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#1
07-01-2015, 03:28 PM
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Guitar instead of drums
Howdy!
One really interesting musician that used acoustic guitar is Hank Williams. In his song I'm so lonesome I could cry there are no drums. We have a guitar doing the rhytm instead. What guitar technique is used in order to get that rhythm sound? What kind of guitar do you need? Another of his song called Moanin' the blues actually include a drummer (using brushes). I somehow thought that this was actually a rhythm guitar of some sort. Is it only me or could that Drum (brushes) sound be played on a guitar if you just used the right technique? I haven't really learned much about the guitar yet so please tell me what you think. I would really appreciate if you could help me understand more about the amazing guitar. 
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#2
07-01-2015, 04:12 PM
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Prior to the early '20s all guitars were essentially made for finger style.
The early jazz bands came about after the American civil war helped by emancipation and a lotofold marching band insruments - largely brass and drums. This msic evolved very rapidly and the drumkit was developed. Banjos were initially more popular as a part of the rhythm section of dance and jazz bands. In the early twenties Gibson released the L-5 - not the first archtop but a landmark intended as a rhythm guitar for mandolin orchestras, but it had an incisive strident sound and a thinner neck - made for closed chording rather than fingerstyle. It quickly found favour in bands, and soon other makers were competng for that market ....includng C.F.Martin. A dreadful man called Perry Bechtel, asked Martin to design a 14 fret to body guitar with a skinny neck for closed chording ....he was a plectrum banjo player. The Dreadnought guitar was quickly converted in the same way *******ising the original wide neck 12 fret design, into a 14 fret rhythm guitar. It didn't work in a rhythm section as well as the archtops but soon found favour in string bands which begat bluegrass and country etc. Nowadays many regard the 1 & 11/16" nut width as standard for most uses, but it was designed as a rhythm / plectrum strummer - as opposed tomore intricate left hand styles. As (white) country music and (black) blues and hokum music developed from acoustic music a strong rhythm from guitars and basses developed not requiring drums until electric guitars came in ....and spoiled everything! (joke ...sort of) .
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#3
07-02-2015, 02:19 AM
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Quote:
Rhythmic guitar strumming involves muting, either with the fret hand or pick hand. In this case, it sounds like the strings are damped at the bridge end - you lay the side of your hand on the bridge. Of course you can't strum normally like that, so it's a kind of pivot action from the wrist. The other kind of muting, to get a short percussive effect, is fret muting, where you hold a barre chord, but let the pressure off just after you strum - keeping your fingers on the chord so it deadens the sound. You do it on the off beat - beats 2 and 4 (in 4/4 time) - so it sounds a little like a snare drum. That's the more common technique in this country/jazz swing style of strumming. Quote:
Quote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kENRSu3pCM That's probably a mix of fret muting, and damping with the strumming hand (because a lot of the chords are open position ones, with open strings that can't easily be muted with the fret hand). Watch his hand movements here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95aP0OWx4jY Notice his right hand isn't moving very much - not freely swinging - because his wrist is staying close to the bridge; he can drop part of that hand on to the strings any time he wants to deaden a chord a little. Also watch how his fret hand sometimes loosens the grip on the chord to deaden the sound. (You can see it when he plays the F chord (thumb over) in the bridge (from about 0:40) - his fingers don't hold the chord down permanently, they kind of bounce up and down a little on it.) IOW, it's all about controlling how long the strings ring for, using both hands if necessary. The "snare drum" effect on 2 and 4 (that you hear more clearly on Moanin' the Blues) would simply be a more aggressive hit, with shorter fret muting. Almost all the rhythm effect is coming from his guitar. There is a second (electric) guitar in the background, but it seems to be just doubling the bass in this case, playing damped bass notes on 1 and 3; the fiddle and pedal steel are playing the lead fills.) No drums necessary!
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