett

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Guy Clark

BY MELANIE HAIKEN

ver since learning to work on boats early in his life, Guy Clark has been handy with tools and wood. His interest in stringed instruments has led to hundreds of guitar repairs, but he has built relatively few (Clark doesn’t remember the exact number), working in a shop he set up in the basement of his Nashville, Tennessee, home. He has kept some, but given most to friends. Rodney Crowell has one, and so does Jamie Hartford, who accompanies Clark with it on the Tejano-style “Cinco de Mayo in Memphis” on Clark’s Dualtone release, Workbench Songs. The guitar pictured here was given to Lyle Lovett by Clark, whose inspiration is the same each time he gives one away: to put it in the hands of someone he deeply respects. “I just thought Lyle ought to have it,” he explains. All of Clark’s handmade guitars are flamenco-style nylon-string guitars, like the ones he grew up with and learned to play on. The Cambodian rosewood back and sides set this guitar apart, giving the instrument its remarkable deepred color and making it a “flamenca negra” (a flamenco guitar with rosewood back and sides, rather than the traditional cypress). “A friend of mine, Donnie Wade, who was director of marketing at Guild guitars, found the Cambodian rosewood for me,” says Clark, who made the guitar about 20 years ago. “I’m lucky—he’ll run across some exotic wood and just give it to me. And of course, I had to use it.” The hardwood can be tricky to work with, though, Clark says. “It’s very pretty but it’s very dense and heavy. It’s hard to thin it out right.” The guitar is finished with a classic French polish. When asked if this guitar is his favorite of those he’s made, Clark thinks a minute, then says, “No, I like them all. But this one’s definitely the flashiest.”

E

This article was first published in the April 2007 issue.

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In lean times, playing in people’s houses (and crashing in their guest rooms) has become a crucial way to keep touring and stay solvent

3

GREG HORNAK

Ukulele sensation Danielle Ate the Sandwich with Carey Baer at a house show in Madison, Wisconsin

ne night in August 2014, singersongwriter Sean Rowe walked onto a stage in Massachusetts—but the stage was just a platform in the woods, next to a small hunting cabin, a supermoon shining above. Rowe and the audience of around 30 people had to hike across a bridge to reach the cabin, and everyone pitched in to carry his gear. As Rowe dug into his intense blend of folk, blues, and soul, playing his Takamine through a Princeton Reverb amp for a bit of ratty dist o r t i o n , s o m e b a c k g ro u n d n o i s e c u t through—not the usual loud conversations, sports on TV, or hiss of an espresso machine, but rather the trickling of a stream. “It was really nice to hear that at the same time as the songs,” says Rowe. “The trees were super tall, and you couldn’t see any other houses. There’s a sonic beauty when the music goes through the trees in a forest. It sort of creates an additional sound. It’s like having somebody else in the band.” This woodsy stage was just one of the unusual settings where Rowe has been performing. He still plays plenty of clubs, but a few years ago he fell in love with house concerts—small, private shows in homes, where hosts invite friends and neighbors for an

O

4 Winter 2015

evening of live music and accept donations for the performer. Rowe’s run of house concerts began when he found himself with an open window of time after finishing his album Madman (ANTI- Records). Awaiting the release, he decided to ask his Facebook fans if anyone wanted to host a show at their home. The response was tremendous, and he wound up booking six months of house concerts around the country, playing living rooms, basements, garages, decks, barns, a horse ranch, and even a mountaintop. “Every possible scenario you can think of,” says Rowe, “I pretty much did it.” House concerts are a longstanding tradition, especially in the folk world. But over the last few decades, house concerts of all kinds have proliferated around North America, from one-time gatherings hosted by fans to larger, established series that present shows throughout the year. In these lean times for professional musicians, playing in people’s living rooms (and crashing in their guest rooms) has become a crucial way to keep touring and stay solvent. Working musicians “have to figure out how to live with a third of the radio income,” says singer-songwriter Fran Snyder, creator of the house-concert booking network Concerts in Your Home.

“They have to play festivals that pay a lot less than they used to. Everything is getting smaller, because the audiences are so fragmented, and there are so many other things to do besides going to listen to music.” While house concerts are fundamentally a volunteer-driven, grassroots phenomenon, in recent years some enterprising musicians have been working to bring a new level of organization to booking and producing these shows. Concerts in Your Home, which connects performers and hosts, is one prominent example, and now Snyder also runs the annual Listening Room Festival, bringing a select group of artists to Florida for a week of house concerts—as well as office concerts, charity events, and a showcase. Another mover and shaker of the current house-concert scene is the young songwriter/ promoter KC Turner, who presents upward of 30 house concerts a year in homes around the San Francisco Bay Area. For Turner, these private venues create special bonds between the performers and the audience. “House concerts are growing rapidly because of this connection,” he says. “Once a fan and artist experience these magical moments in an intimate, listening-room environment, why would they want to try to force that in a bar setting?”

UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL

people over. You’re playing for an audience House concerts are different in many ways that’s already won over because of the from shows in clubs, coffeehouses, theaters, environment.” or other traditional venues. First of all, they House concerts also offer a chance for are private, invitation-only events. If the show less experienced musicians to learn and grow. is publicized outside the host’s own network “There’s an opportunity that’s lost when (via the performer’s website, social media, or you’re playing for an inattentive crowd: You e-mail list, for instance), attendees need to don’t really learn if your material is good or contact the host to reserve a spot and to get not,” Snyder says. “You can’t get the sort of the street address of the performance. While detailed feedback that you get when you’re commercial venues mostly sell tickets to fans playing up close and personal in a room of the artist, house-concert audiences are where the audience is not in darkness. As a often there because they are friends with the developing artist, I think that’s critical, espehost, and they may not be familiar with the cially if you’re doing understated material.” performer at all. “These are all people who Audiences who attend house concerts know each other, but most of them don’t generally have the opportunity to meet and know me, which is exciting,” Rowe says. “It’s chat with the performers, making them much pretty special if the first time you hear me is more likely to buy CDs and other keepsakes. in that setting. I really dig that aspect of it.” Snyder says he often hears from artists that Another difference is the acoustic environthey sell two or three times the number of ment. House concerts tend to be pin-drop CDs at a house concert than they do at a club, quiet and provide an ideal atmosphere for even if the crowd is smaller. many acoustic musicians and songwriters— At house concerts, the artist usually or anyone whose show hinges on the subtlereceives all of the suggested donations (typities of words and music rather than onstage cally $10 to $20), as well as a room for the theatrics and visuals. “You sing one of your night and a home-cooked meal. Factoring in funny lines in your song, and everyone laughs these extra benefits, the income from even a because everyone heard it,” says KC Turner. small house concert can compare favorably “You get to be in your element and deliver it to a club date, especially for performers who how you intended it 1 without trying11:28 to win don’t1 have a big draw. They get a break from ad_AER_trio*_Layout 2015-08-20 AM Page

motels and fast food, and get back on the road the next day with some money in their pocket and the satisfaction of having played for people who actually paid attention.

HANG TIME Not every musician is cut out for the houseconcert environment. It can be unnerving to have people listening so intently, and at such close range, if you’re not used to it. And banter with the audience is essential; just playing your songs without saying anything would be awkward, or even a little rude. Patti Dalton, who runs a series called Patti’s Place in her basement in Massachusetts, says, “As important as the music is, so is the ability to connect with the audience in such a small and cozy place. It’s nice if members of the audience have a question or two to give the artist something to talk about. [The artists] get the chance to tell stories they might not tell in a bigger room.” Performers who like to sequester themselves in the green room right up until the show starts, and then disappear right after, would be better off sticking to clubs, because at a house concert, the artist is expected to interact with the audience throughout the evening. According to Rowe, “It does take a lot out of you, as far as the intensity level, and just that you’re on the whole time. You have

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to be prepared to use your voice that much if you’re a singer. I’m real conscious about not overdoing it.” These informal interactions are part of what motivate hosts to work so hard to promote the event, manage RSVPs, move furniture, prepare food, and open their home to dozens of people. House-concert hosts, says Snyder, “don’t just love music—they love artists. And one of the big reasons they put in the effort to host shows is not just for the music but for the hang. It’s for spending some time with these troubadours, who have great stories and great experiences to share and sort of a unique view on life. All of that is lost if you have a performer who is not comfortable or gregarious or happy to be around people.”

Performers who embrace the social aspect of house concerts can be rewarded with some great experiences. Snyder fondly recalls a day after playing a house concert in western Nebraska, when the host invited him to try the favorite local pastime of tanking: floating down the river in a big tank normally used for feeding livestock, but outfitted for the occasion with lawn chairs and a cooler full of beer. On his annual cross-country house-concert tours, Turner says he loves learning about different towns and communities during the post-show social time. “I learned more about St. Louis the other night than I’ve ever even thought about—and I’m from Missouri originally—because I hung out with Clarence, a 98-year-old baker.”

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6 Winter 2015

BUILDING A NETWORK Most house concerts are set up directly between host and artist, but today booking services can help facilitate the process, both in terms of organizing and making connections. In the case of Concerts in Your Home, artists apply online and go through a detailed audition process that assesses the quality of the music and its suitability for a house-concert setting. The performers’ websites and promo materials are checked out as well. Those who are accepted—two-thirds of applicants are turned away, and there are currently about 300 active members—pay $300 per year for access to the site’s network of about 600 hosts. One problem that touring artists face is that most house-concert hosts naturally want to host shows on weekends—but too many empty weeknights in between weekend gigs quickly turn a tour into a money loser. Snyder is trying to address this situation by encouraging music fans to host small weeknight shows. He promotes Dinner and Song events (dinnerandsong.com), in which the audience breaks bread with the artist and then hears a 35-minute concert, and TenTen Concerts (tentenconcerts.com), which are ten guests, ten songs, for ten bucks. A string of tiny gatherings like this, which would bring an artist $100, plus CD sales, and include a meal and a place to stay, could mean the difference between a successful tour and a bust. In the San Francisco area, KC Turner takes a more hands-on approach. He presents his house concerts through a network of musicloving hosts who have spacious homes and backyards, and he takes care of the booking, promotion, and RSVPs, and supplies sound equipment, folding chairs, and whatever else is needed. While there are plenty of venues for 200 or 300 people or more in San Francisco, Turner provides intimate listening experiences where artists as well known as Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, G. Love, Chuck Prophet, Peter Case, and Glen Phillips can appreciate the chance to perform for an audience of 50 to 100 people. Texas singer-songwriter Alejandro Escovedo often plays rocking shows with his band at clubs, but at a recent house concert, Turner says, “He had no curfew, he could do whatever he wanted, and he did a two-hour set of storytelling and songs with no microphones, just right there in the living room. And for the fans, the back row was only 20 feet away from him. You’ve got this insanely great seat with a legendary songwriter-performer.” Because his house concerts are relatively small and have no overhead, Turner can take more of a chance in helping up-and-comers break into the competitive San Francisco market. They don’t have to book a low-paying gig with a bunch of other bands, as would typically happen in a club. Turner recently

SAINT JAMES

Top Sean Rowe Middle KC Turner introduces an open mic performer at Second Act in San Francisco, California. Bottom A string quartet plays Beethoven, Dvorak, and Dohnanyi at a Groupmuse house concert in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

JILL WHEELER

BRIAN CHURCHWELL

presented the fast-rising, young songwriter Parker Millsap and his band for his first San Francisco appearance at a house concert with 90 people. “They killed it and had the night all to themselves,” Turner says. “Every single person in the room got to hear every single note, and there was no competition with a bar or TV or whatever. So their first gig in San Francisco was pristine as far as connecting with the audience.”

COMING HOME What’s so striking about the house-concert scene, whether you are participating as a performer, a host, or an audience member, is its generous spirit. The love of music shines through, as does respect for those who dedicate their lives to it. Artist Glenn Elvig, who hosts the Creek House Concert series in St. Paul, Minnesota, in a space that doubles as an art gallery and listening room, typifies this spirit. He takes his series very seriously, employing a pro sound system and sound man, and has presented more than 70 shows with top talent such as Laurence Juber, Jonathan Byrd, Roy Book Binder, and Karen Savoca. Elvig got started as a house-concert presenter after being reminded about the travails of making a living as a musician. “I had a good friend who played a wonderful set at a local club and went home with maybe $40,” he says. “I decided that I would create a venue that made money for the musicians. My goal is to treat the guest artists like royalty. I think they are national treasures.” Aside from helping to sustain grassroots music, Rowe explains how house concerts can create personal connections that are surprisingly deep and transforming. “You never know quite what to expect when you’re going into somebody’s house, a space that’s usually reserved for family and friends. I think I had a lot of prejudice against people from a certain demographic and with a certain lifestyle, and [house concerts] broke down a lot of walls for me. I realized, wow, these are just people, and everybody has a story. There were a lot of surprises that I wasn’t expecting—really humbling. It’s changed my outlook on people in general.” • 7

NOW HEAR THIS! BY DAVID KNOWLES

Mabel

8 Winter 2015

The full line of handmade condenser mics from Ear Trumpet Labs

Ear Trumpet Labs, the mic company of choice for a new generation of acoustic players, unveils a new studio model. Meet Mabel . . .

ver the last three years, Ear Trumpet Labs’ distinctive microphones have become the new gold standard among Americana and bluegrass guitarists for live performances. With throwback female names like Edwina, Doreen, and Myrtle, the retro-styled live mics are used onstage by such noted acts as the Milk Carton Kids, Tom Brosseau, and Della Mae. Now, the Portland, Oregon, company has unveiled Mabel, a studio version of the line, designed for recording acoustic instruments and priced at a respectable $1,000. “The biggest difference is the multi-pattern capability,” Ear Trumpet Labs founder Philip Graham says. “There’s also higher output.” Almost immediately after releasing his first microphone in 2011, Graham started being asked whether he could come up with a high-quality studio version. “It was requested from musicians and engineers,” he says. “People were asking for a multi-patterned mic to do figure-eight recording. It was something I’d considered myself, so I started looking into it.” With the addition of Mabel, the company has 16 different microphones that it makes by hand out of copper plumbing supplies and vintage bicycle parts, including reclaimed bicycle chains. To be sure, Ear Trumpet Labs is a boutique operation, selling just over 200 microphones in 2013; double that figure in 2014. “The biggest way people find out about them is they see someone using one of the mics somewhere and usually ask them, ‘What the hell was that? It sounds great!’” Graham says. “I hear from a lot of the musicians that have my mics who say that it’s pretty regular for three or four people per gig to come up to them and ask about them.”

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Graham says that he began building mics in part to try to optimize the guitar and vocal sounds for his daughter, singer-songwriter Malachi Graham. “My impetus for getting into this was home recording,” Graham says. “I was doing different kinds of DIY electronics, building guitar amps and circuitry, building a compressor. When I started researching microphones I realized how expensive they were and wondered, since I was in a DIY frame of mind, whether it was possible to build your own.” By 2011, he had refined his design, and opened Ear Trumpet Labs. “Many of our customers come from the bluegrass and Americana genres,” Graham explains. “In some cases, the mics are specifically designed for the kind of bluegrass and full-band single miking—the Louise and the Josephine, for instance, that’s specifically what their strength is.” One happy customer is Della Mae flatpicker Courtney Hartman. “I was on the

lookout for the perfect large-diaphragm mic to use live with Della Mae when a friend told me about Ear Trumpet Labs,” she says. “We loved the Edwina from the first show and now tour with five of their microphones. They’ve given us the freedom of large-diaphragm microphones while maintaining tone clarity and a high-feedback resistance.” With Mabel, Graham hopes to go toe to toe with microphones that cost more than five times what Ear Trumpet Labs is charging. Still, he’s content to grow his business slowly. “I don’t ever want to take the company to a point where I would have to consider the margins and cost cutting to mass-produce these mics,” Graham says. “My whole intention is to have it be a workshop. I do want to get bigger, and I’ve got a couple of guys helping me out now, but the idea is to keep it a craft workshop, and to get people in who are interested in working like I am, and do it all by hand with that attention to detail.” • 9

Zoom H4n

FLASH FORWARD BY FRAN GUIDRY

Tascam DR-44WL

10 Winter 2015

10 Ways a Flash Recorder Can Aid Students & Teachers

Handheld flash recorders are still state-of-the-art ne of the best ways to improve as a musician is to record your own playing. Sure, it can be frustrating and disappointing when you hear that you’re out of tempo, out of key, or out of tune. But knowing your weaknesses is the first step to improvement, and hearing a well-played number is its own reward. I can remember when decent-quality recording was complicated and expensive, but today inexpensive flash-memory recorders—at most every price point and with any feature set—are capable of remarkable fidelity. Every music recorder I’ve researched can capture in so-called high-resolution formats, using sample rates and bit depth greater than the CD standard of 44.1 kHz and 16-bit depth, although it’s hotly debated whether these formats offer any improvement in audio quality. All of these recorders can record compressed audio using the MP3 format and uncompressed audio in WAV format. Compressed formats take up less room and are handy for passing around on the internet, while uncompressed formats provide higher quality and are preferred if you plan to process your recordings to create audio CDs or add such effects as equalization, reverb, and compression. In addition to sound quality, you’ll also want to consider ease of use (the navigation of settings can vary considerably), storage capacity, and battery life.

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THE MEMORY GAME The devices discussed here all use solid-state memory in the form of standardized flash cards. Flash cards come in three sizes: CF (compact flash), SD (secure digital), and micro SD. The capacity of these cards has increased over the years, along with improvements in read and write speed. The original SD card had a maximum capacity of only 2 GB (gigabytes). The SDHC (secure digital high capacity) standard increased the maximum size to 32 GB, and the newer SDXC (secure digital extended capacity) can reach a maximum of 2 terabytes, or 2,000 GB. Some recorders are limited in the class of SD card they can use, so check carefully when purchasing a recorder and flash card. (Manufacturers generally provide a list of confirmed compatible cards with the documentation for their recorders.)

BY ERIN SHRADER Large capacity cards are great for video and even high-end photography, but for audio recording, even the smaller flash cards store a lot of music. CD-standard WAV files take up about 10 MB per minute, so a 2 GB card will hold more than three hours of music in uncompressed WAV format. Compressed MP3 formats are even smaller, and the size can be adjusted by selecting different compression levels, specified as bit rate in kilobits per second (kbps). For instance, five minutes of music would create a 50 MB WAV file, while a 128-kbps MP3 file would be only 5 MB; at the highest bit rate of 320 kbps, the compressed file will be about 10 MB. There’s a quality tradeoff for smaller file sizes, of course. In general, the 320-kbps MP3 is audibly the same as a WAV file, while the 128-kbps file may have audible artifacts.

BUDGET CONSTRAINTS With so many recorders and a wide array of features available, finding the right tool for your job can be a challenge. Your first step in filtering the choices is to determine your budget, then evaluate the features you need for your recording goals. Most of the recorders have built-in mics, but most also allow you to attach external microphones. Most portable recorders have a stereo 1/8-inch jack that uses a microphone powering system called plug-in power, and there are a wide variety of mics that can be connected in this way; however, the usual stage and studio mics will not work with this connection because they require an XLR input, and condenser microphones additionally need phantom power to operate. The least expensive recorders designed for music have a street price of less than $100. Both Tascam and Zoom make highquality, affordable flash recorders in this segment that record in stereo using built-in mics or external mics through the 1/8-inch stereo jacks. The Tascam DR-05 offers features including a limiter and clip editing, while the Zoom H1 is equipped with directional mics for an improved stereo image. If your budget extends to $200, the choices really expand. In this range, you can find recorders like the Zoom H4n and Tascam DR-40 that support condenser mics requiring XLR connections and 48-volt phantom power.

1. RECORD YOUR LESSONS When the lesson is over, it’s gone—unless you record it. Today’s recorders make it easier than ever to capture and save that gem of an insight or to play along later with your teacher’s wonderful interpretation of that new passage. Parents can use the recording to help youngsters practice the exercises taught in the lesson.

2. RECORD YOURSELF The best way to get better is to listen to yourself. What you hear in your mind’s ear and what’s actually coming out of your instrument can be just a little bit different—or worlds apart! Recordings hold up an honest mirror to your ear. But a bad recording can be more discouraging than necessary, especially if you’re working on beautiful tone. Today’s digital recorders create clear, accurate recordings of your playing.

3. PLAY ALONG You can learn a lot by playing along with your favorite artist. Recordings contain information about style, feel, timing, and interpretation that no sheet music or verbal description can ever provide. Stop thinking so hard and try playing along.

4. COLLECT NEW REPERTOIRE Guitarists and fiddlers were early adopters of mobile technology, lugging heavy cassette recorders to festivals and jam sessions in the 1970s. The skeleton of a tune can be reduced to notes on a staff, but the essence of style is learned by listening, playing along, and trying to match what you hear. CONTINUES ON PG. 12

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YOU CAN BE A BETTER MUSICIAN.

5. TRANSCRIBE JAZZ SOLOS Some of today’s flash recorders have features that could almost be considered cheating: variable speed playback at pitch, and A-B repeat functions that allow you to select and replay a segment endlessly.

WE CAN HELP. B E A B E T T E R S T R I N G P L AY E R

BE A BETTER ACOUSTIC GUITARIST

6. MUSICAL SKETCH PAD Don’t you hate it when a musical idea pops into your head and then pops right out before you can write it down? The smallest flash recorders, the size of a disappointingly small candy bar, fit in your pocket.

5 Ways to Avoid Wrist Injuries

FOR PLAYERS OF VIOLIN, VIOLA, CELLO, BASS, AND FIDDLE

Improve Your SightReading Skills BE A BETTER ACOUSTIC GUITARIST

B E A B E T T E R S T R I N G P L AY E R

How to Find the Right Guitar Teacher

Roland R-26

Tips to Stay in Tune art that always requires an interpreter. Paintings and sculpture you can look at, theater you can read (better with actors interpreting for you, but you can still know what it’s about), poetry sounds pretty good if you read it to yourself, and architecture is eventually a material reality. There are very few people who can look at a piece of music and know what it sounds like, and those folks don’t do it for fun. So unlike a painter, who just does whatever he or she wants on a canvas, we have a responsibility to the composers to not only respect their wishes, but to bring their art to life in a manner that reflects us as well. If composers (lately) didn’t want individual interpretations of their work, they would all just write for computers. Most, even now, don’t. And none of us should sound like a machine, which is all repetition and rote without thought is ever going to achieve.

PLAYER TIP: WATCH THE ACCIDENTAL MARCATO ON DOWN BOWS This can work in occasional circumstances as a way of marking a note in a place where you really need that extra clarity and oomph. However, I have heard folks play entire concertos as though every down bow is marked with a marcato carrot—they take the bow off the string at the frog of the up bow and start the down bow with a bite all the time. Please be careful that you don’t do this very often! Constant use of what should be an occasional technique invariably makes the player sound desperate, repetitive and, frankly, kind of like an angry troll.

you can do it as instructed and it still doesn’t feel right to you, then it’s fine to ask what the reason is behind it. Likely as not, your teacher will have a good explanation, which will probably make it clear to you and easier to perform with integrity. If it so happens that your teacher cannot answer you—or says something like, “That’s just the way it’s done,” well, then, I think you have the right to do what you want. As the author T.S. Eliot once said: “Tradition without intelligence is not worth having,” and BUT WHAT ABOUT THE TEACHERS’ VIEW? Some folks wonder about their teachers. this certainly applies to musical traditions Should everything be taken at face value? that are so ingrained no one has actually Or should one question their teacher about stopped to think about them for decades, if things they either don’t understand or don’t not centuries. However, I think you’ll find that most agree with? Well, I tend to be of the “yes” and “yes” camp. Keep in mind though, ques- teachers will be overjoyed to discuss this tioning does not mean challenging. For hypothetical diminuendo with you, hear example, if a teacher tells you to do a dimin- your thoughts, and come to a mutually agreeuendo someplace not marked that way by able solution. The teacher might even disthe composer, you can certainly try it out. If cover something for her or himself. The more

questions I get asked in master classes, the happier I am. And the same goes for any answers I get to, “Well, what do you think?” The only wrong answer to that question is “nothing.” And now, just imagine how convincing you’re going to be on that phrase, with diminuendo or not. You’ve thought about it, experimented and come to a decision based on instinct and critical thinking. That’s what music is all about. The New York Times has praised Canadian violinist and recording artist Lara St. John as “a high-powered soloist.” She has made solo appearances with numerous major symphonies and performed in recitals around the world. Her Mozart recording with her brother, Scott St. John, and the New York–based string orchestra the Knights, won the 2011 Juno Classical Album of the Year for Soloist with Large Ensemble Accompaniment.

Lara’s Pet Peeve That Almost Everyone Does Because They Aren’t Listening Let’s begin and end with portato. This is fine where it’s marked (dashes under slurs), and can work on rare occasions if used sparingly. However, watch that right hand—make sure, in slurred melodic phrases, that it’s moving at a constant speed, and not changing speed and weight in tandem with your left hand. If you portato everything all the time, which many people do, even entire orchestral string sections (!), you end up with hesitant, heaving, timid sounding melodies that are disturbing to listeners, especially wind players. For them, it’s all about the connection of notes. Joaquin Valdepeñas, the principal clarinet of the Toronto Symphony, once asked me after hearing violin auditions why it was that all the players put an ‘h’ in front of every note. And that’s exactly what portato is. Sing a scale like this:

& 44

œ

Ah

œ

œ

œ

˙

Ó

Now, do it like this:

& 44

œ

Ha

œ

ha

œ

ha

œ

˙

ha

ha

Ó

That’s what you’re doing when you portato constantly. A whole phrase like that is really, for lack of a better word, just icky. Here’s a way to prove to yourself that you’re not doing it. Say, for example, if your melody is on the A string, think and play the melody with your left hand only, but bow the G string so only the open G sounds. If you can think and finger your way through your melody and have that G string sound constant, with no letup in sound when your left hand changes, then you’re sitting pretty! However, I have never met an unintentionally portato-ing string player who can pass this test. So try this whenever you’re portato-suspicious. Be vigilant! It’s a terrible habit.

The Learning Game 4 tips on finding the right teacher

BY OCTOBER CRIFASI

ooking for a good guitar instructor can seem like searching for a needle in a haystack when first starting out. While the Internet is chock full of good (and not so good) video tutorials, nothing can quite take the place of a good ol’ fashioned live, private, or group lesson. Working face to face with a teacher provides the proper technique and form instruction sometimes lost when watching a two-minute tutorial where no one can see what your fretting or rhythm hand is up to. If you have decided the time is right to start taking lessons, the following tips can help you find the best instructor for your needs.

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DO YOUR RESEARCH Start by asking friends and relatives for a good referral. Also check with local music stores, community colleges, and libraries. Oftentimes community colleges will have an extension or adult-learning program that offers series of group guitar classes for nominal cost. Know your budget before making inquiries so you know how long of a lesson you can afford (if private) and how often. Most music stores and private studios require payment by month, series, or semester, so make sure to find out about cancellation and refund policies before you commit, as they vary from studio to studio.

DECIDE WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN If you are interested in learning a specific style, technique or genre, find out if the instructor has experience playing and teaching it. While most instructors have experience with a variety of styles, many have a specific genre which he or she is best and most comfortable teaching. Be clear with prospective teachers about what you’d like to learn and have a few short-term goals in mind when you do. This helps both of you decide if the match makes sense. Short-term goals also provide a great way to assess if you are making progress with an instructor once lessons commence.

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KNOW YOUR LEARNING STYLE Teaching styles and methods vary widely among instructors, so think about what approach would work best for you. If you prefer a more structured approach with weekly assignments in different areas, private lessons are the way to go. Group lessons are great for strengthening listening skills, strumming and singing simultaneously, and keeping time with other players. They can also provide support and feedback when learning something particularly challenging. Private lessons, on the other hand, provide an opportunity for focused one-on-one attention, which might not always be possible in a larger group class situation.

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SCHEDULE AN INTRODUCTORY LESSON The only way to know if a teacher is right for you is to take a lesson with him or her. To get the best use of the lesson time, talk through your interests on the phone or via email in advance of actual lesson time. This allows your lesson time to be spent actually playing guitar and getting a good sense of the instructor’s teaching style, versus talking through the entire time. A few things to consider after the first lesson: Did you feel comfortable asking questions in the lesson? Did you leave the lesson with an assignment that challenged you and inspired to practice? Did you learn something new? Did you like the teacher’s approach? If you left the lesson feeling less than inspired or that your lesson was spent watching your teacher play or noodle around on the fretboard for 25 of the 30 minutes, you might want to consider taking lessons with someone else. The one thing to keep in mind as you go through the search process is you are always free to switch to another teacher if you find things not working out with your instructor. There is usually more than one guitar teacher in any given area, so take an introductory lesson when possible with as many instructors as you need to find the right one for you. AG

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12 Winter 2015

7. AUDITION & RECITAL RECORDINGS

FOR PLAYERS OF VIOLIN, VIOLA, CELLO, BASS, AND FIDDLE

Only a short time ago, these features were limited to professional studios, but today they’re in the palm of your hand. Other features in this segment include overdubbing and multitrack recording, although the user interface for such features in a compact recorder can be a bit challenging. Zoom offers surround recording in their H2n with a combination of XY and mid-side mic arrays, while Tascam has recently released the DR-22WL with Wi-Fi control and file transfer using your smartphone. When you look at the next segment, up to $300, there are some very interesting tools. The Zoom H5 lets you swap attached mics among XY, mid-side, and shotgun modules, along with two XLR inputs and four-channel recording. The Tascam DR44-WL adds Wi-Fi control along with four-channel recording using attached stereo mics and dual XLR inputs. The Sony PCM-M10 is known for its amazing battery life and low self-noise. Above $300, you get to some real powerhouse recorders. The Zoom H6 and Roland R-26 are six-track handheld recorders, great for capturing small groups. The Marantz PMD661 MKII, Fostex FR-2LE, and Sony PCMD100 capture two channels of pristine audio. Only the Sony includes built-in mics in this group, but the other two are worthy of the finest external condenser mics and offer XLR inputs and phantom power to operate them. In this golden age of compact recorders, you can buy an impressive device for the price of a nice instrument case—one that fits in your hand and captures every nuance of your playing. •

The prescreening recording is often the first step toward acceptance at the music school or festival of your choice. For the price of a few hours of studio time, you can get a recorder that will make a high-quality demo without the pressure of the clock ticking. The more robust flash recorders can make broadcast-quality recital recordings with the addition of a couple of good microphones.

8. RECORD YOUR GIGS Think the band sounds great? Find out for real by recording your gigs. If you managed to capture some of those magic moments, pop it up on your website or fan page.

9. SHARE YOUR MUSIC Unless you were lucky enough to land a tenured position in a major orchestra or university, a musician is always looking for a job. Self-promotion is key, and having sound samples on your website is crucial. With the internet’s global reach, you never know who’s listening.

10. CHOOSE YOUR NEXT INSTRUMENT OR BOW A professional musician from California looking for a new instrument took a digital recorder along on a shopping trip back east. After trying several fine instruments, he recorded himself playing his favorites. Listening to the recordings later confirmed his opinions, and he made a purchase based purely on sound.

Making Your World

A BETTER SOUNDING PLACE For all performing acoustic musicians seeking the finest tone, we present FELiX - the worlds first and only studioquality instrument preamp built for the stage. With 2 channels of pure, open preamplifier, powerful EQ, and 2 rock-solid DI outputs, FELiX is unlike any other acoustic preamp / DI you've ever seen or heard. Add a channel our world famous mic preamplifier, a clean boost circuit, deeply powerful feature set, and FELiX is a genuine game changer. With all of this in one rugged, lasta-lifetime, portable floor unit, your world is about to become a better sounding place. Proudly and lovingly built by our family in the USA.

for complete details, visit www.gracedesign.com

MUST-HAVE BOOKS FOR THE ACOUSTIC MUSICIAN

THE HOME RECORDING HANDBOOK by Dave Hunter

Author Dave Hunter shows you how to make pro-sounding recordings without pro budgets. 00332982 Hardcover/CD...$29.99

ZEN AND THE ART OF RECORDING by Mixerman

Mixerman distills the inescapable technical realities of recording down to understandable and practical terms. 00127033 ........................ $24.99

Hundreds of titles available!

ALAN PARSONS’ ART & SCIENCE OF SOUND RECORDING by Alan Parsons and Julian Colbeck

This book takes legendary engineer, producer, and artist Alan Parsons’ approach to sound recording to the next level. 00333735 Hardcover ........$49.99

THE ULTIMATE LIVE SOUND OPERATOR’S HANDBOOK – 2nd EDITION by Bill Gibson

This second edition is updated with new text, photos, illustrations, and video examples.

MUSIC MARKETING FOR THE DIY MUSICIAN by Bobby Borg

This is a proactive, practical, step-by-step guide to producing a fully integrated, customized, low-budget plan of attack. 00124611 .........................$29.99

00333183 Book/DVD-ROM $39.99

Free shipping on orders of $25 or more! Call 1-800-637-2852 or visit WWW.MUSICDISPATCH.COM Please mention ad code SSAD.

13

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Acoustic Guitar Unlimited offers clear, concise guitar instruction— in a variety of text, audio, and video formats—with new lessons added each week. Learn to play in a variety of styles—fingerstyle, flatpicking, slide, blues, bluegrass, Carter-style, Celtic, swing, folk, slack-key, and more—with our extensive catalogue of more than 70 complete courses.

LEARN MORE AT AcousticGuitarU.com

ADVERTISER INDEX Fishman Transducers, fishman.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

AER The Acoustic People, musiquip.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Peterson Electro-Musical Products, petersontuners.com . . . . . . . . . 6

Grace Design, gracedesign.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13

Music Dispatch, musicdispatch.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13

Ear Trumpet Labs, eartrumpetlabs.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14

Miniflex Innovations, miniflexmic.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14

Stringletter, Inc., acousticguitar.com, ukulelemag.com, allthingsstrings.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

String Swing MFG, Inc., stringswing.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

14 Winter 2015

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WELCOME TO

STAGE&STUDIO THE ACOUSTIC MUSICIAN’S GUIDE TO CREATING, PERFORMING & RECORDING

WINTER 2015

LET US KNOW HOW YOU LIKE STAGE & STUDIO. Drop us a line at stageandstudio@ stringletter.com. And look for the next edition in any of these upcoming issues of Stringletter magazines:

EAR TRUMPET LABS BUILDS HIGH-QUALITY MICS FROM RECYCLED PARTS

HEAR

NOW

FEBRUARY 2016

THIS!

FEBRUARY 2016

SPRING 2016

SPRING 2016 PLUS HOW TO BE SUCCESSFUL ON THE HOUSE CONCERT CIRCUIT

WHY HANDHELD FLASH RECORDERS ARE STILL A GREAT TOOL FOR MUSICIANS

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9/8/15 4:52 PM

YOU LOVE PLAYING YOUR INSTRUMENT. THAT’S WHY YOU’RE READING THIS MAGAZINE. TALLEST MAN ON EARTH | SARAH MCQUAID | JD SOUTHER | ED HELMS

And because there’s a lot more to your music than your instrument alone—now you’re reading this special supplement called STAGE & STUDIO.

JAMES TAYLOR BACK IN THE DRIVER’S SEAT AFTER 13 YEARS

+

A COUCH POTATO’S GUIDE TO GUITAR PLAYING

NEW GEAR TAYLOR’S REVAMPED 914CE MÉRIDA MASTER SERIES 75D GRACE HARBOR GHGC-200

We’re here to help you . . .

WIN

TC ELECTRONICS & TC HELICON PRIZES!

FALL 2015

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3 SONGS

ALICE IN CHAINS Nutshell BOB DYLAN House of the Rising Sun EARL BELL Travelin’ Blues

OCTOBER 2015 | ACOUSTICGUITAR.COM

notate share and market your music.

THE HAWAII ISSUE

SPECIAL FOCUS: GUITAR EDUCATION

CLASSICAL GUITAR 3 SONGS MARRY ME TRAIN

REMEMBERING MANUEL MOLINA

GEAR REVIEW Mérida Extrema Trajan T25-CES

DESTINATION HAWAII Exploring the Uke’s Spiritual Home

DALLAS RAG DALLAS STRING BAND NA PANA `ELUA DANIEL HO

ADVENTURES IN ‘PREPARED GUITAR’

THE BOLD COMPOSER/GUITARIST DEFIES CONVENTIONS

ROLAND DYENS

Maccaferri’s Fantastic Plastic Ukes

GEAR REVIEWS KoAloha Naupaka Goodtime Banjo Uke Ohana OBU-22 Bass

ClassicalGuitarMagazine.com

B R A D L E Y C O LT E N • C H R I S T I N A S A N D S E N G E N • B E N W O O D S

FALL 2015

UkuleleMag.com

West Coast Ukulele Retreat

Taimane Gardner UkuleleMag.com 1

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