The unfortunate truth....

[TBman]

While taking a break from playing a lot of Al Petteway's tunes, which primarily were in DADGAD, I took a venture off into the land of Masaaki Kishibe.

I had already noticed that the dadgad tunes were easier for my fingers to play than standard tuning. Many of the "chord" forms in dadgad were just intervals with open strings and some triads thrown in. Even in standard tuning while playing finger style I'm basically just playing triads, but the triads are farther apart across the strings and more stretches seem to be involved to get interesting sounds and other chord structures used are more complex than dadgad. The one thing about Al's tunes is the pace of the songs are quick and require a good amount of movement up and down the neck.

Many of the tunes of Kishibe's that I prefer are slower, very melodic, tunes that ring out. His songs are in DAD#AD and CGDGAD (the ones I played). The ones I happened to like, were not that challenging, dexterity wise, but required a fair bit of quiet and clean execution.

After playing just these songs for a couple of weeks I found that my dexterity had fallen off and I started to suffer from what I call "fumble fingers"

Only after a good few minutes of scales and several barre chords and other movable chords up and down the neck today in standard tuning did my fingers start to be revived. I noted that even while doing these routines my fingers did not feel like themselves at first and were sluggish. I think its going to take a good week of "work outs" and a few days playing standard tuning tunes to "wake up" my fingers and get them back to normal.

The unfortunate truth appears that you can't escape practicing the basics....

Anyone else have this happen? I'm wondering if its just age related (62) or effects everyone.

[Guitar Slim II]

Really nice playing, beautiful. I first heard this tune on the album that Van Morrison did with The Chieftains.

This is a style of playing that I have loved for years (I don't know what to name it: British Isles-, Celtic-, folk fingerstyle?). But it wasn't until I tried working out William Coulter's rendition of "Si Bheag Si Mhor," that I realized how important DADGAD was to the basic sound -- as I defined it in my head, anyway. I say "tried" because I never worked it all the way through. I've only ever played about two tunes in DADGAD my entire life. And one I made up myself...

BTW, Is this your own arrangement? Is there a tab or a score for it anywhere?

[Ameridane]

Play two Pierre Bensusan songs and call me in the morning. 😉

[Ameridane]

I play almost exclusively in DADGAD, as well as a myriad of other alternate and open tunings. It keeps things fresh for me. I find that standard tuning has the opposite effect on me many times. It makes my playing lazy and kind of unimaginative at times. I suppose it's just best to mix it up. There are so many ways to play this wonderful instrument. I'm always learning new things. ☺

[TBman]

Originally Posted by Guitar Slim II

Really nice playing, beautiful. I first heard this tune on the album that Van Morrison did with The Chieftains.

This is a style of playing that I have loved for years (I don't know what to name it: British Isles-, Celtic-, folk fingerstyle?). But it wasn't until I tried working out William Coulter's rendition of "Si Bheag Si Mhor," that I realized how important DADGAD was to the basic sound -- as I defined it in my head, anyway. I say "tried" because I never worked it all the way through. I've only ever played about two tunes in DADGAD my entire life. And one I made up myself...

BTW, Is this your own arrangement? Is there a tab or a score for it anywhere?

Thanks! The arrangement is Jim Tozier's (a forum member). Here's a link to the book:

Celtic Guitar Solos

[TBman]

Originally Posted by Ameridane

Play two Pierre Bensusan songs and call me in the morning. 😉

Originally Posted by Ameridane

I play almost exclusively in DADGAD, as well as a myriad of other alternate and open tunings. It keeps things fresh for me. I find that standard tuning has the opposite effect on me many times. It makes my playing lazy and kind of unimaginative at times. I suppose it's just best to mix it up. There are so many ways to play this wonderful instrument. I'm always learning new things. ☺

Yes, his arrangements are a different animal

[vindibona1]

Originally Posted by TBman

While taking a break from playing a lot of Al Petteway's tunes, which primarily were in DADGAD, I took a venture off into the land of Masaaki Kishibe.

I had already noticed that the dadgad tunes were easier for my fingers to play than standard tuning. Many of the "chord" forms in dadgad were just intervals with open strings and some triads thrown in. Even in standard tuning while playing finger style I'm basically just playing triads, but the triads are farther apart across the strings and more stretches seem to be involved to get interesting sounds and other chord structures used are more complex than dadgad. The one thing about Al's tunes is the pace of the songs are quick and require a good amount of movement up and down the neck.

Many of the tunes of Kishibe's that I prefer are slower, very melodic, tunes that ring out. His songs are in DAD#AD and CGDGAD (the ones I played). The ones I happened to like, were not that challenging, dexterity wise, but required a fair bit of quiet and clean execution.

After playing just these songs for a couple of weeks I found that my dexterity had fallen off and I started to suffer from what I call "fumble fingers"

Only after a good few minutes of scales and several barre chords and other movable chords up and down the neck today in standard tuning did my fingers start to be revived. I noted that even while doing these routines my fingers did not feel like themselves at first and were sluggish. I think its going to take a good week of "work outs" and a few days playing standard tuning tunes to "wake up" my fingers and get them back to normal.

The unfortunate truth appears that you can't escape practicing the basics....

Anyone else have this happen? I'm wondering if its just age related (62) or effects everyone.

Hey... I've just started working on Rainy Windows myself this past week.

I can understand what you're saying, but it's not just about the "basics". And perhaps a bit of age comes into play. I believe that one of the affectations of tablature is that we aren't playing music in the same way as perhaps a pianist or classical guitarist would look at it. In fact when playing tab, we often don't even know what notes we're playing. So we go by sound and finger position. Period.

I read standard notation very well. And when playing in standard tuning I prefer standard notation and then rely on tablature simply for occasional help with finger positions. However as soon as you shift me to alternate tunings the script gets flipped and I'm 75% into the tab, using the standard notation mostly for rhythm and understanding what I might be playing tonally, but as far as execution goes, I'm relying almost entirely on position rather than actual notes. Which brings me back to Barry's point.

I know that when I'm playing a Tommy E tune, regardless of how I learned it, I'm again relying on finger position... and muscle memory. I know that if I try to cerebrally think about something my fingers know well forgetaboutit. I have to stop, slow way down and momentarily re-learn something that I'd previously conquered, once again engaging my cerebellum. So, yes fumble fingers emerge. Thus my question to Barry is: Is it about going back and practicing basics, or just making sure you fingers remember where they need to go for certain songs? I know for me it's the latter. Bring me back into standard tuning and I don't seem to have much of a problem playing cleanly except for those few songs that require a little more complex dexterity (i.e. Angelina or Mombassa).

[TBman]

Originally Posted by vindibona1

Hey... I've just started working on Rainy Windows myself this past week.

I can understand what you're saying, but it's not just about the "basics". And perhaps a bit of age comes into play. I believe that one of the affectations of tablature is that we aren't playing music in the same way as perhaps a pianist or classical guitarist would look at it. In fact when playing tab, we often don't even know what notes we're playing. So we go by sound and finger position. Period.

I read standard notation very well. And when playing in standard tuning I prefer standard notation and then rely on tablature simply for occasional help with finger positions. However as soon as you shift me to alternate tunings the script gets flipped and I'm 75% into the tab, using the standard notation mostly for rhythm and understanding what I might be playing tonally, but as far as execution goes, I'm relying almost entirely on position rather than actual notes. Which brings me back to Barry's point.

I know that when I'm playing a Tommy E tune, regardless of how I learned it, I'm again relying on finger position... and muscle memory. I know that if I try to cerebrally think about something my fingers know well forgetaboutit. I have to stop, slow way down and momentarily re-learn something that I'd previously conquered, once again engaging my cerebellum. So, yes fumble fingers emerge. Thus my question to Barry is: Is it about going back and practicing basics, or just making sure you fingers remember where they need to go for certain songs? I know for me it's the latter. Bring me back into standard tuning and I don't seem to have much of a problem playing cleanly except for those few songs that require a little more complex dexterity (i.e. Angelina or Mombassa).

Rainy Window is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. There are only 2 different three string fingered triads in the whole tune. 2xx1x2 in measure 6 and 28 and 2xx120 in measure 62! Everything else is intervals and single notes. The challenge though is the musicality of the tune, the flow, the melody, the sustain of the notes. You can't hide the occasional string buzz in there,

I've downloaded 13 tabs and GuitarPro files of Maasaki's music this past couple of weeks so I'm set with his stuff for a while!

It's just not enough to keep my fingers at a good level of "fitness." I'm going to work in some of Toby Walker and Woody Mann's blues songs and some of TE's stuff I was learning in Truefire lessons as well as the Petteway and Maasaki stuff.

I'm glad you mentioned Mombassa. I have his Only book and used to enjoy many of those songs. I should dig that out as well. So much music, so little time.