I get a lot of calls from people who are looking to buy their first acoustic guitar and have no idea where to begin. After doing research and playing just about every inexpensive acoustic guitar out there, I have come across one line of guitars that stand out for their combination of low price and high quality construction: This is the Jasmine line from Takamine.
There must be something in the water near the Jasmine factory. In most cases, two guitars can come off of the same production line one after another and they’ll still have differences in action and intonation. That’s why you always have to check the actual instrument you’re about to buy to make sure that the action is low and that the 12th fret harmonic and the 12th fret fretted note are identical. The instrument should also remain in tune while being played. By these standards, for most acoustic guitars at the $100 level there will be several rejects for every guitar that is acceptable. However, I’ve searched out and played over 50 Jasmines and they’ve all had good action and good intonation. Way to go, guys!
Jasmine guitars are designed by the same builders that make the highly-regarded Takamine guitar line, and Jasmine prides itself in maintaining “Takamine-level” instrument construction. Whatever they’re doing, it’s working! The woods used for the Jasmines aren’t up to the level of Takamine – they have laminated spruce faces, nato sides and back and a rosewood fretboard – but like I said, the Jasmine is a steal at its price.
The model I recommend is the S34C NEX Acoustic Guitar which is currently selling on Amazon for $95. The NEX-style body is very comfortable to play and the cutaway shape allows easy access to the high end of the neck. Find it here.
Guitar power amplifiers have been getting smaller and smaller over the years, and now they’ve gotten downright teensy! Meet the world’s smallest – the Electro-Harmonix 22 Caliber power amp.
This baby is the size of an effects pedal, but it’s a full function 22 watt power head – that’s the same amount of wattage as my Fender Deluxe Reverb in a housing that fits in your pocket!
Electro-Harmonix is a New York-based company that’s been around since the late sixties. They were pioneers in fuzz and sustain pedals (remember the Big Muff sustain pedal?). They say that they’re “currently researching and developing breakthroughs in shrinking the guitar amp without sacrificing an ounce of tone” on their website, and let me tell you – it’s working.
The 22 Caliber can power up a 4×12 speaker cabinet and convincingly make those 4 12” speakers growl
. You can plug the amp into a cabinet with 1, 2 or 4 speakers, and it’s safe to use with 4, 8 or 16 ohm resistance which makes it compatible with just about everything.
The controls are simply a volume knob and a normal/bright equalization switch. At low volume the amp has a clear, clean sound that’s quite pleasing. Middle volume gives you a good distorted rhythm sound with long sustain. When you top the amp out to saturation you get a Hendrix sound with lots of screaming overtones. Big fun! And you can add whatever delay or reverb you want in front of it to tailor your sound.
Here’s the punchline: The price is $106.50 (at guitarcenter.com). That’s an amazing value for this amp, and the price includes the A/C power supply.
What do you do with a pocket-sized power amplifier? You can throw it in your gig bag when you’re going to a jam and leave your heavy amp behind, confident that you can get a great, reliable sound through whatever speaker cabinet you plug into. And if you’ve ever had an amp stop working at a gig you know it can be a show-stopper – but not if you have this handy back-up amp.
For about $38 you can upgrade to the 44 Magnum version which is the same Amp with 44 watts of power ($144.75 at guitarcenter.com).
Some guitarists like to tune their instruments lower than normal to achieve a slightly deeper sound. Drop-D tuning is one version of this, and other players tune the whole instrument down a half-step to Eb or even a whole step to D. The effect is quite noticeable and makes the music being played sound darker.
Another very cool option available to the guitarist is to play in a much lower register with a baritone guitar. The baritone guitar is a six-string instrument that falls halfway between the sound of a normal guitar and a bass guitar. It’s generally tuned either a fifth lower (A D G C E A) or a fourth lower (B E A D F# B) than normal. I opt for the fifth below.
The baritone guitar is played just like a normal guitar, except the strings are thicker (especially on the bottom end) and the fret spacing is wider.
If you’ve ever seen an early Clint Eastwood “spaghetti western” movie you’ve heard the powerful and mysterious sound of a single chord being strummed one time on a baritone guitar at key moments.
The sound of the baritone guitar is captivating. It’s an amazing sensation to play the guitar as you normally would and to hear a huge, deep, throaty half-octave-lower sound emanate from your instrument. It can inspire an exciting new direction in your playing and composing.
Danelectro introduced the first solid-body electric baritone guitar in 1957. It looked just like their standard electric guitar but with a neck that was five inches longer! They referred to it as the “UB-2 six-string bass”.
Guitarists as diverse as Jerry Cantrell, Allan Holdsworth, Ani DiFranco, Pat Metheney, Andy McKee, Joe Bonamassa and Dave Matthews have explored the baritone guitar in their recording and performing careers.
Baritone guitars are available from Danelectro, Fender, Gibson, Gretch, Schecter and Ibanez, among others. Try one next time you’re at your favorite music store.
I love playing in open tunings. When I first discovered them as a teenager, I spent hours exploring them and I still do so today. Open tunings allow you to create chord voicings that are more mysterious and colorful than you can get with normal guitar tuning. But there are a couple of downsides to open tunings. For one thing, if you want to switch between normal tuning and open tuning you either need two instruments or take the time to re-tune your guitar between songs. Another problem is that if you re-tune your instrument frequently the strings stretch out and lose their vibrant sound.
That’s why I’m excited about this new development in capos. The fine designers at Creative Tunings have given us the SpiderCapo, the first capo that allows you to capo each string individually. Think of the vast number of tunings that are possible when you multiply all the fret placements by all the combinations of strings capo’d or not capo’d—there are hundreds of them. The SpiderCapo also allows you to finger strings above and below the capo—awesome! What’s more, you can change the individual string settings while you’re playing. It makes your head spin with possibilities.
Find it at Guitar Center, $29.95.
“Sweet Chords” are first-position chords that have in common the notes D and G (fret 3) on the two high strings. These chords tie together well because of the commonality of the two pedal tones on top. They’re also considerably easier than normal first-position chords to switch between because the switches involve only the first and second fingers.
If you’re familiar with the song WONDERWALL by Oasis you’ve heard these chords in action.
Examples of Sweet Chords:
Sweet G E-3 A-2 D-0 G-0 B-3 E-3
Sweet C E-X A-3 D-2 G-0 B-3 E-3
Sweet D E-X A-0 D-0 G-2 B-3 E-3
Sweet Em E-0 A-2 D-2 G-0 B-3 E-3
Sweet A E-X A-0 D-2 G-0 B-3 E-3
In the course of work that I do with special needs students who have limited hand motion I’ve developed an open tuning that I call Sweet Tuning. This tuning is normal on the E, A, D and G strings while providing the constant notes for Sweet Chords on the B and E strings as part of the tuning.
As a result, chord changes in this tuning require only the first two fingers on the fretting hand. This makes them perfect for beginner guitarists because they can achieve fairly complex chord sounds with a minimum of effort.
Because you’re likely to break the B and E strings trying to tune them up a full minor third, this tuning requires tuning the E, A, D and G strings down a whole step. Then the B and high E strings are tuned up one half step, as shown below:
Normal Tuning Sweet Tuning
E down 1 whole step D
A down 1 whole step G
D down 1 whole step C
G down 1 whole step F
B up 1 half-step C
E up 1 half-step F
The final step is to capo on fret 2, which returns the tonality to the key of E.
This is a fun tuning to play around with. Start with the chords shown below and take off from there.
Sweet G E-3 A-2 D-0 G-0
Sweet C E-X A-3 D-2 G-0
Sweet D E-X A-0 D-0 G-2
Sweet Em E-0 A-2 D-2 G-0
Sweet A E-X A-0 D-2 G-0
[photo: Sloanpix]
Most open tunings call for the re-tuning of the existing strings on the guitar to notes other than the standard E A D G B E. “High stringing” calls for a different approach—the notes of the strings stay the same, but the bottom four strings are replaced with strings that are one octave higher than usual. This tuning is also commonly known as “Nashville tuning”.
Nashville tuning makes the guitar sound more homogeneous because the span of notes is reduced from three octaves to two. The resulting sound has a charming shimmering effect that reminds me of a harpsichord. You can hear the sound of the Nashville tuning on your guitar right now by fretting the E A D G strings over the top of the neck with your first finger on the 12th fret. That’s the sound of your open strings in Nashville tuning.
I don’t recommend tuning your only guitar to this tuning, but if you have a second steel-string guitar sitting around, this tuning provides a fun alternative with plenty of creative possibilities.
In the olden days, you had to buy a whole set of 12-string strings to get the high-octave E A D G strings. But nowadays, D’Addario has given us their EXL150H High-Strung Guitar Strings that provide the exact six strings you need for this tuning for just $3.99 per set. You can see them here:
accessories.musiciansfriend.com/product/D’Addario-EXL150H-HighStrung-Guitar-Strings?sku=102243.
[photo: House of Sims]
As a musician, it’s critical to play in time and not drift off the beat by rushing or dragging. But, that said, there are times when you can purposely use rushing or dragging to your advantage.
Fact is, you can create interesting musical effects by “leaning on the beat”, which means purposely rushing or dragging just slightly enough to still be playing in time.
Most up-tempo rock rhythms tend to lean forward on the beat in order to create a “driving forward” effect. By contrast, most slow blues rhythms tend to lean back on the beat in order to create a “falling backwards” effect. In between these two concepts would be playing straight up and down on the center of the beat.
Practice this technique by playing against a metronome, first landing your note a hair ahead of the metronome beat, and then a hair behind the metronome beat. Then, try it playing against jam tracks, leaning forward on the fast pieces and leaning back on the slow ones. You’ll see that this slight shift in note placement has a big effect on the rhythmic feel.
[photo: vonSchnauzer]
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On January 13, I wrote about my passion for putting electric guitar strings on acoustic guitars. Today, I want to add this note: Including all of my guitars as well as friends’ and students’ guitars, I’m sure I’ve re-strung over 100 acoustic guitars with electric strings, and in 95% of all cases, the switch has worked just fine with no guitar adjustments required. However, there have been a handful of times when the reduced tension [more…]
