Slide Guitar What tunning ?

Subject: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: GUEST,RobinA
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 04:44 AM

Can any one advise on what are the tunings used for slide guitar ? Robin

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Green Man
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 05:13 AM

Hi, guess its for Blues music. I use open G. It depends on the instrument and the string gauge. Using normal instruments and strings G works for me. Happens to be a nice singing key too.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 05:49 AM

Thanks, but what is open G tuning ? (PLease excuse my ignorance)

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Clifton53
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 08:34 AM

Open G, from bass to treble is D G D G B D. Tune your low E down to D, tune your A string down to G and your high E string also down to a D, and off you go. Sometimes called slack-ket or Hawaiian tuning.

And the only dumb question is the unasked question. Enjoy.

Clifton

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: RocketMan
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 09:56 AM

Robin, Check out Brad's Page of Steel at

HTTP://www.well.com/user/wellvis/steel.html

Here you will find many tunings for steel/slide guitar as well as a host of other information. Good Pickin!

RMan

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Justa Picker
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 09:59 AM

There's also this site as well.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: CraigS
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 09:37 PM

There are two distinct styles of slide playing - open, where you let all the strings sing, and damped, where you use a finger behind the slide to damp the strings you aren't playing. For open playing, there are three main tunings - the G tuning described above (which is also called Spanish), open D (dadf#ad),also called Vestapol, and C (cgcgce). Damped playing is usually employed for solo work, and can be used in any tuning - even standard tuning, as the main purpose is to utilise the sound of sliding on to a note, rather than anything else.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: number 6
Date: 13 Feb 08 - 10:43 PM

Occasionally D-A-D-G-A-D

Mostly G-G-D-G-B-D (slightly deviated version of open G)

biLL

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 02:15 AM

what is the advantage of having two bass G strings instead of a G and a D ?

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Darowyn
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 02:58 AM

There are also lots of lap and pedal steel tunings, where you never fret any strings,always playing with the bar, so need a few variations on the basic triad.
I play E6
bottom to top
E, B, C sharp, E, G sharp, B, C sharp, E.
(there really are 8 strings)
It gives a major and its relative minor on any one position.
Multi neck non-pedal steel guitars use tunings that have the tonic, the third and the fifth as the top string on the different necks
Pedal steel players use E9 and C6 on two necks, except the universal 12 fans, who have both on the same neck.
It's a huge topic!
Cheers
Dave

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: jonm
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 04:43 AM

I use open G6, which is DGDGBE. Basically, drop the lowest two strings a tone. Gives plenty of octaves, fourth and fifth intervals and both a major and minor triad.

I play a sort of hybrid with usually no more than two strings under the slide not damped (plus a bass note open).

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 10:14 AM

Traditional American Delta-style blues generally uses two basic tunings for slide playing: "Spanish" and "Vastapol."

Spanish tuning, named for a popular instrumental of teh late 19th century called "Spanish Fandango, is the "Open G" alluded to above. You can tune down to open G or achieve the same relative tuning (same chord shapes, note placements, etc.) by tuning up to open A. Acoustic players mostly tune down to open G, but many electric guitar players tuneup to open a, especially when playing with bandmates in standard turing (where A is a better "blues key" than G).

"Vastapol" is also named for a long-forgotten popular tune, one named for a battle in the Crimean War if I'm not mistaken (Sabastopol?) It's open D if tuning down, open E if tuning up. Again, the tuning-up option is more popular among electric players and/or band members, since E is the asiest key of all for playing blues on the standard-tuned guitar.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 11:01 AM

Funny, I thought "Spanish" tuning was the conventional EADGBE.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Trevor Thomas
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 12:17 PM

You can use standard tuning for slide, if you like. I do on a regular basis.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 12:48 PM

Richard ~ I'm sure that "Spanish tuning" has different meanings in different cultures. The guitar that we know today, after all, has been called the "Spanish guitar," so I'm not surprised that some folks might describe the standard tuning of the instrument as "Spanish."

The usage I was decribing is something I not only have read in books about the blues; I also heard it straight from the mouth of Mississippi Fred McDowell one memorable evening in 1969.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 01:03 PM

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Murray MacLeod - PM
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 02:15 AM

what is the advantage of having two bass G strings instead of a G and a D ?
slightly off thread,but I think Roscoe Holcomb used this tuning,ggdgbd,not for slide playing .
but he was also a Banjo player.and gdgbd is a five string banjo tuning. of course your drone g is low on a guitar.
the problem is your d chord becomes more difficult.but ok for tunes/songs that are g chord and c chord. or for playing the guitar in a frailing/up picking banjo type style

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 03:26 PM

Murray, I don't know about Number 6, but I use the "G" tuning he describes with some frequency, though not for playing slide. Usually I am playing "finger style". It provides a deep droning bass that I like. However, if your string gauge is on the light side, your bass E string turns to spaghetti if you tune it that low, so I usually use a heavier gauge string in that position.

Roger in Baltimore

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 04:07 PM

I must explain I think the 6 string was tuned up higher,
by Holcomb so it was the same as the 5 string,which you can do with light strings ggdgbd.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 06:19 PM

I still don't get it.

what is the point of having the sixth string tuned up to G and losing the potential of the D in the bass ?

I am obviously missing something here, but I would really appreciate a lucid explanation of the advantages of this tuning.

please feel free to be as long winded and technical as you want ...

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: number 6
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 07:19 PM

Murray ... Why drink bourbon when you can have the potential of a single malt scotch.

Jonm explained it quite well ... I too play hybrid and I find with the 2 side by side gg's you can extract a good bass plunk providing the beat. Something I can't drive out with having the top D.

I should also add I play a wood bodied accoustic resno which responds much better to my style of slide playing with the tuning of G-G-D-G-B-D.

Other than that, try that tuning yourself Murray and see what you think if it.

Anyone else have any more tuning recipes for slide guitar.

biLL

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: van lingle
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 07:23 PM

I think "Spanish Tuning" for Open-G came from the old parlor tune "Spanish Fandango" which was played out of same and "Vestapol" for Open-D from another old ditty "The Siege of San Sebastapol".
I used to use Open-A for slide (which has the same chord forms as Open-G) because the additional tension on the strings gave the sound a bit more velocity and better suited my voice when capoing at 2nd and 3rd frets (Keys of B and C).

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: reggie miles
Date: 14 Feb 08 - 11:27 PM

I've been using a derivitive of the open D form described above Low - G# D# G# C D# G# - High and it's minor form where the third string (C) would be dropped to B to create a A flat minor. Call me loony but I still laugh at the goofy jokes like, "What do ya get when you drop a piano down a mine shaft?" Maybe that's what drove me to explore Ab minor.

I've only just begun to explore the minor key variance after exploring the major form for many long years without any particular aid or hints from other players offering any kind of guidance. You'd think that I would have bought a book or something by now. The thing that I've found is that unless you're particularly adept at book learning, reading musical notes or tablature, it can get very confusing very quickly and without any assitance readily at hand to help translate or explain such hen scratchin's the exercise can be discouraging.

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 15 Feb 08 - 03:25 AM

"I think "Spanish Tuning" for Open-G came from the old parlor tune "Spanish Fandango" which was played out of same and "Vestapol" for Open-D from another old ditty "The Siege of San Sebastapol"."

Ok... so what about 'sawmill'...

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 15 Feb 08 - 11:17 AM

Murray,

When I do the tuning, I am not raising the bass E string to G. I am dropping it to a G one octave lower than the G of the 5th string. You still have a bass D on the 4th string. Again, it provides a DEEP bass monotone with the ring of two open strings playing a bass G which is appealing (IMO) for some songs.

Roger in Baltimore

Subject: RE: Slide Guitar What tunning ?
From: van lingle
Date: 15 Feb 08 - 08:12 PM

"What about Sawmill tuning?"
That's an easy one. It comes from an old southern appalchian favorite called "The Drunken Billygoat Bit Little Maggie In the Ash Grove Down By The Old Sawmill".
Actually, I have no idea.