Capo. Cheat or godsend?

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Cluin
Date: 02 Nov 04 - 06:33 PM

Yep. Watch the pink-assed baboons struggling to play a tune in Ab with out a capo. Pffffff... they'll never master an arpeggiated F#9th chord with a pull-off on the Ab.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Marion
Date: 02 Nov 04 - 06:27 PM

The use of tools: it's what separates us from the animals.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: DADGBE
Date: 02 Nov 04 - 12:15 PM

Capos are useful if your technique uses open strings and not useful if you use closed positions, but the real issue is snobbery. A snob will find a way to put down other folks. Any reason will do in a pinch for a poor, threatened snob.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 04:53 PM

Capos need no justification. Whoever invented them was onto a good thing. Same goes for picks, thumbpicks, tuners, and so on...

The Shubb remains my favorite capo.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: nager
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 04:23 PM

Andre Segovia, perhaps the world's greatest classical guitar player of the 20th century, used a capo for many of the pieces he performed.
A cheat? Somehow I don't think so. They are an integral part of guitar playing and many works could simply not be performed without one. Ask any classical guitar player.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Cluin
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 04:12 PM

I knew a bass player who told me my guitar sounded a bit "duller" with a capo on it than open. Couldn't hear much difference myself, but maybe his ears were better than mine?

All I know is the guitar sounds better when it's played than when it's not.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Once Famous
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 04:08 PM

I use exclusively Kyser quick change capos on guitar and banjo.

I knew a 5-string player who said that he would not use a capo because he wanted to "challange" himself with out one. Needles to say, when he had to play a song in Bb it sounded like crap.

A capo is a tool that enhances. You are proving nothing by not using one. You are not "cheating" anyone.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Cluin
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 03:52 PM

Midchuck's right. They're both. Of course they're a cheat. So what? Whatever works for you.

If I wanted to play bar chords all the time, I'd have become a jazz player.

You can have my capo when you pry it out of my cold, cramped, arthritic fingers. Hell, I've even thrown a Shubb on my mandolin at times.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Hand-Pulled Boy
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 03:23 PM

My wife bought me a capo but she still got pregnant.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Midchuck
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 01:24 PM

Both.

P.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: chris nightbird childs
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 12:32 PM

There is no right way, only the easiest and most effective. If a capo helps, use one...

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GLoux
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 12:29 PM

Doc Watson calls 'em cheaters. And uses 'em.

Good enough for me...

-Greg

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Big Mick
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 12:17 PM

This goes to a larger issue, that being the "right" way to do anything in folk music. Of course a capo is a godsend. Like Jed, it easier to play certain keys, and ease is important when one is playing for a living. These are tools we use, and they make it easier. It allows much more diversity in the sound you seek.

One of my prize positions is a 12 string capo that Rick Fielding compensated by cutting the grooves for me on a ramble Jed and I took to Toronto. Works like a champ and doesn't pull the other strings out.

Mick

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Pete Jennings
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 11:54 AM

And Martin Simpson uses one (Shubb), as do Bert Jansch (shubb) and even Eric Himself (a Shubb on a Strat!). I use Shubbs, probably got four or five. I tried the trick of cutting the small vees for the two lower bass strings and it works okay but I cut the fifth string vee a bit deep, so I'll have to try again.

(In the UK, you can get replacement rubbers [ooh, er, missus!] from www.highlystrung.co.uk for £1 each).

Pete

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GUEST,Joe
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 11:44 AM

Capo - cheating? If Richard Thompson uses them, that's good enough for me boyoh! (and he knows that Lowdens are the best geetars too).

Even Buddy Holly used one on his strat (and he wasn't a bad guitarist for a lad barely out of his teens).

Try playing Vincent Black Lightning without capoing at Fret 3 (including the famous Thompson riff of course)

Try getting another sound like dropped D tuning with capo on fret 7.

Try a "Colley" Capo, if you can find one (built on the G-clamp principle) - better than a Shubb 'cause the clamping pressure doesn't send the string pitch out - unless you over-tighten of course.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: The Beast of Farlington
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 10:55 AM

Godsend - they taste great

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Betsy
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 10:37 AM

Godsend !!!

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 10:14 AM

Early flamenco guitars had screw on capos too. I have two shubbs, a Jim Dunlop, and a few traditional spanish tie on cejillas. The shubbs are the best by far, and can be operated with one hand only. Flamenco is generally played with a capo solely to lower the string action, the more string rattle from the guitar , the better some players like it.

                     The true path!

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Davetnova
Date: 01 Nov 04 - 07:48 AM

Here is a link to the ealy guitar mentioned above with the screwed on capo http://www.maxwellplace.demon.co.uk/pandemonium/guittar.html the capo is missing from this one but the holes are clearly shown.

And capos are a godsend.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: DocMando
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 03:30 PM

All I know is that you can get the banjo player in your bluegrass band really ticked off at you if you make too much fun about his reliance on a capo. Since the Scruggs-style of banjo playing makes heavy use of open strings, capo-ing and retuning are a fact of life for these unfortunate souls (oops, there I go again).

Rich

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: chris nightbird childs
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 01:54 PM

The 2nd fret is one of my favorite positions. The 3rd also...

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GUEST,Anne Croucher
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 12:54 PM

As I accompany myself on the guitar and there is just me, I think I would give up without a capo. I usually set it on the second fret and see how my voice is - sometimes I move it up, more usually down, or once in a while take it off entirely.

Having to learn to play all the songs I play along with in all the variations I can accomplish with the capo would probably defeat my aging memory. I have to rely on habit anyway - after 40 years I don't even think about what I am playing I just do it. It is such a part of me that I can play without actually thinking about doing it. If I want to change something I have to play it many times before trying to sing it - at least if I want to get it right

Anne

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: chris nightbird childs
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 12:24 PM

tHE sHUBB IS DEFINITELY THE BEST i'VE TRIED...

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 11:42 AM

Tried one...   there's no way it was worth the money they wanted for it...   I recall I coulda bought 2 or 3 Kysers for the price of a G7... and it's my experience that Kysers work WAY better than G7s...

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 10:36 AM

Got one?

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 10:30 AM

They're junk at half the price...

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 01:34 AM

Try a G7th Chris - knocks the Shubb into a cocked hat. Like moving from the 19th Century to the 21st in one jump. They're dear but they're superb, well worth the money.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: chris nightbird childs
Date: 31 Oct 04 - 01:17 AM

Barre Chords are a bitch to play on an acoustic, especially a 12-string, so I put the capo on ( a Shubb of course) and it gives me no problem. I also like the sound of open strings better anyway.
This is also a godsend when I'm stuck in a certain mode or key, or I'm having trouble writing music for a song. I stick a capo on, and it's a whole new instrument...

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GUEST,Joerg
Date: 02 Aug 00 - 08:35 PM

What "huh", MC? Your 'capo vs. macho' is one of the great inventions of our century, simply divine. How else can you give somebody calling you a cheater for using a capo capo an adequate answer?

Capo.

Up to now I I felt somehow helpless in that situation. But now with your genius by my side they may come and fight me like a haha man, those those those mama machos those chauvinists and rapers ahahaha those ripipipers...

Ahahahaha !!! Ha !!!!

sorry for having to finish now there are two gentlemen at my door

Joerg !!!!!

PSPSPSPS: ahahahahahahargh

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 02 Aug 00 - 08:07 PM

A friend of mine in CA uses a little Shubb which has been bent to fit on her fiddle. Works just fien when playing with bagpipes. I use Kysers and Shubbs. Al the best. Seamus

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Mooh
Date: 02 Aug 00 - 08:05 AM

Murray, Likely. I use a combination of two-string capos to give me virtual tunings like E, Am, Em and raised variations in combination with a full capo. Also virtual DADGAD and open A and their raised relatives with a full capo. Various dropped tunings using the "drop D" and "double drop D" capos in combination with a full capo. This is assuming standard tuning as a starting point. Drop tunings with an open chord tuning as a starting point are cool and allow wider chord voicings than normal, a benefit when trying to be bass, guitar, and piano all at once.

Mooh.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From:
Date: 02 Aug 00 - 05:14 AM

I have noticed the Celtic contingent of our folk club tend to have two Keysers which are often both clipped onto the neck at different places. Are they doing wild things with the tuning by using each one as a partial capo?

Murray

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GUEST,Ely
Date: 02 Aug 00 - 02:22 AM

Godsend, godsend, godsend. Whoever said it's cheating has never tried to play a song-ful of bar chords on a steel-string guitar. I know "proper" D and A chords but they make my hands cramp up after I've been playing them for 4 or 6 hours--C and G are much less stressful for me. Also, I have very short, very crooked fingers that are horribly unsuited for barring (not to mention it just isn't practical to do flying bar-chord changes during a break-neck square-dance tune).

I suppose it depends on your style--some styles have no use for a capo and some are unnecessarily difficult without one. I have a monstrous D-shaped capo that my mother bought in 1972--it looks like something you might close around someone's neck to strangle them--but once I figured out how to use it, I was glad I had it.

Incidentally, they are invaluable on the mountain dulcimer, especially when playing with chromatic instruments so you don't have to retune all the time.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Les B
Date: 02 Aug 00 - 01:23 AM

Doesterr - I'm pretty sure that the instrument also had frets, maybe the tied on gut as you suggest, but the hole was in the middle of the neck, front to back, and I believe they had the attachment, too. (It's been several years. I pretty well assured myself it was a capo (or movable nut) at an early period.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: bbelle
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 09:02 PM

Joerg ... "huh?"

moonchild

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GUEST,Joerg
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 08:51 PM

moonchild -

For creating "capo-vs.-macho-controversy": Is there already an emoticon like :-° ? If not it should mean: 'I'm feeling able to kiss you round any corner!'

on my knees

Joerg

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Brendy
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 06:23 PM

I used to have one of these, until some wanker swiped it on me one night, last year.
You can't get them, to my knowledge, outside of the U.S.

It opens up a whole myriad of opportunities to be creative in both standard and any other tuning you care to name.
It can also be used, of course, in conjunction with a 'normal' capo, or, indeed, with another 'Third Hand'
I find the Shubbs very solid, though, for all their size.
The Keysers I have are 'heavily' customised for the job I want them to do; as well as lengthening the handle, I have 're-shaped' the underside as well.
I wouldn't use a 'normal' one, if I had a option to use something else. It's design, though, is the closest I can get to facilitate the changing of key, up or down the neck, within the space of a beat, while still keeping the DAGDAD formation.

B.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Mooh
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 06:02 PM

Dave, Tried that, and every other way imaginable, but I still prefer it sticking out the back. At any rate Kyser has definitely still made as much coin off me as any guitar player, 'cause I need them for "virtual" tunings and I'm on my second set (the first ones being swiped), roughly 14 altogether.

Here's another capo...Using a bit of Corian (I think it's a trademark brand name) scrap from a store that does kitchen counter conversions, I fashion a "capo-nut" which slides between the strings and the fingerboard to raise the strings slightly for the facilitation of slide playing. Wood will work, as will various metals, but I settled on Corian for the tone. Only a slight loosening of strings is necessary to install this. The advantage is that it can be moved about, fret to fret. It rests over the fret with a crown that is in line with the fret so that no intonation adjustments are required. In a pinch a simple piece of thick wire will work, or steel rod, when positioned close to the fret.

Are we having fun yet? Mooh.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: bbelle
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 05:19 PM

The following is a story from the Flatpickl list that gave me a chuckle.

BTW ... the capo vs. macho controversy seems to be among the men of music, not the women. Glad I'm in with the women ...

Anyway ... here's the story:

"I'm one of those guys that gets "one of each" so I own every bit of guitar accessory ever made. Be very, very careful with store bought partial capos, esp the short Schubbs (for virtual DADGAD ) The danger of course, is that when you're on your way out the door, and you reach in the drawer where you keep all that crap, you're gonna grab that little bugger instead of a real capo, cuz they look just alike when you're in a hurry. Then you won't realize it until you're on stage and everyone's ready to play the next tune in E flat, and you've got it down cold in a C position at the third fret and ....... anyway this never happens to me."

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 05:10 PM

Mooh:
I have two Keysers, one for the banjo, one for the guitar. I normally use the "handle" on the 6th (guitar) or 5th (banjo) side. But if I should, occasionally want to capo at the fifth fret of the banjo or above, I'll face it from the 1st string side. No problem either way, really.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 05:00 PM

LesB: You speak of a old lute with holes at each fret, which you say (speculate?) were for attaching a capo. I suspect that the purpose of the holes was for, of all things, frets! It was common to use a gut string across the neck as a fret, as distinguished from the metal frets we use today.

Now if there were actual frets on the fingerboard as well as the holes you mention, you might be right about their function.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Ed Pellow
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 01:51 PM

Using a capo is certainly not a cheat. I've met 'macho' guitarists who think differently but as someone said earlier in the thread, that's simply ignorant.

Music is about producing a pleasing sound. If a capo helps do that then it's great. Do any of us consider using modern instruments with improved action and intonation a cheat? Or should we use 'authentic' hard to play guitars?

My favourite folk guitarists; Nic Jones and Martin Carthy have both used capos to good effect. If anyone wishes to denigrate the capo, let them be better guitarists than them first.

Ed

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From:
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 01:10 PM

Dick. The fiddle not having frets, if you used a guitar-type capo, your open strings would sound stopped instead of open. The gadget you describe just has the effect of moving the nut down the fingerboard. That is what a guitar capo does anyway. It makes the fret in front of it act like the nut.

By the way, Dick, your posting reminds me of an old joke. It is a letter to a typewriter company that goes something like:

Dear Xir,

I am writing becauxe I have found a problem in my new machine. Everytime I press an x I get an x instead. I hope you can xend me a new one xoon.

Yourx xincerely

and so on.

Murray

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 11:12 AM

FWIW, a practical fiddle capo (particularly useful for Scottish dance tunes) consist of a dhort piece of string trimmer line slid UNDER the strings near trhe nut.

A good instruentaklist who uses a capo is a good instrumentalist; a bad one who uses a caopo is just bad in more keys.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 10:58 AM

I always used an elastic capo so I could manually LIFT it up at the moment I might need an extra low note. Especially when playing "Meadowlands" in the key of C, a capo at the 2nd fret, judiciously raised in a timely manner, was the only way to achieve the necessary low note. I explain it in these terms 'cause I play by ear and have no other way to set out the facts of what I did. (Playing by ear made me develop huge calluses on my lobes. Had to have a lobotomy to remove them every so often.)

Later on in my musical life, I used the capo with the strings tuned down a full note and a half to get concert pitch with the strings slack enough for me to be able to depress them. That worked quite well for several years.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 08:54 AM

Thanks for all this information. It was a question I had thought of asking (in my ignorance), having noticed that only "folkish" players used them, rather than jazz or blues players that I've seen.
RtS (just a little bit less ill-informed now)

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Mooh
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 08:22 AM

I DO get kinda tired of defending my use of capos, for open strings, sustain, guitar-friendly keys, mock open tunings with altered capos (much described alsewhere on the 'Cat) and so on, but somebody mentioned Kysers. I've got several, all cut for altered tunings, but I still find the handle difficult to use as it faces away from the player. A similar capo with an easier handle is made by Dunlop, and I use it when I need a full capo. It's not as fine-tunable as the Schubb, but works well nonetheless. It is also a better choice (IMHO) to recommend to student players, as it requires no tinkering.

Paige and Golden Gate capos are also secure devices and easy to adapt for various tunings, but often need their padding adapted so they don't scatch the back of the neck. Leather works well. The Kyser string rubber is also the best to retro-fit most capos except the Shubb, which has the best string rubber.

Having said all this, the Shubb is still my most used full capo.

Peace, Mooh.

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: GUEST,aunttesa
Date: 01 Aug 00 - 12:18 AM

JUST CHEAT, IF YOU WANT TO CALL IT THAT. IT'S ALL ABOUT MAKING THAT GREAT SOUND BETWEEN GUITAR AND VOICE. I KNOW FOLKS WHO ARE ALWAYS DEMANDING THAT I "PLAY A SONG LIKE IT IS WRITTEN." WRITTEN WHICH TIME. JUST MAKE MUSIC; HOWEVER IT COMES OUT OF YOUR HEART!

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: bbelle
Date: 31 Jul 00 - 10:04 PM

Bill Sables said he preferred the Kyser for the same reason ... for quick-changes during a set.

moonchild

Subject: RE: Capo. Cheat or godsend?
From: Brendy
Date: 31 Jul 00 - 10:00 PM

Otherwise, I use a Shubb.

B.