Agm 268

WIN AN ALVAREZ 50TH ANNIVERSARY 1965 SERIES GUITAR
3 SONGS
BOB DYLAN
Mr. Tambourine Man
LED ZEPPELIN
That’s the Way
MADELEINE PEYROUX
Weary Blues
APRIL 2015 | ACOUSTICGUITAR.COM
L LO
CO STE 5 MODERN
TROUBADOURS CRAFT
‘THE NEW BASEMENT TAPES’
LV I S MERLEFEST
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TRIPPING THROUGH THE PAST
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CONTENTS
‘If you had Features Special Focus Miscellany

Bruce playing 18 Songwriters at Play String Bands 10 From the Home Office
5 modern troubadours 36 MerleFest! 11 Opening Act
with you, that’s collaborate with the young Behind the flowering of one of 97 Ad Index
all you would Bob Dylan to create the most influential string-band 98 Final Note
The New Basement Tapes festivals
need to do By Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers By Mark Segal Kemp
just about
anything.’ 22 His Back Pages 39 Goodbye Earl
Studio guitar legend 5 little-known teenage girls
BOB DYLAN, ON Bruce Langhorne is the from North Carolina helped
BRUCE LANGHORNE
real Mr. Tambourine Man blaze trails for women in
P. 22
By Kenny Berkowitz bluegrass
By Mark Segal Kemp
26 Faith, Folk
& Funny Business 42 Pickin’ the Blues
From The Brady Bunch How racism kept black string-
to Transparent, scriptwriter, band music virtually hidden
songwriter, and acoustic-guitar for decades
player Faith Soloway has come By Orville Johnson
April 2015
full circle
Volume 25, No. 10, Issue 268
By Pat Moran 46 I Love String Bands
AG readers weigh in on
On the Cover
30 Music from the Ruins what inspires them about
Elvis Costello
Guitars built from Detroit’s string-band music
abandoned housing stock
Photographer
are adding to the Motor
James O’Mara
City’s legacy
By Patrick Sullivan
AcousticGuitar.com 5
PRS Acoustics
A Culture of Quality
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acoustics are heirloom instruments
with remarkable tone and exquisite
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© 2014 PRS Guitars / Photos by Marc Quigley
The PRS Guitars’ Acoustic Team.

CONTENTS SPONSORED
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NEWS 76 Makers & Shakers
12 The Beat Indian Hill’s Mike Kennedy creates books on how to play the guitar, runs
Seth Avett and Jessica Lea Mayfield release a unique showpiece flattop The Mosella Music school, and tours
a tribute to indie songsmith Elliott Smith; the world as one of the great finger-
Airplane manager Bill Thompson dies 78 Guitar Guru stylists alive today.
What causes random intonation glitches?
14 News Spotlight “Phosphor Bronze strings from Elixir
Rez Abbasi turned to the acoustic guitar 80 Review: Bourgeois Strings are my choice for studio and
to re-invent ’70s fusion classics Bryan Sutton Dreadnought stage. They offer the perfect sound and
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54 Songcraft 82 Review: Paul Reed Smith SE A10E
Songwriter Nathan Bell on This all-mahogany acoustic
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Songs to Play 84 Review: Fishman Platinum Ulli Boegershausen shows you a simple
56 That’s the Way by Led Zeppelin Series Preamps way to arrange music for the acoustic
58 Mr. Tambourine Man by Bob Dylan User-friendly models with guitar. This is a tip you can really use!
64 Weary Blues clean and accurate sonics
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68 Basics 89 Great Acoustics

AcousticGuitar.com/
Master the art of rests Larrivée’s 1975 cutaway How-To /Arrange-Elixir
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70 Weekly Workout
Exercises for honing the major-pentatonic scale MIXED MEDIA
92 Playlist
AG TRADE James McMurtry’s Complicated Game
74 Shop Talk has a softer sound, but more edge
Ovation brand sold to Drum Workshop; to the lyrics; also Jorma Kaukonen’s
Gibson issues a new Dylan signature Ain’t in No Hurry, Julian Lage’s
SJ-200 guitar World’s Fair, and Iron & Wine’s
Archive Series Volume No. 1 SPONSORED
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AG ONLINE
Julian Lage
Watch ‘Acoustic Guitar

Sessions’ Online
If you love AG’s print stories, don’t miss our online interview and performance
series Acoustic Guitar Sessions. Go to AcousticGuitar.com/Sessions and watch
Julian Lage picking solo acoustic tunes on his new Waterloo. While you’re at the
AG Sessions page, check out appearances from other artists including Seth
Avett, Ani DiFranco, Peter Rowan, Richard Thompson, Valerie June, and others.
THE NEWEST GUITARS AND GEAR

Every year guitar makers, amp builders, acces-
sory manufacturers, and more gather in
Anaheim to unveil their newest models at the
NAMM show. 2015 was no different. Head to
AcousticGuitar.com/Gear to watch demo
videos and interviews with Guild, Martin
Guitars, L.R. Baggs, and more.
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8 April 2015
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CONTENT DEVELOPMENT
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Editor Mark Segal Kemp
Editor at Large Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers
Managing Editor Blair Jackson
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Contributing Editors Kenny Berkowitz,
Andrew DuBrock, Teja Gerken,
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Sean McGowan, Jane Miller,
John Pisano Greg Olwell, Adam Perlmutter,
Rick Turner, Doug Young
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MARKETING SERVICES
or some, the annual Winter NAMM conven- away. Due to our location, we couldn’t really Sales Director Cindi Kazarian
F tion—that colossal confab of the musical-
instrument trade—is a candy store of glittering
see his face, but he had a shock of curly white
hair, gnarled knuckles, and an infectious grin as
Sales Managers Ref Sanchez, Greg Sutton
Marketing Services Associate
Tanya Gonzalez
new guitars and gear. But it’s also a place to he formed fat jazz chords and deftly picked
catch up with colleagues and old friends. And standards on an older Martin 00-18 flattop.
the convention offers its share of surprises (the Back on the patio, after the music had
lively onstage interview with Apple co-founder ended and as the players packed their gear, I
Steve Wozniak among them). bumped into Martin historian Dick Boak and
One of those bright moments arrived on the learned the name of the jazz player: John Stringletter.com
second night of the show. Pisano. Yeah, that John Pisano. AKA the Publisher David A. Lusterman
I was attending the annual dinner hosted by 83-year-old Godfather of Jazz Guitar, who
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Office Assistant Leslie Perry
were in a rather relaxed mode—my colleagues guitarist in the trio was Jim Fox, the bassist
taking the time to enjoy the balmy Southern Dave Smith). General Inquiries FrontDesk@Stringletter.com
California evening on the patio with their The other guests headed for the bus to Customer Service
Help@AcousticGuitarService.com
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10 April 2015
OPENING ACT
Jackie Greene
JAY BLAKESBERG PHOTO
THE FILLMORE
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA
NOVEMBER 29, 2014
FOUR MORE
NEWS
ELLIOTT SMITH
TRIBUTE ALBUMS
Various Artists
The String Quartet Tribute
to Elliott Smith (2004)
Released a year after Smith’s suicide,
this string tribute album arranges his
most popular songs for violin, viola,
and cello.
Various Artists
A Tribute to Elliott Smith (2005)
Underground artists deliver
CRACKERFARM PHOTO
wide-ranging interpretations of
Smith’s songs, plus originals
inspired by his work.
THE BEAT
Twilight
Seth Avett and Jessica Lea Mayfield
pay tribute to Elliott Smith
BY WHITNEY PHANEUF Various Artists
To Elliott, From: Portland (2006)
The Decemberists, the Helio
welve years after his death, seminal indie themselves. When Seth is singing, I forget for a Sequence, the Thermals,
T singer-songwriter Elliott Smith’s fans
continue to celebrate his songwriting. This time
moment that they’re Elliott Smith songs, and
when I’m singing them, it’s the same thing. I’m
and other Portland musicians
cover 15 of his songs.
it’s Seth Avett, of the Avett Brothers, and alt- singing the lyrics as if it were my own song.”
country singer Jessica Lea Mayfield bringing Avett and Mayfield spent three years
new life to Smith’s songs on their tribute album, working on the 12-song record, which includes
Seth Avett & Jessica Lea Mayfield Sing Elliott covers of “Between the Bars,” “Somebody That
Smith, out March 17. I Used to Know,” and “Baby Britain.”
PORTLAND CELLO PROJECT
“It only exists because me and Jessica love “It speaks toward the importance of the
Elliott Smith songs,” Avett says in a video trailer project to both of us that we made the time to
for the album. “Even if the topics are dark get it done. It’s a Frankenstein of a project,
sometimes, there’s still a joy to singing them. made up of a lot of different sessions in a lot of
Portland Cello Project
It’s very different than anything I’ve ever done, different locations,” Avett says. “There was To E.S. (2014)
the nature of it being a cover record.” nothing insincere about it.” The genre-bending string outfit
Mayfield, who has frequently opened for the The duo will tour behind the album this significantly reworks six Elliott Smith
Avett Brothers, adds: “Anyone who’s an Elliott spring, with stops in New York, Nashville, songs, pairing them with six
Smith fan takes the lyrics and relates them to Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. commissioned works.
12 April 2015
GARTH BROOKS
SURPASSES
ELVIS IN U.S.
SOLO SALES
“The King” is no longer the

reigning king of record sales.
Once again, country megastar
and acoustic guitar enthusiast
Left Garth Brooks is the best-selling
Bill solo artist in U.S. history, taking
the title away from Elvis Presley,
Thompson
RCA PHOTO
Right according to the Recording

Jefferson Industry Association of America
Airplane
(RIAA).
Brooks’ 2014 album Man
Jefferson Airplane formation in 1965, when they were still very Against Machine, which was
and Hot Tuna much a folk-rock group. certified platinum, helped inch
his total sales to 135 million,
Manager Bill
Thompson had a role in convincing the San
Francisco Chronicle’s main music critic, Ralph just above Presley’s 134.5
Thompson Dies Gleason, to check out the Airplane; Gleason’s

glowing review helped the Airplane become the
million. Brooks first out-sold
the King in 2000 and previously
ormer Jefferson Airplane, Starship, and Hot first of the new wave of San Francisco bands to held the title in November 2007.
F Tuna manager Bill Thompson died January
12 of a heart attack in Mill Valley, Calif., where
get signed by a major record label, RCA. When
the first Airplane spin-off emerged in 1969,
Billy Joel is the third best-
selling solo artist with 81.5
he lived, at the age of 70. Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady’s Hot Tuna, million albums sold. The Beatles
Though Thompson didn’t become the Air- Thompson became their manager and landed remain the best-selling act of
plane’s manager until 1968, he had actually them a deal with RCA. Their live acoustic debut all time, according to the RIAA,
been part of the group’s world since their album is still rightly regarded a classic. AG with 178 million albums sold.
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NEWS SPOTLIGHT
For some of his band members, however,
Rez Abbasi
this is seminal music. “As with many in my gen-
eration,” Ware says, “this music was a bridge
between rock, from my youth, and jazz, as I
matured as an artist. As I reached my teenage
years and began playing in bands, it was all
rock—because that’s what everyone around me
played. As I became more interested in instru-
mental music, I was drawn to jazz-rock. The
songs on this record are very familiar to me, as
they were some of my favorite tunes when I
was in high school.”
ATTACK & POP

Most players know that switching over to
acoustic guitar presents a number of chal-
lenges. “Projection is more difficult on acoustic,
especially within a band situation,” Abbasi
says. “Also, I think the tone of an acoustic is
more difficult to work with because there’s no
manipulation of electronics—it’s just a pick,
your fingers, and the guitar. You really have to
work around that.”
Still, Abbasi’s playing style remains rela-
tively constant. “I feel like myself on both
A Different Light
acoustic and electric; the vocabulary doesn’t
change,” he says. “Any instrument you pick up
is going to influence you and inspire you in a
Rez Abbasi re-invents ’70s jazz-rock classics different way, but essentially, my persona is still
in an acoustic setting completely there.”
Abbasi’s weapon of choice for his acoustic
BY MARC GREILSAMER
project is a thinline Guild Songbird he picked
up at Matt Umanov’s shop in New York almost
here was a time not long ago when the Coltrane, and this kind of stuff. When someone two decades ago. So enamored was he of the
T “f-word”—fusion—was considered dirty
among “serious” jazz musicians. For the most
finally introduced me to fusion, it was too
reminiscent of what I had just left.”
Guild that he traded in a “semi-expensive
Martin” to get it. “I didn’t care, because this
part, that dismissive attitude has all but disap- Inspired, in part, by this “void” in his thing was magical,” he remembers, describing
peared; jazz-rock is now largely considered a musical history, Abbasi decided to tackle a its tone as “childlike and idiosyncratic. . . . It
legitimate link in the chain of jazz history, and range of fusion classics from the likes of Herbie sounds like no other guitar I ever played.”
many of the genre’s finest moments have taken Hancock, Return to Forever, Weather Report, When going acoustic, Abbasi stays commit-
their rightful place in the book of jazz standards. Mahavishnu Orchestra, Billy Cobham, Larry ted to steel-string instruments. “I feel like
As evidence, look no further than Intents Coryell, Pat Martino, and the Tony Williams nylon-strings is the default that a lot of jazz
and Purposes, the new album by the Rez Abbasi Lifetime. Using Spotify as his musical library guys go to when they switch from electric to
Acoustic Quartet (RAAQ), which features Bill and his primary tool in the vetting process, he acoustic. I really like the attack and the pop of
Ware on vibes, Stephan Crump on bass, and pored over hours of jazz-rock history before set- the steel-string.” To add a bit of Eastern flair,
Eric McPherson on drums. For the RAAQ tling on eight touchstones—a discovery process Abbasi, who is intimately familiar with instru-
project, Abbasi leaves behind his cherished he calls “overwhelming.” ments like the oud and sarod, makes use of a
D’Angelico NYSS-3B semihollow-body archtop fretless steel-string—an old custom-shop Wash-
for the sound of the steel-string acoustic. In ‘I feel like myself burn that recently had its frets removed by Matt
doing so, he gives an acoustic voice to several Brewster of 30th Street Guitars. For Coryell’s
pillars of electric jazz fusion. on both acoustic “Low-Lee-Tah,” he created a duo arrangement
“I knew it would recast the music in a differ- and electric; with just his Songbird and a Korean-made Gold
ent light altogether,” Abbasi says.
the vocabulary Tone baritone.
“Rez’s arrangement choices are exciting,”
FILLING THE VOID doesn’t change.’ Ware says, “because he doesn’t just play it the
For Abbasi, this is no nostalgia-laden endeavor. way they were recorded by the original artists.
“There was this hole in my jazz education, “Because there was no nostalgia in this Instead, he allows the arrangement to form
where I didn’t really hear much of the fusion process, I benefited from that,” Abbasi says. organically out of the approaches and unique
coming from the ’70s,” he says. “At about 15 or “There were no extra musical experiences voices of the specific players.”
16, I had been playing a lot of prog-rock music attached to these tunes. It was all about pres- Adds Abbasi, “All I wanted really was to
in garage bands—Rush, Yes, and groups like ent-day aesthetics—what I’m hearing right now. distill the skeleton of the tunes, essentially the
this—and I would listen to King Crimson. It wasn’t like, ‘Oh, yeah, I remember I heard compositions. I wanted no part in any other
When I was 16, the jazz bug bit me. That was this tune in high school, I gotta play that.’ It aspect of the music. I wanted the group to inter-
based on acoustic music—Charlie Parker, cleared the slate for a purely musical reason.” pret them as we are, as musicians now.” AG
14 April 2015
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18 April 2015
Marcus Mumford,
left, Rhianna Giddens,
T Bone Burnett,
Elvis Costello,
Jim James, and
Taylor Goldsmith.
E
lvis Costello was a teenager in
London in 1968 when several UK hit
songs piqued his interest: “The
Mighty Quinn,” by Manfred Mann; “This
Wheel’s on Fire,” by Julie Driscoll; and “You
Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere,” by the Byrds. All were
written by Bob Dylan, but his original versions
were not well-known until the release of The
Basement Tapes in 1975. That album, of course,
consisted of sessions Dylan had recorded with
the Band years before, in 1967.
“I was attracted to the mood of those songs,
because I loved the Band and I loved [Dylan’s]
John Wesley Harding,” says Costello. “Those
records are the product of the work shopping
that they were doing.” The recently released
six-disc set The Basement Tapes Complete
(Columbia/Legacy) documents how Dylan,
Robbie Robertson, Rick Danko, Richard
Manuel, Garth Hudson, and Levon Helm
worked up well over 100 songs in Dylan’s den
and in the basement of the house they called
Big Pink. “You hear a group of musicians trying
stuff out,” Costello says, “fooling around,
playing half-finished songs, songs that sound
like they’ve been made up on the spot, covers
RS
GE
by other people.”
D
RO
PE R
Those lo-fi demos, never intended for public
EP
YP
release, have been a touchstone for generations
FFRE of rock and roots musicians. Last year, Costello
JE
BY was one of five artists given the extraordinary
opportunity to extend the legacy of that era of
Dylan’s songwriting, thanks to the discovery of a
box of forgotten lyrics he wrote at the time of
the Basement Tapes sessions. Dylan’s publisher
shared the lyrics with producer T Bone Burnett,
who in turn invited Costello, along with Marcus
Mumford (Mumford and Sons), Jim James (My
Morning Jacket), Taylor Goldsmith (Dawes), and
Rhiannon Giddens (Carolina Chocolate Drops),
to write new songs based on Dylan’s words, and
to record them as an ad-hoc band.
The result is Lost on the River: The New Base-
ment Tapes, which, apart from its Dylanological
significance, is simply a great album—frisky
and fun, stylistically varied yet unified, too. The
five artists not only rose to the challenge of
making songs from Dylan’s 47-year-old scrib-
bling, but they stayed true to the freewheeling
spirit of the original basement sessions.
“It was our good fortune that these lyrics
came to light and we were given them to play
with,” says Costello. “It was a playground.”
SETTING THE STAGE
It’s hard to imagine a better guide for The New
Basement Tapes than Burnett, who played in
Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue in the ’70s and
has helped shape the contemporary Americana
scene as producer of such albums as Gillian
Welch’s Revival, Alison Krauss and Robert
Plant’s Raising Sand, and the O Brother, Where
Art Thou? soundtrack.
When presented with the lost Dylan lyrics,
Burnett’s first thought was to not think too
much. “I decided not to analyze it or break it
apart, but just find some collaborators who
could relate to it spontaneously,” he says. “I
didn’t want to get a lot of ideas.”
Burnett wanted to assemble a diverse group
of songwriters who could also back each other
on multiple instruments. He had worked with
Mumford, Giddens, and his longtime friend
Costello at a 2013 concert celebrating the
music of the Coen Brothers’ movie Inside Llewyn
Davis (for which Burnett was music supervisor),
and saw them as natural collaborators. He felt
similarly about James, who had already been
through the same process, creating new songs
from Woody Guthrie lyrics for the 2012 album
New Multitudes. Mumford suggested bringing in
Goldsmith, whom Burnett describes as an “all-
around threat” with his chops on guitar, bass,
keyboard, and vocals. swapping instruments as they wrote, arranged, FOLLOW THE LYRICS
Unlike Dylan and the Band, who in 1967 and recorded on the fly. Keeping the sessions fast and loose was appro-
were hanging out in Woodstock and made The With all the musicians working off the same priate for the spirit of Dylan’s lyrics. “The
Basement Tapes over the course of a year or so, set of lyrics, the sessions could have felt like a words are very playful from that time,” Gold-
the biggest window of time that Burnett could songwriting competition to see whose version smith says. “It’s not like he’s trying to get after
find to get his busy artists together was 12 of a particular lyric would get picked for the ‘Visions of Johanna’ or ‘Chimes of Freedom’ or
days. The tight schedule ruled out recording in album. The best strategy, Burnett decided after stuff like that. It’s really like, ‘What’s a good
a house that would have to be set up from a slow first day in which they recorded just one way for us all to have a good time today?’”
scratch, so the sessions were booked instead at song, was to record all of the ideas that every- The silliness heard in original Basement Tapes
the expansive Capitol Studios, on the lower body had and sort through them later. “So we songs like “Lo and Behold” and “Tiny Montgom-
level of the Capitol Records tower in Holly- put the pedal to the metal and started working ery” (Costello calls them “drunken pirate songs”)
wood. “It was a basement, too,” Burnett says fast,” he says. carries over to The New Basement Tapes on songs
with a chuckle, “so it had that going for it.” The group wound up recording 48 songs in such as “Married to My Hack” and “Card Shark.”
Burnett supplied the songwriters with tran- the 12 days they worked together. And out of Costello recalls performing Goldsmith’s
scriptions of the Dylan lyrics in advance, so those 48 tracks, Burnett picked 20 for the album. “Card Shark” at a concert in Los Angeles after
they could work up ideas to bring to the ses- “Because T Bone made the decision to the album release, with everyone off mic and
sions. Once in the studio, Burnett wanted record everything, we didn’t know what was harmonizing in the footlights. “There’s a line in
everyone to do what Dylan and the Band did, going to happen with these recordings, and it that says, ‘Stick it in the rear and roar for a
nobody really cared,” Giddens says. “It was just bit / And waddle down the road like a brick,’
like, ‘We’re making awesome music. Let’s make and we all had difficulty getting to the next
as much as we can.’” chorus without bursting out laughing,” Costello
says. “There’s nothing wrong with playing with
words for sheer mischief. You don’t always have
to be looking for some kind of deep and hidden
meaning in the song.”
‘We’re making awesome Not all the lyrics are so irreverent. “Spanish
Mary,” written in the stark style of a traditional
music—let’s make ballad, builds to the haunting couplet, “Beggar
as much as we can.’ man, beggar man, tell me no lie / Is it a
RHIANNON GIDDENS mystery to live or is it a mystery to die?” That
song was a natural for Giddens, the most trad-
oriented artist of the group, who accompanied
TO
O
her interpretaton on a 19th-century-style min-

H
P
RS
TE N strel banjo. The low-and-lonesome album
WI
DA N opener, “Down on the Bottom,” ponders being
20 April 2015
JAMES O’MARA PHOTO
voice trilling over an insistent rhythm reminis-
cent of “The Other One” by the Grateful Dead.
More examples of such contrasts can be seen in
the Showtime documentary about the sessions,
Lost Songs: The Basement Tapes Continued.
LETTING GO
Since the release of The New Basement Tapes,
the artists have returned to their own bands
and projects. But the creative lessons of that
unique collaboration linger on. Even for
Costello, who has one of the most wide-ranging
‘We weren’t songwriting resumés in contemporary music,
seeking [Dylan’s] the group experience was unlike any other.
“The pleasure of doing it in a cooperative
endorsement or endeavor like this with other songwriters was
approval.’ to not have the arrogance to say, ‘Well, this is
ELVIS COSTELLO how it goes and this is definitive’—because
nothing’s definitive,” Costello says. “There are
all these other versions. So that really changed
the nature. I couldn’t compare it to writing
songs with Allen Toussaint or Burt Bacharach or
Paul McCartney or anyone else I’ve ever written
with.”
In the basement,
at Capitol Records For Goldsmith, the sessions were a reminder
in Hollywood: of “how fun recording and music can and
James (from left),
Costello, Mumford, should be. We really learned how to let go and
Goldsmith, Giddens. not worry too much about how good something
is going to be or how to cultivate our own
“down to the last drop in the cup” and got an Within the group, the songwriters often comfort zones. I feel like the result ended up
R&B treatment by James, while “Kansas City” is came to very different conclusions about how being so great because of that. It’s very easy to
a rueful farewell to a fickle lover that Mumford to make a lyric work. A case in point, Costello get precious about records that you make, and
(with an assist from Goldsmith on some of the says, is “Lost on the River”: James’ version (not the music is often better served not to do that.”
chord changes) turned into a folk-rock anthem. on the CD) included every word Dylan wrote. Giddens was so moved by the experience
Giddens reduced the original lyrics somewhat that, right before the sessions ended, she stayed
EDITING DYLAN and also changed the gender, while Costello up all night writing a song about it. The track,
One of the keys to the project was that the added a verse to complete a story he felt was “Angel City,” closes her new solo album, Tomor-
artists could edit the lyrics however they implied. row Is My Turn, which was produced by
wanted. Dylan himself was strictly hands off. With all those editorial changes, the artists Burnett. She says that making music with
“We weren’t seeking his endorsement or tried to retain the voice and intent of Dylan’s Costello, Mumford, James, and Goldsmith, with
approval,” Costello says. “I think it would be words. With “Liberty Street,” Goldsmith found Burnett’s gentle encouragement, transformed
very strange for him to get involved, as some- he had to move some lines around and add a how she looks at songwriting.
body who’s moving forward all the time.” few words (for instance, he wrote “another “Sometimes you have to just do,” Giddens
Editing and adaptation were necessary in victim of the heat” in order to rhyme with the says. “Later maybe you go, ‘This was not a good
many cases. Some lyrics were incomplete or in title phrase). But, he says, “I didn’t want to song—I’m going to tear it up now,’ but when
progress, as became obvious when the song- make it about words that I was writing. I just you’re in the act of creating, you can’t second-
writers got to examine the original handwritten wanted a little bit of glue to hold it together.” guess yourself because then you just stop the
pages. “You could see where things had been Even when the songwriters used the exact creativity. With The New Basement Tapes, there
crossed out and where there were alternate same words, it’s fascinating to hear how differ- was so much creating going on, you had to just
rhymes and word choices and things like that,” ently they interpreted them. On the album, rip away that self-consciousness. That was a
says Costello. “That made you feel that these James’ “Hidee Hidee Ho” is light and swingy, really great opportunity, because I think as an
were in an unedited state, so you could do a while the version by Giddens and Costello is artist, eventually you have to kick that to the
little work of your own.” decidedly darker, with Giddens’ opera-trained curb in anything that you do.” AG
Costello’s ’60s-era 1938 Martin 000-28 Vintage Framus

WHAT THEY
PLAYED Fender Jazzmaster
1958 Gretsch 6120 tenor electric
12-string acoustic
IN THE 1954 Gibson J160E
(bought during session)
BASEMENT Vintage Gibson Super 400
1956 Fender Mandocaster
1936 Gibson Super 400 with Johnny Smith pickup
Among the sundry instruments
with DeArmond pickup 1938 Gibson tenor ukulele
used on The New Basement Recent Gibson L-00
Tapes sessions were these, 1967 Harmony Sovereign
from Costello’s collection: Deluxe Jumbo H1265
HIS
STUDIO GUITAR LEGEND
BRUCE LANGHORNE
IS THE REAL
BACK
MR. TAMBOURINE MAN
BY KENNY BERKOWITZ
PAGES
IT TAKES A VILLAGE
O
ne day in 1963, multi-instrumentalist of the high points of his career, his only number
Bruce Langhorne brought a Turkish one hit, thanks to a 1965 cover recorded by the Growing up in Harlem, Langhorne played violin
frame drum to a recording session Byrds. as a child, but stopped at 12 after losing two and
with Bob Dylan at the Columbia Recording But despite a long list of accomplishments, a half fingers on his right hand in a fireworks
Studio in New York City. The instrument didn’t Langhorne has largely been forgotten, living accident. Instead, he took up acoustic guitar, and
make it onto the album, The Freewheelin’ Bob out his days in Venice, California, too ill to walk though he could only pick with his middle, ring,
Dylan, but it made a big impression on Dylan, along the beach. He hasn’t played guitar since and pinky fingers, he developed a call-and-
who was starting to write his own songs. having a stroke in 2006, and though he self- response style that relied on subtlety, quietly
“He had this gigantic tambourine,” wrote released an album of solo demos in 2011, embellishing the melody, and voicing two or
Dylan in the liner notes to Biograph, identifying called Tambourine Man, his mind is less focused three notes at a time, each one perfectly placed.
Langhorne as the inspiration for “Mr. Tambou- on those early sessions than it is on Archime- By the time Dylan arrived in New York,
rine Man,” which he initially wrote for Another des, Albert Einstein, and mortality. Langhorne was already the guitarist of choice
Side of Bob Dylan (1964) but released on Bring- “At one point, I was like Mr. Guitar in Green- at Gerde’s Folk City, the center of Greenwich
ing It All Back Home (1965). “It was, like, really wich Village,” says Langhorne, talking by tele- Village’s folk scene, where he would accompany
big. It was as big as a wagon wheel. He was phone on this 50th anniversary of the song’s multiple singers in any given night’s hoote-
playing, and this vision of him playing this tam- release. “I got to play gospel, I got to play Irish nanny. That’s how he met Dylan, along with
bourine just stuck in my mind.” folk music, I got to play everything. And one of fellow folkies Eric Andersen, Joan Baez,
Fifty years later, Bob Dylan is, well, still Bob the things I got to do was play music with this Richard and Mimi Fariña, Richie Havens,
Dylan, and “Mr. Tambourine Man” remains one kid Bob Dylan.” Carolyn Hester, Gordon Lightfoot, Fred Neil,
22 April 2015
and Buffy Sainte-Marie. In 1961, as the music collaborating on the soundtrack to Pat Garrett SESSIONS
reached the recording studios, Langhorne was & Billy the Kid (1973), Dylan and Langhorne For years, it seemed as though Langhorne had
there, first with the Clancy Brothers and never played together again. played with everyone. Before and after those
Tommy Makem on their major-label debut, and “Bobby was one of those people—his intent Dylan sessions, he recorded with Joan Baez,
next with Hester on an album that featured a was very strong,” said Langhorne in 1998, Harry Belafonte, the Chad Mitchell Trio,
young Dylan on harmonica, playing his first describing those early sessions in an interview for Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Richard and Mimi Fariña,
recording session. Martin Scorcese’s film documentary No Direction Hugh Masekela, Odetta, Babatunde Olatunji,
Langhorne didn’t think much of Dylan’s Home. “I like to call somebody’s intent their Tom Rush, and John Sebastian. He was at the
chops, but felt a “telepathic” connection with thread. He would generate a thread from the epicenter of change in the folk world, back at a
him—once Dylan began writing songs, Lang- beginning of his song to the end of his song that time when session guitarists simply showed up
horne’s opinion changed. “He can’t sing for shit, you could really latch onto, either as a listener or ready to improvise, and an album could be
but he’s a great poet,” says Langhorne. “Even as an accompanist. And I would latch onto his recorded in a single day, or even in a few hours.
though I love him very much, I don’t think he thread and I knew what he was going to do. There were too many sessions to remember,
can sing. I mean, I didn’t realize what a great That’s the telepathic part. I had some idea of what even when Langhorne’s mind was still sharp, but
poet he was until I started to really listen to he was going to do before he’d do it. Before he did in the years since his stroke, his memories tend
some of the stuff that he was writing. Then I was it. Even if I’d never heard the material before.” to either blur together or disappear entirely.
impressed.”
He rejoined Dylan in the studio for The Free- ‘As a species,
wheelin’ Bob Dylan (1963), playing on a version
of “Corrina Corrina” that was released as the we are mandated
B-side of a single featuring the nonalbum track to do certain
“Mixed Up Confusion,” on which Langhorne
things, and one
also played. Next came Bringing It All Back
Home (1965), where Dylan officially trans- of those things
formed folk into folk-rock, with Langhorne is to make a
playing on every cut, contributing epochal per-
formances to “She Belongs to Me,” “Love Minus
joyous noise
Zero/No Limit,” and “Mr. Tambourine Man.” unto the Lord.’
“It was a gig for me,” he says, talking about BRUCE LANGHORNE
Bringing It All Back Home. “I was getting paid
for playing guitar—in New York. How phenom-
enal is that? Getting paid was a big deal.
Getting paid doing something that I enjoyed Left
was a big deal. Being paid enough to live on as Langhorne with the
drum he says inspired
a musician in New York was a big deal. It was
“Mr. Tambourine Man”
fun to get paid. It was fun to write music. It was
fun to work with really incredibly talented Below
Bruce performs with
people. But what is fun? The bottom line is I Odetta at the March
was a musician in New York City, getting paid on Washington, 1963
to do what I would have had to do anyway.”
Langhorne had already electrified Dylan’s
sound when he installed a pickup on his 1920
Martin 1-21 and plugged into a Fender Twin to
record “Mixed Up Confusion” (that single was
released on Dec. 14, 1962, more than two years
before Dylan famously “went electric” at the
1965 Newport Folk Festival). The historic Martin
is now owned by collector Maple Byrne,
Emmylou Harris’ guitar tech.
At the 1963 March on Washington, Lang-
horne stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memo-
rial alongside the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and
other civil-rights heavyweights. He was there to
accompany folk singer Odetta as she sang for the
300,000 people who came to watch King deliver
NATIONAL ARCHIVES 542020 PHOTO
his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.

The following winter, Dylan and Langhorne
performed “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue” on the
late-night Les Crane Show, but by summertime,
after the notorious electric set at the Newport
Folk Festival, Dylan’s transition to rock was
complete. Langhorne was replaced by electric
bluesman Michael Bloomfield, who was
replaced by Robbie Robertson, and apart from
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24 April 2015
Bruce, left, with
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Bob Dylan, Bill Lee
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On this early winter day, instead of answering life, just like the portrait of Langhorne that
questions about Dylan, Langhorne, now 76, talks graces the bottle of his own Brother Bru-Bru’s PITCH STABILITY
about Odetta’s cover of “Masters of War”—“I was hot sauce, the pied piper who used to lead a
very happy and proud to be able to play with musical parade along Venice Beach.
her”—or Belafonte—“Harry has always been an “As a species, we are mandated to do certain
outspoken political voice, and I was flattered to things, and one of those things is to make a
assist him”—or the state of the natural world joyous noise unto the Lord,” Langhorne says. NY STEEL
—“There’s a huge battle taking place between “What is the most joyous noise that I can think
marsupials and placentals for domination of the of? It’s the sound of children laughing. But
surface of planet Earth.” that’s just what I think. As I get older and older, STANDARD
He recorded a few songs on his own, but as I get closer and closer to death, I get to
they never materialized into an album, and as realize that what I think is sometimes com-
folk-rock turned into rock, Langhorne went on pletely wrong. And my bottom-line answer
to score soundtracks for Peter Fonda’s The Hired always has to be, ‘Oh.’”
Hand (1971), Idaho Transfer (1973), and Langhorne says he still has the tambourine,
Outlaw Blues (1977); Bob Rafelson’s Stay bought at the Folklore Center in Greenwich STRENGTH
Hungry (1976); and Jonathan Demme’s Fight- Village. He says it could be carried inside a
ing Mad (1976), Melvin and Howard (1980), cymbal case and has a ring of small bells hanging
and Swing Shift (1984). along the inside of the rim. Longtime friends
“Just occasionally you come across these remember the guitarist for his hearty laugh, for
geniuses. Bruce Langhorne was one,” Demme being the kind of musician you’d gladly follow
has said. “These people all tend to work in the through the jingle-jangle morning. But what does
same way: They respond instinctively to the it mean now to be Mr. Tambourine Man?
visual image. I still remember the insane thrill “I’ve also been called Mr. Fuckhead,” Lang-
of being with Bruce in his apartment, with his horne says. “It’s just another name.”
guitar and other instruments, and looking at It was a great compliment, wasn’t it, to have
scenes from Melvin and Howard. He was inspired someone like that?
playing things and I was just saying, ‘Oh my “It certainly was.”
God, that’s amazing.’ Bruce Langhorne has Do you like the song?
done some of the most beautiful scoring that I “I like other pieces of music more.”
have ever been involved with, or ever known.” Like what?
Writing for film meant expanding into other “‘The Well-Tempered Clavier.’”
sounds, other genres, and other instruments, If Dylan came to visit, what would you do?
especially keyboards, and by the ’90s, he was “I’d say, ‘Hi, Bob, how you doin’, man?’”
multitracking solo demos at home, mostly What else?
driven by African and Afro-Caribbean rhythms. “Well, if me and Bobby Dylan actually
“Chihuahua” is sung from the point of view of a started talking, we could probably talk for
jealous pooch; “Subaru” is about a woman who hours, and we’d wind up making each other
loves Langhorne’s car more than she does Lang- laugh.” AG
horne; and “Perfect Love” is the story of the
Garden of Eden, told through a conversation See the music for “Mr. Tambourine Man”
ALWAYS TRUE
with God. They’re joyful, infectious, and full of on page 62. daddario.com/alwaystrue
FAITH, FOLK, AND
The streaming series has been praised as both
genre- and gender-bending, with critical con-
sensus website RottenTomatoes.com applaud-
FUNNY BUSINESS
ing its “sophistication and sincere dedication
to the human journey, warts and all.” In
January, the show won two Golden Globe
FROM THE BRADY BUNCH TO TRANSPARENT— awards: best series, and best actor in the TV
SCRIPTWRITER, SONGWRITER, AND ACOUSTIC GUITAR comedy/musical category for Tambor.
PLAYER FAITH SOLOWAY COMES FULL CIRCLE At the ceremony, Jill gave a shout-out to her
and Faith’s transgender dad for inspiring them.
BY PAT MORAN “I want to thank you for coming out,” she said,
“because in doing so, you made a break for
freedom, you told your truth, you taught me
how to tell my truth and make this show, and
“I
n some ways it’s all using the same director at Chicago’s Second City, theatrical maybe we’ll be able to teach the world some-
basic muscle,” Faith Soloway says. impresario of such raunchy yet open-hearted thing about authenticity and truth and love.”
The Boston funnywoman is talking stage shows as Jesus Has Two Mommies, and Faith, a gay single mother, credits the
about the intersection of songwriting, acoustic acoustic-folk singer-songwriter—she almost show’s binge-watching appeal with being a
guitar playing, and theater. “You’re starting forgets to mention her most recent gig. Soloway “real story told with love.”
with feeling, with hooks, with imagery. Be it is a scriptwriter for Amazon’s white-hot, much- Transparent is not the first time Faith and
writing a song, a musical, or a short story, the buzzed-about serio-comedy Transparent, which Jill have worked together to balance empathy
poetry is similar. The thing you need to do is get was created by her younger sister, Jill. and comedy. Growing up in Chicago, the two
out of your way and let it happen.” Transparent stars Jeffrey Tambor as Mort/ “were always collaborating, constantly
As Soloway unpacks the creative process Maura, a retired college professor who comes making up songs, shows and jokes,” Faith
that has fueled her eclectic career—musical out to her family as a transgendered woman. says. “We were each other’s wingmen.”
26 April 2015
ACOUSTIC GUITARS CAN BE FUNNY own show. Inspiration struck when the Soloway where Jill and I thought we’d help write it,”
Music has always been a catalyst to Faith’s cre- sisters watched a rerun of TV sitcom The Brady Soloway says. “But the horrible truth is that this
ativity. “I played cello in high school and that Bunch with a mutual friend who started reciting whole thing is owned by Paramount. We were
got me started,” she says. “I turned it sideways all of Jan Brady’s lines verbatim. borrowing their idea. We were lucky that it
and played it like a four-string guitar—a jumbo “Jill and I got the idea to put the Brady went as far as it did.”
cello-tar.” Bunch onstage,” Soloway says. “I played the At loose ends in Los Angeles, Soloway rekin-
After learning how to play a G chord, the underscoring,” providing the guitar when Greg dled her love of folk music. She borrowed
self-taught guitarist never looked back. She left Brady “strummed” his acoustic onstage. guitars, started hitting open mics, and played
Chicago to study theater at Indiana University. The Real Live Brady Bunch premiered in her songs. The audience response was encour-
Borrowing a classmate’s classical guitar—“The 1990. Both the audience and theater were tiny, aging. “I always wanted to write songs and sing
classical fit me because my hands are small,” but Soloway recalls that the air was electric. them,” Soloway says, citing Suzanne Vega as a
Soloway says—she played obsessively. She also “People weren’t just watching the show, they key influence. “I fell in love with everything
started writing songs. “I was serious about were erupting as they were experiencing it,” about her—her style, her quiet, her pain.”
songwriting, but in a way it was still goofing she says. “So many people had been brain- Tired of L.A. glitz and emboldened by Vega’s
around,” she says. “I never thought I would washed by that show, it hit on many different example, Soloway moved to Boston in 1994,
perform my songs.” levels. The next week, there was a line around and got serious about writing songs and playing
Soloway returned to Chicago during college the block.” guitar. “I didn’t know anybody, so I went to an
break to stage a Club Med-themed production of The Soloway sisters took the Bradys to New open mic,” she says. “I was a new guitar player,
Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. She wound up York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Boston, but I trusted my musicianship because I played
landing the prestigious job of musical director at as well as to college campuses across the piano and cello.”
Second City, the comedy launching pad for per- country. The media buzz spawned a revival of Soloway took the plunge and bought the
formers ranging from Bill Murray to Stephen the campy ’70s sitcom and piqued Hollywood’s Yamaha acoustic she still owns and plays. “I
Colbert. After three years with the famed interest in the Soloways. Sadly, their involve- had the action lowered to make it a little easier
Chicago comedy troupe, scoring scenes and ment in the 1995 cash-in, The Brady Bunch for me,” she says. “I put [an input jack] in at
writing parody songs, she was ready to stage her Movie, was minimal. “There was a brief moment the base where the guitar strap goes. I learned
about guitar parts as I went along.
“Since my hands are small, it was hard for
me to do barre chords,” she continues. “I
‘I didn’t do that couldn’t play in the standard way that every-
three-chord
body else could. I didn’t do that three-chord
strumming thing. I had to cram my fingers
strumming thing. together to make interesting chords, and do a
I had to cram lot of fingerpicking and open tuning. I surf the
guitar with my palm, and my right hand is
my fingers really percussive.”
together to make Drawing on her improv and theater days,
interesting chords, Soloway began interspersing her songs with

quirky, unfiltered humor, a quality that stood out
and do a lot of in Boston’s often overly earnest folk scene. As she
fingerpicking honed her act, she gained notice for her empathy
and open tuning.’ as well as her diamond-hard wit. She frequently

saves her sharpest comic jabs for herself. “I like to
make fun of myself first,” Soloway says. “I have
to make myself look the worst through the most
humiliating things, so that people [feel comfort-
able] to join in with me.”
Opposite A case in point is “Lesbo Song,” one of Solo-
Actor Jeffrey Tambor
way’s more popular tunes. The percussive,
picked up a Golden
Globe for his acting energetic folk-rocker that closes her sole studio
in ‘Transparent.’ album, 1997’s Training Wheels, celebrates Solo-
Left way’s sexual and gender identity, while at the
Faith Soloway same time poking fun at the po’-faced serious-
ness in the women’s music genre exemplified in
the 1990s by Lilith Fair.
“I don’t have a whole bunch of stuff
recorded,” Soloway says. “What is great about
the Boston folk scene is that there was just so
much collaboration. The bad thing about it is, I
was a really lazy songwriter and I would just
depend on my same five songs. I could get
away with doing that because I was constantly
sharing bills.”
To help fill the bill, Soloway “started closing
shows with these little rock operas.”
MISS FOLK AMERICA “I had jumped ship,” Soloway says. “I went Catie Curtis and Mary Chapin Carpenter. Soloway
Boston filmmaker and producer Ian Brownell back to my roots and did crazy musicals.” reveled in the sense of community she’d created.
caught Soloway’s show just as her theatrical Brownell became a key collaborator when “I like to have the most fun onstage and the
side was reemerging. “A friend dragged me to Soloway moved her folk-rock operas, retitled most passion as possible. I love working with
see what he described as a ‘funny singer at Club “schlock operas,” out of Club Passim into larger people,” Soloway says. “I’d rather work with
Passim,’” Brownell remembers. “This did not fill venues. “Ian developed a creative way of shooting people than work alone, and I find theater a
me with excited anticipation.” live—like concert-style,” Soloway says, “and we religious and healing experience. I love sharing
The first half of the show—Soloway playing made videos for the show (Miss Folk America), that with people.”
with her plugged-in band, the Faith Soloway which is a celebration of the folk scene. Soloway shares that passion in her day job at
Crisis—changed Brownell’s mind. But it was the “Miss Folk America was all about girls playing Urban Improv, an educational theater program
second half of the show that blew him away. guitars, so I played a lot of guitar in that show,” for children in fourth grade through high school
“The second half was one of her original ‘rock Soloway says. “Mary Gauthier, Kris Delmhorst, that she’s been doing for more than 20 years.
operas,’ in which she roped many of Boston’s and Meghan Toohey were all a part of that pro- “It’s a choice-making curriculum that works with
best singer-songwriters and folk instrumental- duction. It was a crazy show—a folk explosion.” improv to parse out issues that kids go through,
ists into acting in these loose original playlets,” Soloway’s multimedia schlock operas grew from bullying to self-esteem,” she says.
Brownell says. “The first one I saw was called grander and bawdier. The casts continued to Soloway still has that first Yamaha she
The Lez Boat, and it was hilarious.” expand, pulling in Boston folk luminaries like bought, but she also plays an acoustic Taka-
mine, an electric Gibson ES-135 semihollow
body, and her current favorite, a Taylor acous-
tic. “The Taylor is cut better than the Yamaha,
and the action is a little easier,” she says. “It has
a Fishman onboard Blender [pickup system]
and pearl inlay on the fretboard. It’s really
pretty, and it sounds great.
“I just accompanied this musical I wrote,
Norbert Beany Is Action Man, and I played the
Taylor for it,” Soloway adds, crediting her work
in children’s musical theater with keeping her
young. “It keeps me on top of where kids are,
and that helps me with my writing.”
That on-the-job training came in handy
when sister Jill turned to Faith for help with
Transparent. “I told her if the series went any-
where, I definitely wanted to be included, and
she called my bluff,” Faith says. She laughs. “Jill
asked, ‘Can you move here in three weeks?’ It
happened that fast.”
The whirlwind success of the show reminds
Faith of the previous project that brought the
sisters together. “The Real Live Brady Bunch is
the show that really married us creatively,
[and] it had this incredible word-of-mouth,”
she says. “I think that’s what’s happening again
with Transparent.”
Currently working with Transparent’s
writing team on season two, Soloway splits her
time between Boston and Los Angeles. The
bicoastal life and hectic pace of turning out a
hit show is taxing, but Soloway finds solace in
her guitar playing. “Because my life is so crazy
now, it’s centering to write and to play,” she
says. “It calms me down.”
Will Soloway’s therapeutic, meditative
playing result in a new folk album—a follow-up
to Training Wheels? Soloway says that’s a dis-
tinct possibility.
“I would love to record an album. I’d need
to go out, do some open mics,” she says. “I’m
curious to see what my set list would be after
all these years, and what kind of interesting
sounds I come up with.
“I’m a musician first and I feel blessed to have
that connection with music,” she adds. “That’s
why I started writing songs in the first place.”AG
28 April 2015
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FROM THE
GARY ZIMNICKI MAKES GUITARS FROM

DETROIT’S ABANDONED HOUSING STOCK
BY PATRICK SULLIVAN
30 April 2015
A
stray yellow dog ambles through a
muddy lot in what was once the heart
of the Motor City, sniffs around among
some orange barrels and stacks of discarded
tires, then, finding nothing of value, runs off.
Built in 1910 and located 500 yards from
Motown’s legendary Hitsville USA studios, the
two-story house that once stood in the lot at
6406 Trumbull is long gone. Like a growing
number of once-beautiful homes in Detroit’s
Northwest Goldberg neighborhood, the struc-
ture was knocked down to combat urban blight,
but that’s where the story takes a hopeful turn.
Thanks to local luthier Gary Zimnicki, the
discarded floorboards and joists of 6406 Trum-
bull, and other homes in what is now one of the
city’s most crime-ridden neighborhoods, are
being recycled to make something wholly unex-
pected—gorgeous acoustic guitars.
“Not many people who see these completely
destroyed skeletal houses are probably imagin-
ing that they could be made into musical instru-
ments,” says Zimnicki, a self-taught luthier with
30 years of experience who recently started
working with reclaimed wood after a friend
suggested the idea.
A lifelong resident of the Detroit area, Zim-
nicki, 56, is the son of a factory worker who was
also a talented carpenter. “My dad worked like a
dog and got paid very little,” the tall, powerfully
built Zimnicki recalls. “Out of necessity, he figured
out how to make just about anything we needed.”
Having grown up some ten miles from
Northwest Goldberg, Zimnicki had a veritable
front-row seat as his hometown slid into
neglect and decay. Once the richest city in
America, Detroit has lost more than half its Gary Zimnicki
population since 1950. It now has some 70,000
abandoned structures that attract arsonists,
drug dealers, and feral dogs, but Zimnicki is from this wood is an eye-opening experience. The wood is much harder than freshly
hopeful the city can rebound. People say, ‘That instrument came out of a milled maple. “It’d be an exaggeration to say
“I don’t want to sound New Age-y or any- house? How does that work?’” it’s like cutting steel, but it’s definitely a lot
thing, but it helps to have a connection with the Haines was a bit surprised himself when Zim- more effort to push it through the table saw,”
material you’re using,” Zimnicki says as he nicki first called. “I said, ‘We don’t have exotic Zimnicki says.
stands next to a row of instruments hanging woods here—it’s just lumber, man,’” he recalls. The fact that this wood has been air-drying
from the ceiling of his crowded workshop. But as they talked, Haines realized how for many decades means there has been ample
For all Detroit has endured, its residents suitable the wood was for Zimnicki’s purposes. opportunity for intercellular water to work its
retain a strong sense of connection to the past, way out in ways that kiln drying can’t achieve.
T
which can make the demolition of the city’s he houses Reclaim Detroit decon- And that, Zimnicki feels, helps explain why
once coveted residences that much more diffi- structs typically date back to the musicians really like these instruments. “I’m
cult to watch. building boom of the 1910s and ’20s. writing it off to the age of the wood,” he says.
“My mom was one of the last to move out of They were built with lumber from trees that “It does something to the sound.”
the neighborhood and was very stubborn about may have been hundreds of years old. That’s echoed by Tom Roach, former presi-
giving up her home,” says Linda Hernandez “Old growth? Check. Air dried? Check,” dent of the Classical Guitar Society of Michigan,
Mangum, the daughter of 85-year-old Alice Haines says. “He does need quarter-sawn who just commissioned Zimnicki to make a
Hernandez, the last owner of 6406 Trumbull. boards, which are a little challenging to find classical guitar out of reclaimed wood. The
If not for Reclaim Detroit, a nonprofit organi- sometimes. But we’ve got them.” wood from these houses, Roach feels, has stood
zation that dismantles vacant structures to Zimnicki has spent hours carefully sorting the test of time. And, he says, it sounds great.
recover materials for reuse, the remains of Her- through piles of maple floorboards in the hunt “I’m in the market for a classical guitar,”
nadez’s home may never have found their way for usable pieces. Perhaps the biggest challenge says Roach, who lives in the Detroit area. “But I
into Zimnicki’s guitars, ukuleles, and mandolins. is finding boards without cracks. “I don’t mind played the steel-string and said, ‘Oh, wow. He’s
“Gary’s work gets people interested in what nail holes though, because they can be filled made something really remarkable here.’”
we’re doing here,” says Jeremy Haines, Reclaim and they serve as a reminder of where the Crafted from wood pulled from the remains
Detroit’s sales director. “Seeing a guitar made wood originated,” he explains. of the Trumbull house, Zimnicki’s steel-string
‘Seeing a guitar
M
model features a soundboard made with ake no mistake, Northwest Goldberg
Douglas fir from a ceiling joist. The back and can still be a dangerous place. The
made from sides are made from maple floor boards, alter- murder rate is almost eight times the
this wood is nating with thin strips of black walnut from a

local tree.
national average, according to data compiled
by the National Association of Realtors.
an eye-opening To date, Zimnicki has constructed ten instru- “Rough ain’t the word,” says Daniel Ross, a
experience. ments with wood purchased from Reclaim

Detroit. Since debuting them at 2013’s Healds-
tattooed construction worker helping to reno-
vate an old bar on Trumbull. “It gets crazy here
People say, burg Guitar Festival, and being featured on a PBS sometimes. But it’s definitely coming up. That’s
“That instrument NewsHour segment in July, hundreds of people

from around the country have inquired about pur-
why we’re fixing up this place.”
Thomas Habitz, an urban planning special-
came out of chasing their own piece of Detroit. ist with Henry Ford Health System, which has a
a house? How The rising demand for his guitars aside,

Zimnicki says that crafting these instruments is
hospital complex just north of Trumbull, says
that crime and safety problems tied to the
does that work?”’ also a way of paying tribute to the craftsmen vacant structures have diminished.
JEREMY HAINES, who built many of these dwellings before his “The area is quieter, waiting for develop-
RECLAIM DETROIT parents were born. ment and investment,” he says. “It doesn’t look
“Some of the homes were absolutely beauti- great yet by any means, but our goal is to have
ful, with details that nobody puts into homes a completely blight-free neighborhood and add
these days,” he says. “It’s nice to think about hundreds of jobs over the next 20 years.”
that and wonder what the people who laid the To that end, Henry Ford Health System
flooring a century ago would have to say if they bought about 200 neglected properties in the
saw what I was doing with it.” neighborhood, and has partnered with Reclaim
Word of Reclaim Detroit’s promising raw Detroit and other contractors to tear down
materials is definitely starting to spread. A about 75 structures.
Detroit musician named Mark Wallace has “A lot of these homes were occupied by drug
begun using this wood to make dealers and squatters,” Habitz says. “A number
solid-body guitars, and artisans of the garages had stolen cars in them.” C
from around the world are con- With many more homes slated for demoli-
M
tacting the nonprofit, with orders tion, Zimnicki sees even more opportunity to
Y
coming in from as far away as come, both as a luthier and a Detroit resident.
Japan. “There is still a lot to be done, but at least CM
“There’s a huge thirst for this the downtown area seems to be getting pretty
MY
stuff,” Haines says. “It’s about the well established with new businesses,” Zimnicki
CY
story of the city. People say, ‘I’ve says. “Part of that path is removing the 70,000
heard about what’s going on in vacant, decaying structures, which means there CMY
Detroit, and this is inspiring.’” should be a pretty good supply of floor boards
K
That helps explain why Reclaim and ceiling joists for a lot of years to come.”
Detroit is moving soon to a larger, For many people in the community, the
more central location. The hope, work Zimnicki and Reclaim Detroit do serves as
Haines says, is to begin supplying an important reminder that there was a suc-
products to furniture manufactur- cessful city here even before the auto industry’s
ers and other large companies. heyday. After all, when the Trumbull house was
Scaling up will divert more mate- built, the city was considered the Paris of the
rial from landfills. And it will Midwest—a capital of culture. In musical terms,
provide much-needed jobs. that distinction was repeated in the 1960s,
Lee Powell, 34, has worked for when artists like Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder,
Reclaim Detroit for two years. He and Diana Ross recorded hit records and metic-
appreciates the paycheck and the ulously honed their stage acts under the tute-
chance to learn woodworking lage of Motown’s Berry Gordy.
skills. And he’s seen empty houses “These houses were beautifully designed, and
contribute to crime in his own they were often made of very expensive materi-
neighborhood in southwest als,” Roach says. “Repurposing them for another
Detroit. artistic project seems very appropriate. It repre-
Still, taking houses apart is sents Detroit’s past and takes it into the future.”
tough work. And it can be pro- As for 6406 Trumbull, specifically, the fact
foundly sad. that it now enjoys a second life as a musical
“I found newspapers in one instrument is icing on the cake.
place from 1918,” Powell says. “It “Many fond memories were made in our
really gets you thinking about how childhood home, and it warms my heart to
old these houses are, how many think that part of it lives on in the lives of
people lived in them. And it makes others as they make music from wood used to
you wonder. Where are they build precious homes over a hundred years
now?” ago,” Mangum says. AG
32 April 2015
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SPECIAL
FOCUS
JIM GAVENUS PHOTO
Old Crow
Medicine Show
at the 2014
MerleFest
STRINGBANDOLOGY
FROM AFRICAN-AMERICAN FIELD WORKERS TO THE GRAND OLE
OPRY UP TO MERLEFEST, STRING BANDS HAVE BEEN AN IMPORTANT
PART OF AMERICAN POPULAR CULTURE
It’s rare that an acoustic-guitar player Since most acoustic-guitar players also
performs in a vacuum. Sure, classical appreciate other acoustic instruments,
guitarists can perform entire solo recitals, Acoustic Guitar recently added a new
and singer-songwriters can record and department (Pickin’) that offers news and
perform their music with no additional reviews of banjos, mandolins, and all manner
accompaniment. But the rich, resonant of other acoustic stringed instruments. With
sound of acoustic guitars becomes the annual Merlefest coming in late April,
exponentially more interesting when you AG’s editors have decided a special focus
add other instruments: drums, keyboards, on string bands is in order.
electric or pedal-steel guitars . . . or, say, So, grab your big ol’ dreadnought, strum a
several other purely acoustic instruments. few chords or flatpick a few notes—and enjoy
Enter that most historic of American this issue’s journey through the glorious
ensembles: the string band. sounds of bluegrass and string bands.
STRING
BANDS
MERLEFEST!
HOW A FAMILY GATHERING
FLOWERED INTO ONE OF
THE MOST INFLUENTIAL
STRING-BAND FESTIVALS
BY MARK SEGAL KEMP
U
nder a warm Carolina blue sky in
spring 1988, a flatbed truck pulled up
in a grassy meadow at a community
college in the southern Appalachian mountains.
The truck’s bed would provide the stage for a
sold-out music event—more than 1,000 people
splayed out on blankets or sitting in lawn chairs
brought from home. The event had piqued the
interest of an equal mix of young, scraggly,
long-haired hippies in tie-dye and jeans, and
senior citizens clad in their Sunday-go-to-meet-
ing best.
This event—held in the tiny town of Wilkes-
boro, North Carolina—would come to be known Della Mae, and many others have made their ‘I immediately
knew that I wanted
as MerleFest, a folk and bluegrass showcase names at MerleFest. At this year’s event, to be
named in memory of the late Merle Watson, the held April 23-26, the Avett Brothers will head-
guitar-playing son and musical partner of flat- line the coveted Saturday night concert. to be part of that
picking guitar legend Doc Watson. The younger For the Avetts, who first appeared on a world. I had found
Watson had died tragically in a tractor accident
three years earlier.
much smaller MerleFest stage in 2004, the
band’s status as headliners this year is the cul-
where I belong.’
SETH AVETT
“It was intended to be one time, one show, mination of a dream. Banjo player Scott Avett
one night,” says original MerleFest executive remembers when he and his guitar-playing
director B Townes, a horticulture instructor at brother Seth first attended the festival as fans
the community college. in the 1990s and witnessed life-changing per-
Townes had no idea how popular the festi- formances by artists ranging from Watson and
val would be for music fans starved for acoustic folk legend Ramblin’ Jack Elliott to then-new-
sounds rooted in tradition. What began as a comers Gillian Welch and David Rawlings.
way for Townes to raise money to improve the “I immediately knew that I wanted to be
campus gardens—now called the Eddy Merle part of that world,” Avett says. “I had found
“This is a particularly pretty tune I did on an
Watson Memorial Garden for the Senses— where I belong. That was a pivotal time in our
album called Cold on the Shoulder,” flatpicking
today attracts nearly 80,000 people a year to journey.”
guitarist Tony Rice said as he stepped to the
see up to 100 acts play on 14 stages. The year 1988 was a pivotal time for Mer-
microphone that day. “It’s called ‘John Hardy
With its guitar and songwriting workshops leFest—and all who love string-band music. On
Was a Desperate Little Man.’”
and musical marketplace, MerleFest has the bed of that flatbed truck on that spring
And from there, Rice, fiddler Mark
become one of the biggest and most influential afternoon, American music veterans, including
O’Connor, mandolin player Sam Bush, shaggy-
folk and bluegrass festivals in the world, and a Watson, Earl Scruggs, and Chet Atkins, played
haired bassist John Cowan, banjo man Béla
rite of passage for new generations of string scorching sets alongside a who’s who of pro-
Fleck, and Dobro player Jerry Douglas—all in
bands that have carried acoustic music into the gressive pickers, all of whom had been inspired
their 20s and 30s and full of youthful zeal—lit
21st century. Acts ranging from Alison Krauss in some way by Doc and Merle Watson, whose
into the lilting traditional tune, spraying solos
and Union Station to Nickel Creek, Old Crow very presence in the folk/bluegrass scene of the
into the warm mountain breeze. AG
Medicine Show, the Carolina Chocolate Drops, 1960s and ’70s bridged generations.
36 April 2015
GORDON BURNS PHOTO
Clockwise
from top left
Steep Canyon Rangers,
SARA BRENNAN-HARRELL PHOTO
The Waybacks
with the T Sisters,
Justin Robinson
of Carolina
Chocolate Drops,
Steel Wheels,
Holly Williams,
Doc Watson
MELANIE LITCHFIELD PHOTO
AUSTEN MILKULKA PHOTO
SARA BRENNAN-HARRELL PHOTO
JIM GAVENUS PHOTO
The Avett Brothers
at the 2013 MerleFest
JIM GAVENUS PHOTO
38 April 2015
STRING
BANDS
The Happy Hollow

String Band
plays a 1976
Democratic Party rally
on the back of a flatbed
truck at Blue Mist
Barbecue, in Asheboro,
North Carolina.
From left to right:
Sonia Hughes Michael,
Gwen Auman, Sandy
Chrisco Hatley, Robin
Auman Penninger.
GOODBYE EARL
HOW 5 TEENAGE GIRLS FROM NORTH CAROLINA
HELPED BLAZE TRAILS FOR WOMEN IN BLUEGRASS
BY MARK SEGAL KEMP
n 1975, my friend Buck Parker intro- Though it’s not talked about nearly enough, Auman, the five teens were acutely aware early
I duced me to the Auman sisters, two
teenage bluegrass musicians who
women have been prominent in folk, country,
bluegrass, and old-time string bands from the
on that they were making a feminist statement.
“We realized we were different, but we wanted to
could play rings around most of the guys in our beginning—much more so than in rock ’n’ roll. be accepted as musicians and not just labeled as
neck of North Carolina. Gwen and Robin, who The whole concept of a lead guitarist was a girl band,” Auman says. “I remember that was
played mandolin and upright bass, respectively, invented by a woman, Maybelle Carter of the really important to us—you know, ‘Yeah, we’re
were members of the all-girl Happy Hollow Carter Family, who has inspired generations of girls, but can you accept us as musicians?’”
String Band. acoustic guitar players. Sally Ann Forrester When they came together in the early ’70s,
The only other all-girl band I knew of at the became a Bluegrass “Boy” in 1943, when Bill the Happy Hollow String Band—which also
time was the Runaways. I was 15. I didn’t know Monroe hired her to put a little accordion into included guitarist Sonia Hughes (now Michael),
much back then. the Appalachian-music genre he created. Hazel banjo player Sandy Crisco (now Hatley), and
Today, the emergence of groups such as Della Dickens was a powerful voice for mountain fiddler Karen Joyner (now Pendley)—had few
Mae has created a resurgence of chatter about women and coal miners when she picked up a peers to turn to for support. “We started out on
all-female string bands. As if this were some- guitar and began singing bluegrass and folk the fiddler’s convention circuit and there were
thing new. The truth is, before Della Mae there protest songs in the mid-’60s. And Cynthia May no women hardly at all,” says Auman, who still
was Uncle Earl, and before Uncle Earl, there was Carver, better known as Cousin Emmy, wrote performs in bands around my hometown of
that little trio called the Dixie Chicks. And one of the more enduring banjo-based string- Asheboro, just east of the Wilkesboro site of
women have played prominent roles in numer- band tunes, “Ruby, Are You Mad at Your Man?” MerleFest. “There might have been somebody’s
ous mixed-gender contemporary, old-time folk And yet, in the 21st century, some people wife singing in a band, or maybe they’d let a
and string bands, from Rhonda Vincent, who still express surprise when women strap on woman play bass, but it was very obvious to us
started out in the 1960s as part of her family guitars and banjos and form bands. As if it’s a that this was a male-dominated thing.”
band the Sally Mountain Show, to later players, novelty. The Auman sisters were lucky to have a sup-
including Alison Krauss of Union Station, Sara For Gwen Auman, that’s exactly how she and portive big brother, who had already navigated
Watkins of Nickel Creek, and Rhiannon Giddens her fellow members of the Happy Hollow String the bluegrass world. “My older brother, Michael,
of the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Band were treated: as a novelty. According to who was a member of a local bluegrass band,
the Bluegrass Gentlemen, not only taught me to
play,” Gwen Auman remembers, “but he also let
me play his heavenly 1969 Martin D-18.”
She soon gravitated to the mandolin, pur-
chasing a German-made Hofner and then a
local luthier’s copy of a Gibson A model. “Many
bluegrass players pick F-model Gibsons, but I
preferred the look and sound of the A. Still do.”
The Aumans’ cousin Sonia played an
F-series Yamaha, and banjo player Sandy picked
a ’70s-era Gibson RB-250. These days, Sandy
says, “I pick a 1960s Baldwin C model that I
bought during college. My middle daughter,
Kellie, now picks my Gibson.”
One can only hope that Kellie Hatley will join
together with the growing number of players in
other bands—from those still unknown to
members of well-known bands such as Della
Mae and the Carolina Chocolate Drops—in con-
tinuing to diversify traditional string-band
music—just as Hatley’s mom and the other
teenage girls of Happy Hollow so boldly did in a
small Carolina town in the bell-bottom ’70s. AG
For more on the role women have played in folk

and bluegrass, read Murphy Hicks Henry’s
Pretty Good for a Girl: Women in Bluegrass
(University of Illinois Press), which documents
more than 70 overlooked female players.
Happy Hollow String Band
From left to right: Karen Joyner Pendley,
Michael, Auman, Hatley, Penninger.
40 April 2015
Julian Lage
and Collings Guitars
Serious Guitars | www.collingsguitars.com

STRING
BANDS
COURTESY OF OLD HAT RECORDS

PICKIN’ THE BLUES
Memphis Jug Band
veterans: Laura Dukes,
left, Will Batts, Milton
HOW NEGLECT AND RACISM KEPT Roby, Will Shade, 1950.
BLACK STRING-BAND MUSIC

VIRTUALLY HIDDEN FOR DECADES
BY ORVILLE JOHNSON
T
he 2005 Black Banjo Gathering in different black musicians who were interested dexterity, but most of the musicians participat-
Boone, North Carolina, was a giddy in this type of music together,” says Dom ing in the jam sessions at these gatherings
time for a splintered community of Flemons, a founding member of the Chocolate played their instruments at varying levels of
artists and academics. The event not only Drops who now records as a solo artist. “That’s skill. Many grew up listening to rock, pop, hip-
acknowledged the crucial role of African-Ameri- something that showed we had a community of hop, or other types of music, but when they
can musicians in the historic creation and devel- people, all of us knowing we’re out there, discovered old-time string bands, they were
opment of old-time Southern string-band music, instead of it feeling like we’re all on our own drawn in by a key element: the sense of
it brought together players who were hungry to separate island.” community.
breathe new life into this rich American music Around that same time, an influx of youth- “I really didn’t hear old-time music until I
tradition. Among those players were the future ful energy was pouring into established old- got into the contra-dance community,” says Rhi-
members of the Carolina Chocolate Drops. time music festivals in North Carolina, Virginia, annon Giddens, another Chocolate Drops
“One of the most important things about the and West Virginia. Young members of bands founder who has a solo album coming soon. “I
Black Banjo Gathering—besides it being an aca- like Old Crow Medicine Show and the Avett just fell in love with the banjos, played in the
demic event with a lot of great minds that were Brothers were bringing raw power to both the clawhammer style. I’d never really heard a
studying different aspects of the banjo as an music and dance traditions. Virtuoso players whole lot of that, and that was it. I was com-
African-derived instrument—was getting ran their fingers across fretboards with magical pletely hooked.”
42 April 2015
STRING THEORY SEGREGATION BLUES As this artificial segregation of music contin-
In the American melting pot, disparate ele- Another cultural artifact from that period in ued through the 1920s, musicians realized that
ments are often thrown together and, occasion- American history is segregation, which was if they wanted to record, they needed to change
ally, new and beautiful things emerge. The largely carried over into the recording industry. the music they played to fit the record com-
Southern string band is one of those things. There are some examples of white and black pany-driven categories.
Fiddles were part of the baggage of the Scots- string-band musicians recording together. Black Young black musicians who had grown up
Irish immigrants who populated the Southeast, fiddler Andrew Baxter joined the Georgia Yellow playing string-band music (including players
and when they arrived, their traditional tunes Hammers, a white string band, for a recording of like Lonnie Johnson and Brownie McGhee)
and ballads began filling the Appalachian hills “G Rag,” for instance; and black fiddler Jim shifted their sound to the blues.
and hollers. African Americans brought the Booker played several old-time standards includ- The black Tennessee Chocolate Drops, fea-
gourd banjo onto the slave ships that carried ing “Soldier’s Joy” and “Grey Eagle” with the turing fiddler and mandolin player Howard
them to the Americas, and when they heard white Taylor’s Kentucky Boys. For the most part, Armstrong, and the Mississippi Sheiks, with
their captors’ fiddles and other European though, the companies segregated music along brothers Bo, Sam, and Lonnie Chatmon, devel-
instruments, the musical styles began to blend racial lines in the same way that Southern bath- oped a string-band sound that relied on blues
together. Literary references to slave fiddlers rooms and restaurants were segregated. That rhythms and tonalities, but they managed to
date back to the early 1700s; by the 19th created separate release categories for the races, sneak an occasional banjo-and-fiddle tune past
century, the fiddle and banjo were the two and distribution of the records accordingly to the recording managers by adding the word
major folk instruments played by both white stores in black and white neighborhoods. “blues” to the song title.
and black musicians throughout the South.
Black players who provided the music at
balls, dances, and community events for whites
learned the jigs, reels, marches, and quadrilles
that were the current dance favorites. But they
would add the rhythms and minor tonalities of
their own musical culture, and as white musi-
cians heard these new and exciting sounds, they
would incorporate them. Eventually, a sound
developed that was uniquely American and spe-
cifically Southern. After the Civil War, some
former slaves became professional musicians,
working in traveling medicine shows, playing
square dances, doing street performances, and
sometimes working with white musicians as well.
CHRIS ALBERTSON PHOTO
Left
They spread this new sound across the country. Lonnie Johnson, 1960
It wasn’t until the late 19th century that Below
guitars became more accessible and were used— Howard Armstrong
along with the string bass—to fill out the banjo (fiddle) and
brothers L.C. (guitar),
and fiddle tunes, establishing the format for the F.L. (mandolin),
modern string band. Around the same time, the Roland (cello), 1925.
recording industry arrived and began putting
string bands on wax. However, the racism and
segregation of the times dictated that black
string bands would get short shrift. Even though
there were many white and black string bands,
most surviving recordings are of the white ones.
That imbalance is due primarily to a calcu-
lation made by record executive Ralph Peer,
who worked for then-popular record labels
Okeh and Victor. Peer was among the first to
record folk styles, believing that if the music of
certain ethnic and cultural groups was made
available, there would be a market among
those same groups. He and a few others in posi-
tions of power at the major record companies
decided which styles would be appealing to
whom, and that determined what would be
COURTESY OF OLD HAT RECORDS
recorded. Southern whites, they believed,

would be more interested in “hillbilly” string-
band music, and black audiences would gravi-
tate to blues, jazz, vaudeville, and gospel.
Because of this calculation, only a few record-
ings of black string bands are available today to
reflect the breadth and influence of African-
American string-band music during its heyday.
Even though the lack of recording opportuni-
ties reduced the commercial viability of black
string bands, their impact was felt in the music
of white players who had heard and performed
with black musicians. Several iconic white
country artists, including Bill Monroe, A.P. Carter
of the Carter Family, and Hank Williams, credit
African-American string-band musicians as
strong inspirations and major influences. Carter Carolina Chocolate
Drops original
would travel into the mountains of Virginia and lineup: Giddens
east Tennessee on song-collecting trips with (from left),
African-American guitarist Leslie Riddle, who guitarist, taught Hank Williams guitar chords Robinson,
and Flemons
would memorize the melodies while Carter col- and introduced him to blues progressions that
lected lyrics and later adapted the tunes into found their way into the country legend’s classic
songs that would become country and bluegrass songs such as “Mind Your Own Business” and Black Banjo Gathering. Soon thereafter, the
standards, including “Hello Stranger” and “Let “Honky Tonk Blues.” three began visiting Thompson’s house on a
the Church Roll On.” Elements of Riddle’s guitar weekly basis to learn his music and hear stories
technique found their way into the combination BRINGING IT ALL BACK HOME of the black string bands from his youth in the
rhythm/lead guitar style of Maybelle Carter. Bill By the 1940s, the black string-band sound had 1930s. “The casualness of being able to go
Monroe was a young boy traveling around to become virtually invisible in terms of popular down to his house on Thursday night and play
square dances with his Uncle Pen Vandiver when recordings or job opportunities besides a few with him consistently was amazing,” Flemons
he met African-American fiddler and blues gui- isolated communities in the Southeast. It would remembers. “It was a unique experience being
tarist Arnold Shultz. not be until the 1970s that Joe Thompson, an able to play next to Joe and understand the
African-American fiddler from North Carolina, music on a different functional level. He grew
‘One of the most would rekindle interest in the black string-band up with the music being at a functional level in
important things form and inspire young people to bring it back to the community instead of it being a music that
life. He learned to play from his father, who had was always performed on stage.”
about the Black learned from his own father, a slave. Thompson, Inspired by those weekly meetings to
Banjo Gathering his brother Nate, and a cousin, Odell, formed a reclaim and reinvigorate that part of their
was getting string band and played throughout North Caro-

lina until World War II, when Thompson joined
musical heritage, Flemons, Giddens, and Rob-
sinson adopted the Tennessee Chocolate Drops’
different black the Army. After the war, Thompson returned to name and started the Carolina Chocolate Drops
musicians who the States and took a job at a furniture factory, in honor of their mentor and his music. Within
were interested in
relegating his music to a hobby. a handful of years, the Chocolate Drops would
In 1973, ethnomusicology student Kip be a critically acclaimed young band, their
this type of music Lornell urged Thompson to begin playing again album Genuine Negro Jig winning the 2010
together.’ at folk-music festivals. The fiddler gathered his Grammy for best traditional folk album.
family band together and, as word got out In no small part due to the Carolina Chocolate
DOM FLEMONS among the folk-music community, he was soon Drops’ success, the old-time string-band sound, a
invited to play at venues across the country. vital part of the fabric of American music, has
“The first time I ever saw Arnold Shultz was They wound up touring Australia, made new undergone a wave of popularity that doesn’t seem
at a square dance in Rosine, Kentucky,” Monroe recordings, performed for folklorist Alan to be diminishing. The engaging simplicity of the
has recounted. “Arnold and two fellows come Lomax’s American Patchwork documentaries, music and the social values of the community that
up there and played for the dance. He was pow- and played Carnegie Hall in 1990 as part of its springs up around it create a warmth and vitality
erful with it.” Folk Masters program. In 2007, Thompson was that is timeless. Black string bands including the
Monroe went on to create and popularize awarded a National Heritage Fellowship for his Chocolate Drops and Ebony Hillbillies, as well as
bluegrass music, a driving, exciting modern syn- music. white ones such as Old Crow Medicine Show and
thesis of the old-time string-band sound mixed Two years earlier, three young African- Foghorn Stringband, are keeping old-time string-
with blue notes and blazing tempos. Likewise, American musicians—Dom Flemons, Rhiannon band traditions alive and pushing them forward
Rufus “Tee-Tot” Payne, an African-American Giddens, and Justin Robinson—met at the into the 21st century. AG
44 April 2015
THE
SE
RIES
PRE ORDER FROM FEBRAURY 1ST

EXCLUSIVELY FROM GUITAR CENTER
for more information visit www.alvarezguitars.com/gratefuldead www.guitarcenter.com
STRING
BANDS
CHIP RUSSELL PHOTO

Above
I STRING BANDS
Guitarist Ken Chapple
performs at the 2013
Northwest String
Summit Band
ACOUSTIC GUITAR ASKED READERS ON SOCIAL MEDIA Competition at
TO SHARE WHAT INSPIRES THEM ABOUT STRING-BAND MUSIC. Horning’s Hideout,
WE GOT TONS OF FEEDBACK FROM PLAYERS, FANS, & OTHERS. near Portland, Oregon.
HERE’S WHAT THEY HAVE TO SAY.
I remember seeing the Juggernaut String Band I play acoustic music because I love the tones As a nonplayer, I’d like to throw in my thoughts.
at Cambridge Folk Fest around 1980. Been the acoustic instruments create. There is a As you may know—it’s a bit of a cliché, but
hooked on all things string band ever since. simple honesty to acoustic guitar and acoustic true-ish—we Brits can be a bit reserved at
Sara Anne O’Keeffe bass that I just adore. I’m very passionate about times, especially when older. It has been bril-
London, England making the best possible music I can. I strive to liant to watch, therefore, the effects that Old
not be defined by genre. I try to use the genre Crow Medicine Show has on the British public,
as tools to mix and match to tell the story. clapping, hooting, and hollering! You’d have to
Bluegrass music has been the nucleus of my Music has always been my first love and it’s my see it to believe it. There is something about a
existence ever since I went to my first tiny, local hope that I convey my love of music in every string band that just gets to the very heart of
bluegrass jam in Portland in 2004. Despite a song I write or cover. you and carries you off on a wild ride, even if
degree in classical guitar, my music had always Eric Evans you turned up to the gig in shirt and tie!
been steeped in improvisation and jamming. Great Meadows, New Jersey Inez Soman
Before I stumbled on the bluegrass jam scene, I London, England
had no idea that improvisation and collabora-
tion were at the center of bluegrass culture. I Some of my favorite memories and best music
was familiar with bluegrass music, but was I’ve played has been parking-lot picking—just It’s pure and just plain fun. I’m in a string band
unaware of the bluegrass community. What sets something very free about it. It all started for called the Ragtime Relics, and we’re old guys
string-band music apart from any other genre? me at the Union Grove fiddler’s convention in playing old acoustic music and love it!
Community, authenticity, musicianship, and N.C. back in the mid-’70s. John Sudia
thoughtfulness. You’re exposed, vulnerable— Ralph Tompkins Hillsborough, New Jersey
string-band music is nude emotion, and the Sykesville, Maryland
community is there to support you.
Ken Chapple String bands can have people ranging in age
Wayward Vessel, Ken Chapple String Band from their teens to their 70s.
Portland, Oregon Eric A. Hughes
Oakland, California
46 April 2015
ANDREA BEHRENDS PHOTO
Old Crow Medicine Show
I play in a band called Ocotillo Rain and ‘Every single time the essence of jug band, with old-school picking
we play a song,
Thunder Bluegrass Band. We play mainly tradi- and banjo-led. Raw, honest, and so simple it’s
tional bluegrass but have been adding some actually deceptively difficult and can’t help but
songs from newer groups like Old Crow Medi- it’s us at our core. carry you away. I defy anyone to sit still.
cine Show. Nationally, I do see a range from all When everything Claire Latham
ages, especially the young, but here in Tucson it Halifax, England
seems to be mainly the older crowd. My wife clicks, it’s just
and I RV in the summer, and I attend jams in the most amazing
other cities. I see the younger crowd there and
feeling’. [String-band music is] more organic, it sounds
the enthusiasm goes up to another level. I’m 56 a lot more intimate and palatable. I like string
GABRIEL MONET VARESCHI
but young at heart. My son has a string band in bands like Leftover Salmon, Keller Williams,
Nome, Alaska, called Bear Mountain Holler, and the Travelin’ McCourys; some of Jerry
and their crowd is mainly 30-something and I love the string-band format because of its Garcia and David Grisman’s stuff. Most string
younger. ensemble nature. We are a five-piece group of bands I listen to have lifted my spirits in one
Jeff Collins multi-instrumentalists; there is no lead singer. way or another. The whole scene that they
Tucson, Arizona When it’s your turn to do a song, the rest of us create is one of passion and peace.
have your back. I also like the fact that the Sean Selburg
format allows us to do a Louvin Brothers tune Portland, Oregon
It’s real. It’s raw. When playing with people, it followed up with a deep cut from the Stones.
is full and complete. I grew up following my From Ralph Stanley to Pink Floyd, it keeps the
dad and his friends around playing bluegrass. shows fresh and unexpected. It also allows for I think that most of the musicians doing that
Paul Jacob Enders jamming and improvisation. are just hipsters. Usually it’s just urban/subur-
Coatesville, Indiana Everett Harlow ban hipsters playing. That just doesn’t make a
ROOTS 66 lot of sense to me.
Gloucester, Massachusetts Kenny Randall
I’ve been playing in a band for two years. It isn’t Tampa, Florida
a pure string band, because we have accordion
and trumpet. But I love it—the layering, the I love Old Crow Medicine Show, whether
raw sound, every note and chord is being playing in a carpark or on stage. Bands like I have loved string-band music since before I
played right there. It’s not produced in a com- these are not sanitized, they don’t apologize, knew what to call it. I just love how, whether
puter. Every single time we play a song, it’s us and they live the music as a way of life. You it’s an old-time fiddle band or jazz hot club,
at our core. When everything clicks, it’s just the can’t take the music from them, and they give every instrument needs to fit together to either
most amazing feeling. so much back through preserving the music and make it drive or swing.
Gabriel Monet Vareschi growing the audience. Carolina Chocolate Chris Jones
Atkinson, New Hampshire Drops bring something different—the vibe is Buffalo, New York AG
ACOUSTIC GUITAR 2015
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50 April 2015 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

56 66 68 70
Acoustic Classic
Led Zeppelin’s
‘That’s the Way’
Here’s How
Take a ‘chance’
at songwriting
Basics
Ah, the art of
mastering rests
Weekly Workout
Major pentatonic
scale exercises
PLAY
MARINA CHAVEZ PHOTO
Madeleine Peyroux
& ‘Weary Blues,’ p.64
SONGCRAFT
AILEEN BELL PHOTOS

Hello Song, Meet Guitar
Writing the right music often means having the right instrument
BY NATHAN BELL
he song is driving me crazy. I have been a songwriter for a very long or sounds I haven’t heard yet and didn’t know
T I’m trying to finish writing the material for
my next album. I have a session scheduled to
time, but I’ve been a guitar player for even
longer, starting on a Harmony strung with
I was searching to find.
The cues always arrive. The problem is,
record in Nashville with acoustic-bass player medium-gauge barbed wire, and later with a I never know when, where, or how.
Missy Raines and her scary-good band, the variety of other acoustics and electrics. But the right guitar can make all the differ-
New Hip. But I’m stuck trying to finish the song I’ve played a lot of guitars. ence. It’s not rule of law, but I find it a lot easier
that will tie the project together. It’s not every day that somebody sends me a to write a fingerpicked blues on a 00 or an LG
The title is “Dust,” and it’s one word here, one vintage Gibson, though. My friend says he just than on a dreadnought or a jumbo.
word there away from being done. It’s a new wants me to play it and tell him what I think. I’ve had two careers, with a large gap in
song, with the heart of an old song, about rugged, This will be a welcome diversion from between. In my mid-’80s career, with the acous-
worn country and the equally rugged and worn writing that song. tic duo Bell and Shore, I played dreadnoughts—
people who stay on and make it a living place. first a 1976 Martin D-35 and then a 1976
Unlike every other song I have ever written, ongwriters find different ways to extract Mossman Flint Hills model. For the alt-country
it will have two leading voices—one rough,
male, and tired, the other brighter and female.
S music and lyrics from what seems like
nowhere and nothing. I know songwriters who
lead work, I played a 1937 National steel-bodied
guitar. I strung them all with medium-gauge
I’ll know what I’ve been looking for when I hear can only write in complete silence, by the light strings, and I played hard enough that one day
it—something that sounds and feels well- of early morning. I have met songwriters who I would require shoulder surgery.
rooted in the earth; weary yet hopeful. And I can only write in a room with other songwriters. I wrote many albums’ worth of material
know I haven’t heard it yet. And almost every songwriter I know can write with those guitars.
Did I mention that finishing this song is in the car, while moving. The songs from that period are aggressive,
driving me crazy? I write best with a guitar in my hand, stum- in your face; even on the ballads, they are
My friend calls. He’s sending a guitar. bling along until the ideas that have been tapping heavily on the two and four, a direct result of
It’s a 1932 Gibson L-00, bound fretboard, at my conscious self hear their cues. The cues can those big, loud guitars from the bluegrass and
black with a white pickguard. It has bracing so be fast, repeating bluegrass runs, chopped acous- dancehall, Delta blues traditions.
delicate that it can only be strung with very tic-soul 9th chords, delicately fingerpicked moun- The lyrics are assertive, wordy, clever, and
light silk-and-steel strings. tain melodies, minors over majors and the reverse, equally in your face.
54 April 2015
Then I quit music. For almost 15 years I middle-class family man, hanging on by my fin-
didn’t play at all. When I came back to writing gertips to a job that only pays the bills, on the
and performing in 2008, my shoulder had been verge of watching my children move away. I’m
shredded by athletic endeavors, warehouse fragile, but I’m still here, like this old guitar.
jobs, and playing flatpick guitar, and I couldn’t I decide to play through the 90 percent of
play the dreadnoughts. the song that is almost “Dust,” because I feel
I bought a Larrivee OM-03, strung it with something in this guitar. I have learned to
light-gauge strings, and started learning to finger- believe in this one thing—the guitar. I attach a
pick. That smaller, thinner guitar had a sound capo on the fourth fret. The first chord is an Em
that was controlled, with a feeling of compression with a suspended seventh, and I strum down
and restraint. I started writing songs that were hard with my thumb to make it ring.
more compressed, with fewer changes, fewer But it doesn’t ring. It catches for a moment WHAT
words, more restrained. The lyrics and melodies before unfolding with extra half-tones and a NATHAN
were new, reflecting both a different writer and a dissonance that feels exactly like the moment BELL
different instrument. Because of the tight and in 1986 that I stood in a gravel parking lot in PLAYS
controlled sound, the songs had more space, and Enid, Oklahoma, and the sky looked incredibly
it was incumbent upon me to honor that space. beautiful, and I understood for the first time GUITARS
That Larrivee had a high-end sparkle that how somebody might want to make their way I carry three guitars on the road:
made me feel optimistic, made me play more in such a harsh, windy place. The sound is hard A 2011 12-fret Larrivee 00-03
melodically, so I also became a more melodic like that, and beautiful. And then I sing this Special Edition, a 2008 maho-
writer, and my songs were more optimistic. song for what feels like the first time, new gany 14-fret Larrivee OM-03E,
And because I now played with my fingers, lyrics falling into place. and, lately, a 1932 Gibson 12-fret
the sound and the songs were more intimate. Twenty minutes later, I have a song that ties L-00. I also have a 1937 National,
Shortly after finishing three new albums— everything together. I record it a few weeks painted auto-body brown, that
Traitorland (2009), Black Crow Blue (2011), later, and it sounds exactly as I hoped it could. I play at home and would bring
and Blood Like a River (2014)—I became the It turns out that I wasn’t really stuck—I just on the road, but I’m saving that
proud new owner of a used Larrivee 00-03, a didn’t have the right guitar. for the unlikely day in the future
guitar that played beautifully and was simple to when I have a guitar tech.
mic, both in the studio and on stage. Its sound, When the guitar
even more contained, accorded even more meets the writer AMPLIFICATION
I like to have somebody point a
halfway, real
restraint, both in the playing and writing.
That brings me to the present. microphone at whatever guitar
I wrote the title song of the new album, I magic always I’m playing, and I don’t have a
Don’t Do This For Love, I Do This For Love occurs. pickup for the Gibson, but when
(Working and Hanging on in America), with this I have to plug in, I use either the
guitar, starting from a fingerpicked melodic riff. believe that when we write songs with our Larrivee 00-03 with a Schatten
Then I wrote the next two songs on the same
guitar, because it turned out that, when pressed,
I hands on a guitar, we become, for those
moments, part of the wood in the instrument
HFN Artist pickup through
a Fishman Platinum Pro EQ
my little Larrivee had a rugged personality and and part of every note that ever vibrated there. Analog preamp, which is remark-
enjoyed playing down-and-dirty blues. We are part of the strings and the frets where ably natural sounding. If I’m
It was this Larrivee that I was using to finish our hands move. playing in an electric band, I
the final song, but something wasn’t right. The Like all creative pursuits, songwriting is full use the Larrivee OM-03E with
chords sounded OK; the guitar fit my hands, as of rules that are meant to be broken, tricks that the factory installed LR Baggs
always. Yet everything I played was a tiny bit off, work once and never again, and techniques Element through a Passac EQ.
making the words feel separate from the melody. that lead the writer down well-worn paths that And I use Mogami Gold cables.
end nowhere. But my 40 years of writing and
hree albums into my second career—the playing tell me that when the guitar meets the ACCESSORIES
T Old Guy career—and I am stuck on the last
song of the fourth. Really, really stuck.
writer halfway, real magic always occurs. It just
takes the right guitar, at the right time, in the
Couch guitar straps. Strings are
Ernie Ball Aluminum Bronze
Voila!—my friend sends me the Gibson. right place. Medium Light (00-03), Elixir
The L-00 is equal parts dustbowl and Delta I also know that one day, when no guitar Phosphor Bronze lights (OM-
blues. One strum reveals that it is also an feels right in my hands, when I’m really, really 03E), and John Pearse Silk
unusual guitar, deep and powerful with a deli- stuck, I’ll take that old 1976 Mossman off the and Phosphor Bronze 11’s
cate high-end sparkle. Later, when I play it on wall, hang my arm over the top (the shoulder (extra light) for the Gibson.
the recording of this song, engineer Ben Surratt surgically repaired for four years now), and it My pick collection includes Cool
compares it to an orchestra. will lead me through my hills of Tennessee to Picks heavy gauge cellulon trian-
The guitar arrives on a Friday, and the first somewhere I haven’t been in 25 years, and gles, 2.2 mm Chicken Picks, and
thing I play is a variation on the fingerpicked there will be songs there and it will be, once medium gauge Everly Star Picks.
standard “Cocaine Blues.” The instrument falls again, the perfect guitar at the perfect time. AG I use Kyser and G7th capos,
into my hands as if it were made for me. All both regular and cut style. And
guitar players have had this moment: A guitar Nathan Bell is a singer-songwriter based in last, but not least, a Louisville
that is an actual revelation. A guitar that is Signal Mountain, Tennessee. You’ll find all of his Slugger with a duct taped
perfect for who the guitarist is right at that Old Guy-era albums on Stone Barn Records, handle (because I carry
moment. And at this moment, I’m a middle-aged, available at nathanbellmusic.com. a 1932 Gibson on the road).
ACOUSTIC CLASSIC
Acoustic Zep
Is Still Heavy Led Zeppelin
Explore Jimmy Page’s pastoral classic Led Zeppelin III
Atlantic
BY ADAM PERLMUTTER
n 1970, the members of Led Zeppelin open tuning. Unless you’re playing along with the remainder of the transcription). To play this part,
I h u n k e r e d d o w n i n B r o n -Y r - A u r, a n
18th-century cottage in Wales, where, free from
song, you can simply lower strings 1, 5, and 6 by
a half step, to get into open-G (D G D G B D).
fret the second- and fourth-string notes with your
first and second fingers, respectively. As for the
the distractions of the city, they composed the Whatever tuning you use, note that everything strumming, be sure to add the accents on the
songs that would appear on their largely sounds a half-step lower than written. “ands” of select beats; this will help you capture
acoustic album, Led Zeppelin III. A pastoral influ- The song kicks off with a two-measure the proper groove.
ence is particularly evident on “That’s the Way,” pattern that’s also heard throughout the verses You will find a contrasting two-bar pattern in
with its droning acoustic guitar supported by and interludes. By moving a two-finger grip the chorus, this one based on the flat III chord, Bb,
evocative mandolin and pedal-steel parts. along the second and fourth strings, Page etches borrowed from the parallel key of G major—not
Guitarist Jimmy Page played “That’s the Way” out a colorful harmonic sequence (analyzed in the most common harmonic choice in a rock
in open-G, down a half step (low to high: Db Gb Db full in the first two measures’ chord symbols, and song. Note, too, that the chord receives the raised
Gb Bb Db), exploiting the beautiful resonance of this streamlined to the overall harmony of G in the 11th, E, adding further color to the song. AG
HEINRICH KLAFFS PHOTO
56 April 2015
THAT’S THE WAY WORDS AND MUSIC BY JIMMY PAGE AND ROBERT PLANT
Tuning: Df Gf Df Gf Bf Df
Intro
G C/GD/G G maj7 D/G C/G G C/G
Riff A
#4 œœœ œ œ œœœ œœ œœ
End Riff A
& 4 .. œœœœ œœœœ œœœ

œ
œœœ œ
œ œœ œ œ œ œ œœ œœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œ
œ œ œ œ œœ œœ
œœ
œœ
œœ
œœ
œœ œ
œœ
œ
œœ
œ
œœ
œ
œœ ..
œ
œ œ œ œ œ > œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
> >
. 00 .
0 0 0 0 0 4 4 4 0 0 0 0
. 00 .
0 0 0 1 3 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 1 0 0 0 1 1 1 1
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 2 4 4 4 0 0 0 4 4 4 4 2 0 0 0 2 2 2 2
B 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Verse
# . G‰ . r œ œ.
& . œ œ œ œ œ bœ œ œ Œ Œ Œ
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
1. I don’t know how I’m gon - na tell you, I can’t play with you no
2. See additional lyrics.
# r
‰. œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
EXCLUSIVE PRINT RIGHTS FOR THE WORLD EXCLUDING EUROPE ADMINISTERED BY ALFRED PUBLISHING CO., INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
& ˙. Œ œ œ œ œ.
J
more. I don’t know how I’m gon - na do what Ma - ma told me,
1 2
©1970 (RENEWED) FLAMES OF ALBION MUSIC, INC. ALL RIGHTS ADMINISTERED BY WB MUSIC CORP.
Interlude Interlude
with Riff A (3 times) with Riff A (4 times)
# 6 .. 8
& Œ œ œ œ œ œ. œ. œ ˙.
my friend, the boy next door.
% Verse
# r
‰ œj œ œ œ œ œ j
G
& ‰. œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ. ˙ Œ Œ œ œ. Ó
3. And when I’m out, I see you walk - ing. why don’t your eyes see me?
# r
& ‰. œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ bœ œ œ œ œ Œ Œ œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ w
And could it be you’ve found an - oth - er game to play? What did Ma - ma say to me?
Chorus
ACOUSTIC CLASSIC
Chorus
B b(#11)
# nœ œ œ œ œ œ nœ œ œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ
G
& Œ ‰. R Œ œœ
That’s the way, oh that’s the way it ought to be,
# b œœœ œœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ b œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œ œœ œ œœ
& œ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œ œ œ œœœ
œ œ œ œœ œœ
b œ œœ œœ œœ
œ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ b œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œ œ œ œ œ > œœ œ
> > > > > > >
2 2 2 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 0 0 0 0 4 4 4
3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 0 0 0 0 1 3 0 0 0
3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 4 4 4 0 0 0
B 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 0 0 0 0 0 0
To Coda fi
B b(#11) bœ œ œ œ œ
# J nœ œ œ œ œ
& œ œ. œ œ œ. œ Ó J œ
yeah, yeah, yeah. Ma - ma said that’s the way it ought
# œœ œœ œœ œ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ b œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ b œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ
& œœ œœ œœ œœ œ œ œ œ œ b œœ œœ œœ œœ
œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ > œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ b œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
> > > > > >
0 0 0 2 2 2 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
3 3 3 1 0 0 0 1 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
4 4 4 2 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
B 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
#
D G7
˙. œ œ ‰ Jœ œ
& #œ nœ œ
J
œ
J Œ Œ œ œ
to stay, yeah, yeah. Ooh.
# œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ n œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
& œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ n œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
> > > > > > > > > > > >
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
B 7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
C/G G
# œ œ
& J œ œ œ. œœ ∑ ∑
# œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œ œœœ œœ œœ œœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ

& œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœœœ œ
œ œ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ > œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
> > > > > > >
2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 0 0 0 0 4 4 4 0 0 0 0
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 1 3 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 1 0 0 0 1 1 1 1
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 0 0 0 2 4 4 4 0 0 0 4 4 4 4 2 0 0 0 2 2 2 2
B 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
58 April 2015
Verse
with Riff A (4 times)
# . G‰ . œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ. Œ ‰. r
& . R œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
4. And yes - ter - day I saw you stand - ing by the riv - er. And weren’t those tears that filled your
# r
& ˙. Œ ‰. œ œ œ œ œ œ œ. œ œ œ œ œ œ. Œ nœ œ œ œ œ #œ œ
J
eyes? And all the fish that lay in dirt - y wa - ter dy - ing, had they got you hyp - no -
D.S. al Coda (2nd time) fi Coda

b
Interlude
# 8 #B (#11) œ œ. œ
J
with Riff A (4 times)
& œ œ. ˙ Œ .. & Ó ‰
- tized. Ma - ma said,
# 8 .. # b œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ
& ∑ &
b œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
> > >
.
2 2 2 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
.
3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
B B 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
C# D C#
# œ œ œ œ nœ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ˙
D C
œ. œœ œ
C
Œ
&
ma - ma said that’s the way it’s gon - na stay, yeah.
# b œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœœœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ # n œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ # n œœœ
&
b œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ >œœ œœœœ œœ >œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ # œœ >œœ œœ œœ œœ >œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ # œœ
> > >
2 2 2 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6
3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
B 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6
D C C# D G7
# ww
& Œ ‰ Jœ œ œ Œ Œ ‰ Jœ ˙
Ah.
Ah. Ah.
# œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ # n œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœ n œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
& œ n œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
>œœ œœ œœ œœ >œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ # œœ >œœ œœ œœ œœ >œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœœ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
> > > > >
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
B 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 0
0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
ACOUSTIC CLASSIC
Outro
œ œ U
C/G G G
# wœ . œ œ œ œ ..
& œ œ œ œ œ œ œ ∑
J
U
O
# œ œ œ œ OO
œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœœ OO .. œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœ œœ œœ
& œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œ O œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œœ œœ œœ
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
harmonics
2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 12
. 000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
. 00
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 12 0 0 1 1 1 3 3 3 5 5 5
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 12 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 0 12 0 0 2 2 2 4 4 4 5 5 5
B 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0
12
12
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
D G
# œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ
& œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
> > >
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 5 0 0 0 0 0 0
7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
B 7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
repeat and fade

D
# œœ œœ œœ œ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ œœœ .
& œœ œœ œœ œœœ œ œ œ œ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ .
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
> > > > > > > > > > >
7 7 .
0 4 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 .
5 0 0 0 0 0 0 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
0 0 0 2 0 0 0 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
B 5 0 0 0 0 0 0
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7
0
7 7
0 0
2. I can’t believe what people saying

You’re gonna let your hair hang down
I’m satisfied to sit here working all day long
You’re in the darker side of town
5. And yesterday I saw you kissing tiny flowers

But all that lives is born to die
And so I say to you that nothing really matters
And all you do is stand and cry
6. I don’t know what to say about it

When all you ears have turned away
But now’s the time to look and look again at what you see
Is that the way it ought to stay
60 April 2015
Accentuate
1.800.788.5828
www.rainsong.com
Escape the expected. Experience graphite.

Intro
D
# 4 Dœœ œœ œœ œ œœ œœ
Tuning: D A D G B D, Capo III Intro
D G A E m7
& # 4 .. œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ
# 4 . œ œœ œ œœ œœ œ œ œœ œ œœ
ACOUSTIC CLASSIC 0 0 0 132 x 1 0 0 34 T 0 111 x 23 0000
0 0 0 132
ob Dylan originally recorded “Mr.
D
Tambou-
G
& #*Strum:
A x E m7throughout the
x 1 0 0 34 T 0 111 23 0000
ornaments 4 .Also,
song. œ be sure
œœ œ œ
≥ œ≥ thanks
≥ œ≤ œ≥ ≥ œ≥ ≥ œ
to the root on the open sixth string.œ œ232 œ 2 œ2
B rine Man” in drop-D tuning, with a capo at to enjoy the fullness of the D (F) chord
.shown
≥ 3≥ ≥in3≤the
3≥ ≥ 3≥ ≥ 3
the third fret. To get into this tuning, simply
2
*Strum:
Shake .
tune your sixth string down by a whole step, to The accompaniment pattern
2 beat, 22 2 2
. 0you32 to0 play

D from E. If you use the capo, note that all of next two bars—a root or fifth on each 0 0
2 20 32 0
2 0
2
the music in this arrangement will Intro B
.down;0 ≤ =little
sound a flanked by chord strums—will set 33 3 3
0 0
That Thing
22 2 2
* ≥ =written;
minor third higher than written; for example,D a the rest of the song. Don’t be overly concerned
00 0 0
up
D chord is in fact an F. Intro B
with playing exactly what’s
0 0 0 0
* ≥ = down; ≤ = up
To learn the song, first work out the intro. improvised variations will make for the most
D
‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ As seen in the first bar of the notation, Chorus
Dylan dynamic rendition. AG
helped to launch decorated the D chord with the occasional G sus- A D G
pended fourth (the note G, played Hey Chorus
Mr.
theTambourine
Read anMan play awith
song for me 3.
the folk-rock movement
with interview Bruce Langhorne,
fourth finger on string 1, fret 3) or suspended the inspiration for “Mr. Tambourine Man,”
G A D G
BY ADAM PERLMUTTER second (the open first string). Try using theseD on page 22. G A 3.
Hey Mr. Tambourine Man play a song for me
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to
Tuning: D A D G BMAN
D, Capo III G Global Strum
D G A
MR. TAMBOURINE Intro Hey
G A
I’m not sleepy WORDS
D
and there AND
is no MUSIC
place I’mBY
Mr. Tambourine Man play a song for me
going
BOB to DYLAN
D Hey
G A D G G
œœAAœ œœ DDœœ œœ œG.G œœ œœ œœ œœ

D G A D
# œ œ
Mr. Tambourine Man play a song for me
4 œ œ
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ you
# .
Tuning:DDAADDGGBBD,D,Capo
Tuning: CapoIIIIII Intro
Intro Global
Global Strumming
Strumming Pattern
Pattern
& 4 . œ œ œ œ œ œ .
œœ œ œœœ œœœ œ œœ œ œœ œœœœœœœ œ œ œ œœ œœ
D G A D
DD GG
œœ œ œœ œœœ œ œœ œ œœ œœœ œ .. .. œœœ œ œœœœœœ œœœœœ œœ œœ œœ œœœ œ œ

D
DADGB D, G A
Capo III E In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ you
Global Strumming Patte
Intro œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
m7
œœGœœœ œœ œœ œ œ
x D A D G B D,x Capo III# #
4 œ œ
œ œ œ
œœ œ œ œ œ
œ œ œ
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
œ œœ œ œ œ
œ œ œ
œœ œ œ œ œ œ œœ œœ œ
G A D G
# # 4 . .
. œ œ
œ
œ œ
œ
0 0 0 132 1 0 0 34 T 0 111 23 0000 Global Strumming Pattern
. œ œ
Tuning:
& 4
Intro
& 4
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Intro
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00 00 2 2
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0 0 Chorus
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the ancient empty street’s too dead for dreaming GG
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. .
HeyMr.
Hey Mr.Tambourine
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songforforme
me 3. Though you might
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thesun
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0 0 0 Chorus
G Em7 A
Chorus 2
4. 222
And the ancient
D GG empty street’s DD A too deadGGfor dreaming
GD
D
0 GG
00 AA
0 00 GD 0 000 D G 2 222
©1964, 1965 WARNER BROS. INC. COPYRIGHT RENEWED © 1992, 1993 SPECIAL RIDER MUSIC.
A D G It’s not aimed at anyone it’s just escapin’ on the run
INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT SECURED. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. REPRINTED BY PERMISSION.

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amazes me I’m branded on my feet
G Em7
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D
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Global Strumming Pattern
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DChorus
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Harmonica Solo(use
(useverse
verseprogression)
progression)
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Three full days, affordable,
D private G guitar Em7 A
instruction
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Chorus
Chorus of crazy sorrow
with Grammy-winning
G A
Mike dowling D G
Yes to dance beneath
Harmonica the diamond sky with one hand waving free
inSolo
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his (use verse
(use verse
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progression)
D G D G
rocky Mountain home.
Silhouetted by the sea circled by the circus sands
D G
Wind riverDGuitar G
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves
is all this and more.
D Em7 A
Let me forget about today until tomorrow
request a brochure:
mikedowling.com
Repeat Chorus
Harmonica Solo (use verse progression) AcousticGuitar.com 63

ACOUSTIC CLASSIC
More than
the Blues
This standard has worked as
both a jazz and country tune
BY ADAM PERLMUTTER
ot to be confused with the Langston

N Hughes poem of the same name, “Weary
Blues” is a popular standard with roots in
ragtime. It was penned in 1915 by the composer
and pianist Artie Matthews—not as well known
MARINA CHAVEZ PHOTO

as Scott Joplin, but considered by some to be an
equally sophisticated musician.
“Weary Blues” is most often played by Dixie-
land and New Orleans jazz bands, and it’s seen a
number of great interpretations by such heavy-
Madeleine Peyroux
weight soloists as Louis Armstrong, Johnny
Dodds, Sidney Bechet, and Johnny Hodges. The
song has also been transformed into a country feel, but most of its sections are in fact 16 bars sound, appropriately enough, a little darker. The
classic by Hank Williams. The jazz singer Made- long. And as demonstrated on Peyroux’s record- music here in notation and tablature is an
leine Peyroux recorded “Weary Blues” for her ing, the song, originally in 4/4, works beauti- accompaniment pattern for the first eight bars of
album Careless Love (2004), which informs the fully as a waltz. the chorus. Try fingerpicking this part (remem-
arrangement shown here. In the key of A minor, this arrangement is ber: p=thumb, i=index, and m=middle), letting
Though the title of the song would suggest built from just a handful of chords—Am, Dm, B7, all the notes of each chord ring together. After
that it’s based on the 12-bar blues, that is not Accompaniment Pattern
E7, and D7. These could be played as open grips, you’ve learned the patterns in the notation,
AG
Swing
the case. “Weary Blues” might have a bluesy but shifting them up the neck makes them apply them to the rest of the song.
Chords 3
( q q =q e )
Am
WEARY Dm
BLUES B7 TRADITIONAL
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x 1342 x
1 x1 2 1 x A m Pattern Dm Am B7
Pattern œ œ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ œœ #œ œ
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HERE’S HOW
playlist with samples of the genres or bands
you choose so you have references to work
from. Include at least one style or band that
demands a complete departure from your
norm, like speed metal, flamenco, or polka
(depending on your tastes).
This process can be used to determine any
number of song and arrangement elements,
from the tuning of the guitar to the number of
lines in a verse. Experiment and see what works
for you or for the song you are using it for.
Expand your rolling options by including differ-
ent types of dice, like the doubling cube used in
backgammon (perfect for deciding things like
the bar count, as its faces are the numbers 2, 4,
8, 16, 32, and 64) or the dice used in role-play-
ing games like Dungeons & Dragons, as they
usually have multiple combinations of single-
and double-digit numbers.
CRAFTING THE LYRIC

Take pages from a magazine or newspaper, and
cut out the words and phrases that catch your
eye. Go with your first impulse and try not to
overthink the choices. Once you have a good
pile of words and phrases, take a blank piece of
paper and order the words into phrases on the
page. Again, don’t overthink this process. Do
an initial placement and read through it. Revise
as you need to, filling in with new words from
Roll of the Dice

the pile. When you have your text locked in, go
ahead and paste or tape your lyrics in place.
An introduction to aleatoric songwriting ONLINE RESOURCES

There are a slew of excellent resources on the
BY OCTOBER CRIFASI
web to assist you, should you get stuck. Two of
my stand-bys are: languageisavirus.com, a
leatoric or “chance” music, as it is more MAP THE SOUND & STRUCTURE treasure trove of interactive programs like the
A commonly known, is music in which some
part of the composition is left to chance by either
Choose six genres of music that you like and
assign each the numbers 1-6 to correspond with
virtual cut-up machine, haiku generator, and
daily writing prompts; and also muse.fawm.org
the roll of the dice or, as in the case of composer a six-sided die. You can also use “in the style of” for its user-friendly collection of random lyric,
John Cage, the I Ching. While this may sound and list six favorite players or songwriters song title, plot, and structure generators
like a strange approach to songwriting, it is an instead. Create similar lists for key signature, (pulled together by the folks of the February
excellent way to free yourself of the I’ve-written- chord type (i.e. major, minor), and chord Album Writing Month challenge, or FAWM).
the-same-song-again blues, a complaint I often pattern (I–IV–V; I–vi–IV–V; ii–V; etc.). In each Once you have completed everything, test
hear from students. While there is no set order to case, refrain from your “go to” chord type or drive the lyric and music together to see what it
the exercises provided here, there are a few style—you already know how to write that song. sounds like. If you don’t like what you hear, go
items you will need to gather before you begin: through the process again, changing out text or
several sheets of blank paper, dice (six-sided is ROLL ONE DIE PER CATEGORY category choices as you feel appropriate. The
best), a newspaper or magazine, scissors, some- You may be tempted to roll again if you don’t point of all of this is to open your ear and
thing to write with, and tape or a glue stick. Feel like the first outcome. Fight that urge and go process to new ways of hearing and thinking
free to start from the lyric exercise first, should with the result anyway; remember this is about about the songwriting process. You just may
that be your preference. breaking out of your comfort zone. Create a find the results surprise you. AG
66 April 2015
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THE BASICS
Rest Easy
Learn how to value the quiet between the notes
BY ADAM LEVY
ave you ever noticed that most of the measure in 4/4 time. Ex. 1b is comprised of You can terminate
H musical examples in this and other guitar
magazines are chock full of notes? That’s
two half-note rests. These each get a count of
two beats. The symbols in Ex. 1c are quarter-
the note by muting it
because writers want to make the most of the note rests, which count for one beat each. with your pick hand
visual real estate available within the layouts, Ex. 1d shows eight eighth-note rests. As you or by simply lifting
and usually the notes are what best illustrate a might expect, each of these is valued as half of
lesson. But rests—the silences between the a quarter rest. your fretting finger
notes—are important too, and you’re likely to off the string.
encounter them more frequently in the music EVERY COUNT COUNTS
beyond pages such as these. If you want to be a Ex. 2 begins with a whole-note rest. There’s no
fluent music reader, you’ve got to understand special trick to counting a big fat rest, but be can terminate the note by muting it with your
rests as well as you understand the pitch and sure not to waste any time lingering there. Use pick hand or by simply lifting your fretting
rhythm values of notes. That’s what you’ll be the quiet opportunity to look ahead and size up finger off the string.) After the quarter rest
working on in this Basics lesson. The musical the next measure. comes an eighth rest on beat 3. Consequently,
examples that follow will help you get there. In the third bar, take care to give full value the note that follows (A) is played on the
Before diving into the examples, however, to the notes as well as the rests. The C on beat upbeat (“and”) of beat 3.
here’s a quick review of the most common rest 1—held over from the previous measure— Make sure to cut off the final C after one
symbols. Ex. 1a shows a whole-note rest, which should sustain for a full beat before the silence beat so that the quarter rest on beat 4 gets its
represents the value of four beats—a full that follows. (When the note’s time is done, you full silent value.
Ex. 1 shows rest values. Ex. 2 shows how rests indicate silence.
Ex. Ex.
Ex. 1c Ex.
Ex. 1d
Ex. 1a
1a Ex.
Ex. 1b
1b 1c 1d
& 444 ∑∑ ÓÓ ÓÓ ŒŒ ŒŒ ŒŒ ŒŒ ‰‰ ‰‰ ‰‰ ‰‰ ‰‰ ‰‰ ‰‰ ‰‰

&
B
B
Ex.
Ex. 2
2
qq == 76–92
76–92
∑∑ œœ œœ œœ œ œœ œœ ŒŒ ‰‰ œœ .. œœ œœ œ ŒŒ
&
& œ œœ œ
0 0
0 3 1 0 1 0 3 1
3 1 0 1 2 0 3 1
2 0
B
B
68 April 2015
Ex.
Ex. 3
3
Ex. 1a Ex. 1b Ex. 1c Ex. 1d
44 ∑ Ó Ó Œ Œ Œ Œ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰
Ex. 1a Ex. 1b Ex. 1c Ex. 1d
& 44
& ∑ Ó Ó Œ Œ Œ Œ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰ ‰
B
ALL ABOUT THOSE EIGHTHS rhythm, count “one and, two” before playing Though the notes in bar 4 are different from
B
Ex. 3 is an eighth-rest drill to help prepare you
for Ex. 4. The lone D in measure 1 is on the
the G on the “and” of beat 2. The same value of
rest can be seen in measure 2 as well—a
the notes in bar 2, the rhythm is exactly the
same. Seeing this is helpful because it frees you
Ex. 2of beat 1; in measure 2, the note is on
“and” quarter-note rest on beat 2 followed by an from having to count the rhythms all over
q2= 76–92
Ex.“and”
the of beat 2; and so on, through eighth rest on beat 3. This is not represented as again. The more you practice reading, the more
until qyou
measure 4. Repeat this example several times a dotted-quarter rest because, as a matter of you’ll begin to notice recurring patterns like
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ Œ
AG
œ œ
= 76–92
∑ Œ ‰ œ Adam
can easily play—and feel—the convention in musical notation, the center of this in music.
& œ . Levy œis an itinerant

œ guitarist
œ œ œ œ œand songwriter
rhythm in each bar. the measure (between beats 2 and 3) should
& ∑ œ œ Œ ‰ œ based
. in LosœAngeles, where Œ
always be visible. Using a dotted-quarter rest
CONNECTING THE DOTS here instead would make it harder to see he is Department
See the dotted-quarter rest in measure 1 of exactly where the beats are. Chair of the Guitar Performance Program at
Ex. 4? Just as with regular notes, any rest may Measure 3 is particularly thorny, with Los Angeles College of Music. His guitar work
be dotted, multiplying its value by one-and- eighth-note rests on beats 1, 2, and 4. Before has appeared on recordings by Norah Jones,
0 0
half times. In this case, that’s one-and-a-half 3 you 1try playing
0 it 1on the guitar, you may want 3 DiFranco,
Tracy Chapman, Amos Lee, Ani 1
0
beats. (This could also be written as a quarter to clap the rhythms while counting “one and, 2 among others.
0 Read more
0 of Levy’s writing
3 1 0 1 3 1
B
rest followed by an eighth rest.) To play this two and, three and, four and” aloud. 2 and hear 0
his music at adamlevy.com.
B
Ex. 3 shows how to count rests before upbeats. Ex. 4 shows rest variations.
Ex. 3
Ex. q3= 76–92
q = 76–92
# œ œ œ œ
& # # .. ‰ œJ
Œ Ó Œ ‰
œJ
Ó Ó ‰ Jœ Œ Ó Œ ‰
œJ
..
& # .. ‰ J Œ Ó Œ ‰ J Ó Ó ‰ J Œ Ó Œ ‰ J
..
. .
. .
3 3 3 3
. .
3 3 3 3
B
B
Ex. 4
Ex.q =476–92
#q = 76–92 j j œ
& # Œ. œj œ œ ‰ œj œ œ Œ ‰ œ œ œ ‰ Jœ ‰ Jœ œ œ ‰ œJ œ œ Œ ‰ œ œ œ
& Œ. œ œ œ ‰ œ œ œ Œ ‰ œ œ œ ‰ Jœ ‰ Jœ œ œ ‰ œJ œ œ Œ ‰ œ œ
0 0 2
0 1 3 3 3 1 3 3
0 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 0
4 4 0 1 3 3 3 1 3 3
B 0
4
0 0
4
0 2 0
B
WEEKLY WORKOUT
Two for the Price of One

Learn a new scale sharing the same notes as one you already know
BY PETE MADSEN
s a guitarist, while you’re likely intimately apply them to assorted licks, as well as a pair of fret C. Play the scale using alternate picking,
A familiar with the minor pentatonic scale,
the major pentatonic scale might seem foreign.
solos on the 12-bar blues form. With any luck, in
the process you’ll become just as fluid with the
and strive for a clean and articulate attack. If
needed, use a metronome to help you keep a
But actually, if you know the minor pentatonic major pentatonic as the minor pentatonic scale. steady tempo.
scale, then you know its major counterpart. Dedicate one finger per fret, keeping your
Take, for instance, the A minor pentatonic scale WEEK ONE hand in one position so that you can move
(A C D E G), which contains the same notes as Let’s look at five patterns for the C major penta- between the notes with maximum efficiency. For
the relative major, the C major pentatonic scale tonic scale, each starting on a different note of example, the first pattern starts at the eighth fret,
(C D E G A). In this lesson you’ll explore a the scale, played in two octaves. Pattern 1 then moves to the tenth fret on the same string.
handful of fingering patterns for that scale, then starts at the root, on the sixth string’s eighth- If you use your second finger for the eighth fret
Week 1
œ œ œ œ œ
Pattern 1
œ œ
Pattern 2
œ œ œ œ
& œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
œ œ
8 10 10 12
8 10 10 13
7 9 9 12
7 10 10 12
B 8 10
7 10
10 12
10 12
œ œ
Pattern 3 Pattern 4 Pattern 5
& œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
0 3 3 5 5 8
1 3 3 5 5 8
0 2 2 5 5 7
0 2 2 5 5 7
B 0 3
0 3
3 5
3 5
5 8
5 7
Week 2
œ œ œ œ œ
Lick 1 Lick 2 Lick 3 Lick 4
4 # œ œœœ œ œ œ œ œœ œ j œ œj œ œ œ œ .
Œ œ œ œ œ œ (œ) œ œ
3
& 4 œ œ J
œ œ
3
j
8 8 5
8 10 8 5 8
8 9 7 5 5 7 7 (7) 5 5 7 5
7 5 5 7 0 2 5 5 7
B 0 3
70 April 2015
Lick 5 Lick 6
B 8 10
7 10
10 12
10 12
and your fourth finger for the tenth fret, you’ll be third finger, backed up by your second and first
œ œ œ
preparedPattern
to play the3next note, the seventh-fret Pattern bend4 requires a bit of muscle to Pattern 5
fingers—this
œ
BEGINNERS’
& œ œ œ œ œ œ œ TIP 1
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ
E, with your first finger. Use the same fingering execute. (If the bends in this lesson are too dif-
œ œRepetition
œ œ œ œ œ œ
principle for Patterns 2–5, each starting on the ficult, try rendering them a half step, or simply
œ œ
second note of the previous pattern. omit them.) Hold the bent note while you use
is key to memori-
your fourth finger to fret the eighth-fret F. Pick zation. However, you all have
WEEK TWO the second string, then the third string again, limits on your practice time.
Now you’ll have fun with some cool licks, all of
0 3
releasing the bent note to its original pitch.
3 5 Based on how much time5 8
which can be played over a C chord. The 1 3 scale Lick 4 moves between the fourth 3 5 and fifth you have to practice,
5 8 you
patterns will form the 0 0 for
2 your licks, 2 5the lower regis- can set 5 7like learning
goals,
2
template 2 5
scale patterns and emphasizes 5 7
B 0 3
and adding bends, slides, hammer-ons, and
0 3
pull-offs will make them sound more inter-
3 5
ter. Try playing the first quick hammer-on with
3 5
your second finger, then use your first and
5 8
5 7one new position a week.
Week 2
esting. Lick 1 starts off with a non-scale tone, fourth fingers for the second-fret E and the
D#, but it quickly slides into a scale tone from fifth-fret G, respectively. Then, try switching to
œ œ œ œ œ
Lick 1and resolves on C, theLick root2 your third finger toLick 3 the fifth-fret G to Lick 4
#œ œ œ œ œœ œ œ œ
the first pattern slide from
4 œ œ œ j œ œj œ 2
Œ œ œ œœœœ œ œJ œ .
the seventh-fret A; this3sets you up to play the BEGINNERS’
TIP
note. Lick 2 uses the fifth-scale pattern and is
& 4 (œ)
œ œ œ
articulated with a series of pull-offs. Use your remainder of the lick in fifth position.
j
œ
fourth finger for the eighth-fret notes, your Lick 5 uses a series of hammer-ons within
3 To create licks from scale
first for the fifth-fret notes, and your third the second pattern, reaching across to the third
finger for those at the seventh fret. pattern for a whole-step bend1on the second patterns, try using different
Lick 3 is a little trickier. It starts out where string. Use your second finger for this bend, techniques, such as bends,
8 8 5 slides, hammer-ons, and
Lick 2 left off and8 produces
10 pedal steel–type 8 positioning
5 8
your third and first fingers to take
8 9the whole-step bend, use your (7) 5 pull-offs, to move 5from7note
effects. To play over7for5the rest of the lick.
5 7 7 5
7 5 5 7 0 to
2 note.
5 5 7
B 0 3
~~~~~ œœœœœ œœœœ

œ œ œ œ œ œ œJ œ . ˙ œ
Lick 5 Lick 6
œœ œ œ œ œ œ œ
#œ œ œœ œ #œ œ
& œœœœœœ
j
œ Ó
3 3 3
~~~~~
1
8 8 12 8 8 10 8 8
13 13 10 8 10 8 10 8 10 10 10
12 12 14 14 8 9 8 9 89
10 1212 14 10
B 10 12 10 12
Week 3
C7
œ œ #œ œ #œ nœ
j œ ˙ œ w
& . œ œ œ œ œ
(nœ )
œ
1/2
8
5 7 5 7 7 (7) 5 5
5 7 7
B 3 5 7
œ œ œ
F7 C7
& œ œ œ œ œJ œ . œ œ œ œ ˙ œ œ œ œ w
8 5
8 8 5
7 5 5 7 5 7 5 5 7 5 5
7 7 7
B
G7 F7 C7
WEEKLY WORKOUT
Lick 6 expands on the phrase from Lick 1. WEEK FOUR

BEGINNERS’
TIP 3
The opening phrase is played three times, the In this 12-bar solo, you’ll play a lot of double-
second time resolving to the C that’s an octave stops or pairs of simultaneous notes. The first
lower than the first; the third time, extending four bars take notes from the first pattern and
For a good flow in your up to the first string’s 12-fret E, bouncing off slide into the various double-stops. In the fifth
solos, stay in one or two surrounding scale tones in alternation with a C bar, while the note F is not a member of the C
positions and grab notes pedal or constant tone. major pentatonic scale, it’s an appropriate
that are easily accessible, choice given that the chord is F7. The rest of
rather than jumping around
WEEK THREE this lick moves between the second and third
the neck.
Now you’ll put some of these licks to work in a scale patterns.
12-bar country-flavored solo. The opening In the seventh bar, back on the C7 chord,
sequence works for country-fueled grooves in C you’ll do a full-step bend with your third
and will also come in handy over rock songs finger—remember to reinforce the bend with
requiring major-flavored runs—think Keith your first and second fingers. Keep the bend held
BEGINNERS’
TIP 4
Richards on the Rolling Stones’ “Brown Sugar.” and grab the 15th-fret G with your fourth finger
For the half-step bend in the third bar, use your before releasing the bend and pulling off to the
first three fingers on the same string to support 13th-fret C. This maneuver might be a little
Look at this lesson’s scale
patterns and find double- the bend. This puts your fourth finger in place tricky, especially if your guitar doesn’t have a
stops on adjacent strings. to play the eighth-fret G. Most of this sequence cutaway. For the G7 in the ninth measure, you’ll
Most of the double-stops in is played using the major pentatonic patterns. slide into some more double-stops and descend
Week 4’s solo are created In the next four bars you’ll play over the on the first and second strings as you progress
from major and minor thirds. same pattern, adding some pull-offs and using back to C7 via the F7 chord.
your fourth finger to play the eighth-fret G. Now that you have explored the major pen-
œ œ œ
This will set you up to play the descending pull- tatonic scale in the key of C, try it in other keys.
F7 C 7fifth frets. And in
& œ œ œ œ œJ œ . œ œ œ œ ˙ œ œ œ œ
offs between the eighth and If you know the E minor pentatonic scale, for
w
the last four measures, to play the hammer-on example, you can use its patterns to play the G
triplet lick, bar the first and second strings with major pentatonic scale. Try creating your own
your first finger. licks from the scale patterns and see if you can
find interesting ways of navigating between the
patterns. There are virtually limitless ways to
8 5 do so! AG
8 8 5
7 5 5 7 5 7 5 5 7 5 5
7 LISTEN 7 Rolling Stones 7
B TO THIS! Brown Sugar
œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ œ #œ nœ œ œ œ
G7 F7 C7
& œ œ œ œ œ œ œ # œ (n œ ) # œ n œ ˙. Œ
3
3 3 3
1/2 1/2
3 3 3 5 5 3 3
3 5 3 5 3 5 5 5
5 5 7 7 (7) 5
5 7 7
B
Week 4
C7
œœ œœ œœ œ . œœ œœ
j œœ ˙˙ œœ œœ œœ œ œœ œ # # œœ œœ œ .
j j j j j œ j j j
œœ
# # œœ
J œ. J œ J œ J J œ.
œœ œœ # # œœ œœ œ # # œœ œœ œœ
& J
7 8
7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8
8 9 8 9 8 9 9 8 9 8 9 8 9 8 9 8 9 9 8 9 9 8 9 9
10 10 10 10
B
~~~~~~~~ œ œ œ œ œ
72 April 2015
F7 C7
œ œ œ ˙ œ œ œ w
10 10 10 10
B
F7 ~~~~~~~~ C7
œ œ œ œ œ œ
œ œ œ œ ˙ œ œ w
œ œ
œ
& œ œ œ œ œ
3
~~~~~~
1
15
13 15 13 15 15 (15) 13 13
12 14 14
10 12
B8 8 10 12
œœ
j G7 j œœ œœ n œœ .. œœ œœ œœ ˙˙ œœ œœ œœ œœ
F7 C7
# œœ œœ j j œœ j œœ
& J œ œ
#œ w
11 12 11 12 12 10 10 10 8 8 8 8 8
12 13 12 13 13 12 12 12 10 8 10 10 8 10 8 10 8
10 8 9
10
B
Steve Kaufman
Group Guitar Lessons The Original
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76 78 80 87
Makers & Shakers
Indian Hills’
Mike Kennedy
Guitar Guru
Let’s talk about
intonation
New Gear
The limited-edition
Bryan Sutton dread
Great Acoustics
A Larrivée
for the ages
AG TRADE
SHOPTALK
Ovation Brand Sold

to Drum Workshop
Surprise sale is latest in a series of divestments by Fender Ovation founder
Charlie Kaman
BY MARC GREILSAMER
n January 6, Fender Musical Instruments “fluid situation. . . . We’re excited about the leaving all of Ovation’s production to its over-
O Corporation (FMIC) announced that KMC
Music, its wholly owned subsidiary, had sold the
future of Ovation and what we can do with that
brand,” he said.
seas facilities in South Korea, China, and
Indonesia.
Ovation guitar brand to Drum Workshop, Inc. Donnell added that, based on preliminary For Fender, this is the second major acous-
Considering Fender’s recent history of brand discussions, there is a “distinct possibility” that tic-guitar brand with which it has parted ways
divestment, the move wasn’t entirely unex- Ovation will be reopening a US-based produc- in the past year. The company sold its Guild
pected. However, Ovation’s acquisition by tion facility. brand to the Cordoba Music Group last year,
DW—a major manufacturer of percussion instru- Founded in the mid-1960s by aerospace followed by the announcement in December
ments and accessories—raised a few eyebrows engineer Charles Kaman, the Ovation brand of that it had ended its European distribution rela-
across the industry. guitars distinguished itself thanks to its use of tionship with Japanese maker Takamine (which
“What does a drum company want with a fiberglass-composed, bowl-shaped guitar backs is now handled by Korg), calling into question
guitar company?” asked one commenter on and, later, onboard electronics. Thanks to Glen the future of both brands in the United States.
AG’s Facebook page. Campbell and other well-known supporters, As for Drum Workshop, the bulk of their
“I think an Ovation would make a fine Ovation enjoyed a period of great popularity in acquired Fender product lines revolve around
drum!” joked another, referring to the guitar’s the 1970s and 1980s. Less than a decade ago, percussion—including Latin Percussion, Toca
unconventional design. the Kaman Corporation decided to sell off KMC, Percussion, Gretsch Drums, Gibraltar Hardware,
Initial reports indicate that DW will be its music-related subsidiary, to Fender, but last and KAT Percussion from Fender’s KMC subsid-
keeping the Ovation brand alive. Scott Donnell, year, Fender announced it was closing its Con- iary—while the inclusion of Ovation in the sale
VP of marketing at Drum Workshop, called it a necticut-based Ovation manufacturing facility, seems to be of secondary importance.
74 April 2015
MILESTONES
C.F. Martin Guitar, an early
advocate for sustainable woods,
earned an FSC Leadership
Award from the Forest
Stewardship Council at an
awards ceremony at Greenbuild.
Gibson Brands has opened a

store at the former site of an
iconic Tower Records in West
Hollywood, California. “We want
to reinvent this site to be an
international phenomenon that
its legacy deserves,” Gibson
CEO Henry Juszkiewicz told
the LA Times, promising to
retain the store’s “crazy vibe.”
DYLAN SIGNS ON TO SIGNATURE SJ-200
Bob Dylan has been associated with some iconic signed) include an Adirondack spruce top,
guitars, including a late ’20s- or early ’30s-era flamed maple back and sides, a rosewood
vintage Nick Lucas flattop that he played in the mustache bridge (inlayed with mother-of- Bono has said he may never play
studio and on tour between 1963 and 1966 pearl), bone saddle, a double pickguard guitar again following a bicycling
(Gibson offers a signature model). When he engraved with the classic poinsettia pattern accident, but he’ll have direct
countrified his sound, the folk rocker turned to a and inlayed with mother-of-pearl dots, a rose- input into the guitar playing of
Gibson J-200, as seen on the cover of the Nash- wood fingerboard with a bella-voce inlay, and a others—Bono and U2 guitarist
ville Skyline album. Now Gibson is offering a 111/16-inch bone nut. It comes equipped with an the Edge have joined the board
limited-edition signature vintage sunburst Dylan LR Baggs Anthem pickup system. of directors of the Fender Musical
SJ-200 model, six years in the making. The Player’s Edition (sans signature) is Instruments Corporation.
The special appointments (120 bear the $4,999 list; the autographed Collector’s Edition
bard’s own signature; another 300 are not is a cool $9,999.
TANGLEWOOD ISSUES THE PREMIER III LINE
The UK-based Tanglewood Guitar Co. has B-Band Crescent pickup system (only the OM
revamped its Premier Series, one of the compa- does not have a pickup) and sell for under $600
ny’s most popular product lines. The third and street. In addition, the Super Folk six-string also
newest generation of Premier Series instruments is available in a left-handed model. John D’Addario Jr., vice chairman
features solid AA Sitka spruce tops, lending a Meanwhile, Tanglewood has expanded its of D’Addario & Co. recently
robust tone that retains its clarity even under Java Series with two new dreadnoughts: one picked up a Lifetime
heavier strumming. Backs, sides, and necks are acoustic model and one electro-acoustic with Achievement Award at the
made of mahogany, and the bodies are finished cutaway and Fishman Sonitone pickup. Both Koblenz Int’l Guitar Festival in
in natural satin. The guitars are fitted with feature solid cedar tops and three-piece backs Germany on behalf of himself,
NuBone nuts and saddles and D’Addario EXP built of matching outer pieces of amara wood, the company, and the D’Addario
strings. The guitars—cutaway dreadnoughts, an centered by a wedge of golden spalted mango. Foundation for their dedication
OM model, 12-string, and bass—feature a Learn more at tanglewoodguitars.com. AG to promoting the classical guitar.
MAKERS & SHAKERS
Western
Spirit
Indian Hill’s
Mike Kennedy
LENNY P. ROBERT PHOTO

creates a unique
showpiece
flattop
Mike Kennedy
BY MARC GREILSAMER
orm follows function—that has been Before he’d arrived in Santa Cruz, he says, Kennedy’s first attempt involved using a
“F misunderstood,” said the renowned
architect Frank Lloyd Wright. “Form and func-
“I didn’t even realize until that point that
people actually could build guitars.” That
how-to book as tutelage, but he abandoned that
notion when he got to the list of required
tion should be one, joined in a spiritual union.” changed when Kennedy started working at a tools—on page two. He then decided that
Luthier Mike Kennedy, proprietor of Indian coffee shop near the Santa Cruz Guitar taking a full-blown guitar-making course was
Hill Guitars in Montreal, calls this statement Company, where a number of SCGC employees the best approach, and he soon enrolled in the
one of his “guiding principles” of guitar build- would hang out—which only served to feed his program run by esteemed Canadian luthier
ing. “I strongly believe,” Kennedy has said, newfound acoustic-guitar obsession. Learning Sergei de Jonge. At the time, Kennedy wasn’t
“that a cohesive design in both structure and to build guitars soon became a viable option. particularly familiar with de Jonge or his ster-
aesthetics is fundamental to producing excep- “I’ve always loved figuring out how things ling reputation; he chose de Jonge’s course
tional instruments.” worked and building things,” Kennedy explains. simply because it offered vegetarian meals.
In many ways, Kennedy has reached the apo- “I’d studied mechanical engineering, so I’ve “He’s an amazing guy,” Kennedy says of de
theosis of this philosophy with his recent work always had that bent.” Not only would he be Jonge, “an incredible teacher and one of the
on a singular presentation guitar he created in able to make himself a new instrument, he most generous people I’ve ever met—with
honor of the legendary Western artist Charles thought, but maybe he could land a gig at knowledge, and with tools and wood.” Of
Marion Russell, whose early-20th century paint- SCGC in the process. Kennedy, de Jonge says, “I could see right away
ings of cowboys, Native Americans, and land- that he had a really good aptitude for guitar
scapes are internationally revered. Kennedy’s Below, left making—didn’t take long for me to see that.”
“Russell guitar” will be a featured auction item The unique bracing pattern Kennedy completed the course, but the
in “The Russell: An Exhibition and Sale to Right timing never quite worked out for him to join
Benefit the C.M. Russell Museum,” to be held Magnetic end graft
this spring in Great Falls, Montana.
Kennedy’s instrument, a Grand Concert
model, combines a Sitka spruce top with walnut
back and sides, and it includes a number of
noteworthy Western-themed flourishes—most
significant, a wood-burned image of Russell’s
bison skull logo in the center of the spruce top.
erhaps it’s only fitting that Kennedy was

P first bitten by the acoustic-guitar bug
while living out West, in Santa Cruz, California.
“I basically just put everything I had in my car
MIKE KENNEDY PHOTOS
and drove out there,” he recalls. Living in a

friend’s garage for much of his time there,
Kennedy’s life revolved around surfing and
playing guitar. When the time came for him to
get a new acoustic, he considered the idea of
building his own.
76 April 2015
Santa Cruz. Yet, Kennedy had such a wonderful taking an ever-more holistic approach that con- main X, instead of out toward the waist. “I like
experience with de Jonge the first time around siders how all the parts interact, how changes to to think a lot about evenly distributing the
that he decided to take the course again. When one element of the build affect all of the others. forces. I try to have all the braces connected to
the course was complete, de Jonge agreed to take “I’m not doing each part in isolation. I’m taking each other, because they’re not only support, but
him on as a full-time apprentice. “He’s incredibly a step back a little bit and having a wider per- they’re helping transmit vibration.”
easygoing, but he still has very high standards for spective on how the build is going,” although his Though he wasn’t sure if the new system
the quality of work that he will accept,” Kennedy eye for detail has never been more precise. would work, his subsequent Chladni testing,
says. “From the get-go, from the very first guitar which assesses nodal patterns to help tune the
I built for him [in 2005], it had to be up to his ike de Jonge, his mentor, Kennedy likes to top, proved successful. “I was able to get a
standards. It had to be perfect.” L keep an open mind—willing to take things
in new directions, not caged in by a concrete
closed ring and a half [pattern], so I was able to
tune the top right where I was hoping to get it.”
‘I think it’ll sound system, working very much by intuition and Another challenge created by the lack of a
feel. The Russell guitar presented him with a soundhole was being able to provide access to
different than my number of fascinating challenges. the guitar’s interior. Kennedy settled on the use
other guitars, but In terms of the wood choices, Kennedy of an end graft, which is held in place by
I’m not sure how, wanted to “keep it North American,” settling on

highly figured walnut for the back and sides
magnets and features an Indian Hill logo design
that has a sort of Old West “branded” appear-
and that’s what because it was “visually striking,” and on Sitka ance. For the purfling, Kennedy expanded on
I’m curious about.’ spruce for the top, because it would provide a the Western theme by opting for an intricate
nice contrast with the wood-burned Russell rope design that combines maple, walnut, and
De Jonge was impressed with Kennedy. “It logo. In order to accommodate the wood burn, a “mystery tannish veneer” and is constructed
was a pleasure to have him in the shop,” de Kennedy had to forgo a traditional soundhole based on the golden ratio (related to the Fibo-
Jonge says. “His work was always good, he was in favor of f-holes, a relative rarity for a flattop nacci sequence). To facilitate appropriate air
conscientious, and towards the end of his time acoustic, which meant modifying his standard movement in the box, he plans to add at least
with me, his workmanship was just excellent. bracing pattern. one soundport.
Often, when I’d have real fine details to be In the end, the new pattern was only slightly Though the aesthetic considerations are
executed on a guitar, I’d pass it over to him.” different than his usual bracing. The hybrid ample, Kennedy is, of course, most concerned
Kennedy has been on his own for about six bracing style, which he likens to a “birdhouse with how the Russell guitar is going to sound.
years and has built roughly 25 guitars under the shape,” uses elements of a double-X system com- “Not nervous,” he says, “just curious. I think it’ll
Indian Hill name. “I’m starting to hone in on bined with elements of a ladder system. He sound different than my other guitars, but I’m not
how the guitar functions as a system,” he notes, shifted the side braces so they connect at the sure how, and that’s what I’m curious about.” AG
CarbonFiberCases.com
GUITAR GURU
What Causes Random

Intonation Glitches?
Even the best-built guitar can exhibit idiosyncratic gremlins
BY DANA BOURGEOIS
Q A
A plucked string produces a funda- Inaccurately placed frets and saddles, common
Using an electronic tuner, mental tone and a series of over- to many older guitars not produced using
I can verify that when tones, or harmonics. In an interval of today’s ubiquitous computer-guided machinery,
a perfect fifth, the third harmonic of the lower can further skew the baked-in imperfection of
my open strings are in tune, fundamental and the second harmonic of the equal-temperament fret spacing. Fret, saddle,
my fretted octaves are accurate upper fundamental are the same pitch. When and string wear can wreak havoc on even the
significant harmonics of two notes are perfectly most accurately manufactured instrument,
or nearly accurate. Individual in tune, the interval is said to be just, or conso- while dryness or humidity can raise or lower a
notes of certain chords, however, nant. By virtue of shared harmonics, the easiest soundboard (and with it, strings), altering into-
intervals to hear as consonant or “out of tune” nation from one day to the next. And players
can be very out of tune, and are unisons and octaves, followed by perfect may have a tendency to push strings sideways
capoing in some positions fifths and perfect fourths. A consonant perfect when fretting certain chords, inadvertently sea-
fourth above a consonant perfect fifth produces soning the harmonic soup.
requires retuning. I’ve noticed a pitch slightly higher than an octave above the Yet guitars have distinct intonation advan-
that all guitars, even electrics original note. This phenomenon (difficult to tages. By making subtle, even unconscious
succinctly explain) presents serious problems adjustments in tuning and inflection, squeezing
with ‘properly’ adjusted saddles, for instruments capable of playing multiple, a chord a certain way, sliding up on a pivotal
have the same intonation simultaneous notes. note, or simply refraining from bad technique, a
If you demand consonant octaves, some- good player’s intonation always seems dead on.
problems to a greater or lesser thing has to give. Guitars and pianos solve this Andrés Segovia is said to have preferred high
degree. Can you explain what problem by dividing consonant octaves into 12 action (the better to manipulate intonation),
equally spaced semitones. This tuning system, eschewed compensated saddles, and advised
causes seemingly random known as equal temperament, allows instru- students that tuning to the unique requirements
intonation glitches? Is it possible ments to play in all keys with reasonable into- of an individual piece of music is a fundamental
nation. The downside is that every interval aspect of musical inter-pretation.
to modify a guitar to intonate except the octave is either flat or sharp relative Before succumbing to keyboard envy,
as accurately as a keyboard?” to its harmonically consonant counterpart. always remember that no pianist can manipu-
Alex Medford Every interval, except the octave. late intonation with the left hand. AG
Somerville, Massachusetts So the good news is that guitars do, in fact,
intonate about as accurately as pianos, though Dana Bourgeois is a master luthier and the
not without idiosyncratic intonation gremlins. founder of Bourgeois Guitars in Lewiston, Maine.
GOT A QUESTION? Ask Acoustic Guitar’s If AG selects your question

Uncertain about guitar care and resident Guitar Guru. Send for publication, you’ll receive
maintenance? The ins-and-outs an email titled “Guitar Guru” a complimentary copy of
of guitar building? Or a topic to editor Marc Greilsamer AG’s The Acoustic Guitar
related to your gear? at marc@stringletter.com, Owner’s Manual.
and he’ll forward it
to the expert luthier. Dana Bourgeois
78 April 2015
Americana music blends country, folk, bluegrass,
roots-rock, blues and R&B into a unique sound. knowledge in string design. We incorporate innovation into
Now GHS introduces the Americana Series of materials selection and string construction while utilizing
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this exciting genre of blended American roots music which utilizes a sealed nitrogen atmosphere, preventing Now available at GHS retailers
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NEW GEAR VIDEO REVIEW
ACOUSTICGUITAR.COM/GEAR
Aged Tone Adirondack spruce top
VIBRANT SOUND
Gentle
ow considered one of the world’s premier
N flatpickers, Bryan Sutton was quite a
phenom when he hit the bluegrass scene nearly
The Sutton model is a responsive instrument
with dynamic projection. Its rich, robust bass is
Giant
20 years ago. certainly evident, though it never overwhelms.
When Sutton was first establishing his ster- It’s got the muscle to cut through any string
ling reputation, it was usually with his 1997 band without sacrificing the nuance and refine-
Bourgeois’ Bryan Sutton Bourgeois D-150 in hand—a dazzling dread- ment of a memorable instrument. It boasts
Limited Edition dreadnought nought with an Adirondack spruce top and Bra- impeccable clarity and glorious sustain no
revisits a modern marvel

zilian rosewood back and sides that boasts an matter how far up the neck you wander. The
often elusive combination of power and finesse. note separation is brilliant, and its deep, full
BY MARC GREILSAMER That D-150 surely marked a pinnacle of sound is sure to make ears perk up.
Dana Bourgeois’ 40-year guitar-building career, Constructed using hide glue, the review
so it may come as little surprise that the model features an Aged Tone torrefied Adiron-
esteemed luthier has chosen to replicate that dack spruce top—with tight, even, straight
instrument with the majestic Bryan Sutton grain—and elegantly figured Brazilian rosewood
Limited Edition dreadnought. back, ribs, and headstock cap, plucked from
Using the original as a springboard, Bour- Bourgeois’ special reserve. Toss in an ebony fret-
geois has constructed a wonderfully balanced, board and bridge plus a one-piece mahogany
tonally superb guitar that adds a number of ele- neck, and you have all the ingredients of an
ments to give it a particularly lived-in feel. archetypal, “golden-era” flattop guitar.
80 April 2015
Ebony fretboard 123/32-inch nut width Gold Waverly tuners
BODY
Dreadnought size
Aged Tone Adirondack spruce

top with Aged Tone double-
scalloped X-bracing NECK
One-piece mahogany neck
Brazilian rosewood
AT A GLANCE
back and sides Ebony fretboard
BOURGEOIS PRICE
BRYAN Ebony bridge 25½-inch scale length $11,645 list
SUTTON Aged Tone finish 123/32-inch nut width Made in the United States
LIMITED
EDITION Abalone rosette Gold Waverly tuners bourgeoisguitars.net
SPECIAL APPOINTMENTS Other features exclusive to this line include a for a particular instrument to catch the ears of the
No doubt that Bourgeois was looking to vintage-style through (long) saddle that extends folks around here. But when I started picking on
approximate the look and sound of that orig- to the wings of the bridge, double-scalloped this Bourgeois, several coworkers ambled over to
inal D-150, his top-of-the-line dreadnought, X-bracing pattern, and ultra-thin Aged Tone finish. my desk—and I can assure you it wasn’t my virtu-
but he’s taken things a few steps further by Bourgeois rounds out the package with a number osity that turned heads; far from it. The magnifi-
trying to approximate the overall feel of a of standard D-150 features, including triple cent tone of the guitar is immediately recognizable,
“broken-in” guitar. (After all, Sutton’s D-150 ivoroid binding for the neck, headstock, and body, whether blazing down the bluegrass path or lei-
has gotten nearly two decades’ worth of heavy a beautiful abalone rosette, ivory bridge pins, and surely strumming jazz-inflected voicings.
use.) To achieve this, he’s used the torrefaction diamond/square fretboard inlays. Gold Waverly Bourgeois is limiting this model to a run of
process on the guitar’s Adirondack braces (to machines round out a visually stunning, aurally 30 guitars; with a list price of $11,645, it’s no
release moisture and sap, and add stability) as satisfying, eminently playable instrument. bargain. On the other hand, the likes of this
well as on the soundboard itself. investment-grade instrument may be increas-
COMPLETE PACKAGE ingly hard to come by. Without question, there
If you happen to end up In the world of acoustic guitars, the word are a number of heirloom-quality guitars that
as one of the 30 owners

“special” is bandied about with regularity, so can be had for less. Still, if you happen to end
much so that it may even invite a sense of skepti- up as one of the 30 owners of a Bourgeois
of a Bourgeois Bryan cism. However, the Bryan Sutton model needs no Bryan Sutton Limited Edition dreadnought,
Sutton Limited Edition embellishment or hyperbole. Sometimes, special consider yourself lucky. AG
is indeed special.
dreadnought, consider With a constantly rotating assembly of guitars [Editor’s Note: Dana Bourgeois writes the
yourself lucky. rolling through the AG office, it can prove difficult Guitar Guru column for AG.]
NEW GEAR
AT A GLANCE
PAUL REED
SMITH
SE A10E
BODY
Solid mahogany top with
proprietary X-brace/classical
hybrid design
Mahogany back and sides
Rosewood bridge
Gloss finish
NECK
Mahogany neck
Rosewood fretboard Warm, Woody,

25.25-inch scale length
and Inexpensive
121/32-inch nut width PRS’ first all-mahogany acoustic mixes
characteristics of steel-string and classical models
Gloss finish
BY ADAM PERLMUTTER
PRS SE tuners
hen I first pick up Paul Reed Smith’s position, to vigorous strumming in drop-D
EXTRAS
Undersaddle pickup with
W SE A10E, with its narrow nut and sleek
low action, not to mention its asymmetric head-
tuning, to chord-melody arrangements of jazz
standards.
volume and tone controls stock and super shiny finish, the guitar feels Clearly the SE A10E isn’t a guitar that’s
more like an electric than an acoustic. But a few pitched at the fingerstyle player, but it does fare
D’Addario light phosphor- cursory strums reveal the SE A10E to have the quite well in this context—again, despite the
bronze strings (.012–.053) warm and woody sound characteristic of a good skinny nut. The instrument refuses to muddy
all-mahogany guitar. up when placed in lowered tunings like
Hardshell case DADGAD and open-G, and fingerpicked impro-
BALANCED SOUND visations in these tunings benefit from the
PRICE Out of the box, the SE A10E plays extremely instrument’s clarity and balance.
$799 list; $599 street well. Its slightly chunky neck—comparable in
profile to a typical 1950s solid-body electric— The guitar would
Made in Korea is easy to cradle in all registers, whether I’m make a no-brainer
prsguitars.com
playing full barre chords or single-note runs.
And, though at 121/32 inches, the nut is a hair
for an electric
narrower than on a standard Gibson electric, player looking
the fretboard doesn’t feel at all cramped. for a comfortable
An aficionado of prewar flattops won’t nec- acoustic.
essarily be wowed by the SE A10E’s overall
voice; it seems to lack a certain complexity and The SE A10E comes complete with an
character. But it does have an assertive, punchy undersaddle pickup whose tone and volume
midrange; a tight, clear treble; and a round, controls are positioned conveniently, tucked
solid bass. inside the soundhole. Plugged into a Fender
Given its even sound, the SE A10E accom- Acoustasonic amplifier via a quarter-inch jack
modates a wide range of stylistic approaches. at the endpin, the electronics system delivers a
It responds equally well to everything from good approximation of the guitar’s natural
bluegrass-style cross-picking in the open acoustic sound.
82 April 2015
VIDEO REVIEW
ACOUSTICGUITAR.COM/GEAR
RIDE THE MAGIC BUS WITH US ORGANICALLY CULTIVATED IN USA

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A HYBRID MACHINE
Presided over by the luthier Paul Reed Smith,
PRS Guitars has been making high-perfor-
mance electric guitars since the mid-1980s but
didn’t enter the acoustic market until 2009.
The SE A10E is PRS’s first all-mahogany guitar
and, like the company’s other acoustic offer-
ings, it borrows design trademarks from the
electric series, such as the idiosyncratic head-
stock and the birds-in-flight fretboard inlays.
The SE A10E also shares a unique bracing
pattern with other PRS acoustics. Its solid top is
supported with a hybrid of Torres-style fan
bracing used on classical guitars and the X-pat-
tern traditionally seen on steel-string guitars—a
design that Smith conceived of after he played
an original Torres whose sound he found
explosive.
The SE A10E is available in two finishes—
tortoise shell and black. Our review model
came in the former. The coloring, a deep
brown-maroon, feels heavy and oversaturated.
It partially obscures the grain of the mahogany
and makes it difficult to see the body’s black
binding.
PRS’s American-made instruments are
known for their superlative craftsmanship. The
build quality on the SE A10E is good overall but
doesn’t quite measure up. The fretwork is clean
and tidy, as is the slotting on the bone nut and
saddle. But there’s the occasional dimpling in
the finish, and inside the guitar, excess glue is
apparent around the bracing and kerfing.
These small anomalies of craftsmanship are
easily overlooked, though, given the SE A10E’s
low street price of $599. Having smooth play-
ability and tonal balance, the guitar would
make a no-brainer for an electric player looking
for a comfortable acoustic, or a studio musician
in search of an inexpensive guitar that will sit
nicely in a mix. AG
Contributing editor Adam Perlmutter

transcribes, arranges, and engraves music
for numerous publications.
NEW GEAR
The Platinum Stage, left,
Power to the Preamp

and the Platinum Pro EQ
Fishman’s Platinum Series is Class A all the way

BY ADAM PERLMUTTER
hen it comes to guitar electronics, very The unit features controls for honing and Apogee Duet interface, I enjoyed similarly
W good things are coming in increasingly
small packages. That’s definitely the case with
controlling the sound of a stringed instrument,
and all perform very well. A row of dials—low
satisfying results for recording some basic
acoustic-guitar tracks on the fly. And plugging in
Fishman’s newly designed Platinum Pro EQ cut, bass, middle, treble, and brilliance—offer a Fender Jazz bass, I tracked some robust low-end
analog preamplifier, which is about the size of great tone-shaping possibilities, while notch parts: testament to the preamp’s versatility.
the average portable hard drive, and its even and phase controls attenuate unwanted feed-
more diminutive counterpart, the Platinum back. A boost control enhances the volume of a THE PLATINUM STAGE
Stage. Auditioned with a new Yamaha LL16 ARE low signal without coloring it; a single-knob The Platinum Stage ($119.95) comes in a simi-
guitar, both units deliver clean and accurate compressor smoothens the overall sound. larly sturdy chassis and has about the same
sonics, not to mention user-friendliness and I plugged the Platinum Pro EQ into a Fender footprint as a typical smartphone. Its controls
affordability. Acoustasonic amplifier and found that the class-A are more minimal with just a four-band EQ
preamp does an excellent job of delivering the section, a volume boost switch with level
THE PLATINUM PRO EQ Yamaha’s natural acoustic voice. The EQ section is control, and a balanced D.I. with pre/post EQ
Powered by a nine-volt battery or AC adapter, very smooth and responsive: The treble control setting and auto-ground lift.
the Platinum Pro EQ ($249.95 street) is housed precisely tailors the sound to cut through a mix As its name suggests, the Platinum Stage is
in a sturdy steel chassis and is intended for use without any harshness, and the bass control mini- intended for live performance, and it handily
as a stompbox. Its control panel is easy to mizes the booming low end of the dreadnought clips on to the belt (although it feels a little
grasp. At the bottom-left corner is a footswitch guitar. An attractive shimmer to ringing arpeggios goofy to wear it this way). Though obviously
for engaging a built-in tuner with five different can be had with the brilliance control, and the not as versatile as the Platinum Pro EQ, the
modes: fully chromatic, ukulele, bass, guitar, or compressor works beautifully in evening out Stage sounds just as good, thanks to the class-A
violin. The tuner is intuitive to operate with its the sound without robbing the tone of vitality. electronics. And the EQ controls still offer
virtual needle displayed on a screen in the Plugging the Platinum Pro EQ directly into plenty of tone-shaping possibilities—enough to
center of the front panel. Apple’s GarageBand on a MacBook Pro via an satisfy most performing guitarists. AG
84 April 2015
Make
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PICKIN’
AT A GLANCE
FENDER
PREMIUM
CONCERT
TONE 59
BODY
11-inch Remo
Renaissance head
Burl walnut resonator
Heavyweight Champion
Brass 40-hole flathead tone ring
24 hooks
Fender’s top-of-the-line Premium Concert Tone 59 banjo
Multi-ply maple rim revives a long-celebrated line
with walnut stain
BY ADAM PERLMUTTER
Maple bridge with ebony cap

ender’s new Premium Concert Tone 59, a COSMETIC APPEAL
Chrome clamshell tailpiece F modern interpretation of the five-string
banjo that graced the company’s catalog during
The Concert Tone looks as beautiful as it plays
and sounds. The resonator is fashioned from
Gloss polyurethane finish the 1960s, is loud and lively, rife with overtones, American black burl walnut, with stunningly
rich and warm-sounding. Its intonation is true eccentric figuring and rich color. The maple rims
NECK and correct, and the banjo plays effortlessly have been stained a warm brown to match the
Five-piece well, thanks to a svelte neck and a perfect walnut. Non-stained maple and walnut segments
walnut-and-maple neck factory setup. are sandwiched together in the neck, their
When played in the Scruggs or clawhammer appearance echoed in the multicolored wooden
Rosewood fretboard style, the Premium Concert Tone 59 has an asser- marquetry gracing the fingerboard and rims.
with 22 frets tive voice that’s perfectly suited to a bluegrass The headstock, which sports a rosewood
romp. There’s good note separation between the cap, is emblazoned with an ornate torch inlay
26.4-inch scale length individual chord members; everything is clear in abalone; the fretboard is decked out with a
and distinct. It also sounds excellent when sub- wonderful assortment of old-school floral and
1.69-inch nut width jected to non-idiomatic approaches—for geometric shapes, complemented by acrylic
example, improvisations informed by Indian clas- pearl buttons on the planetary tuners.
Dual-action truss rod sical music or the sort of cluster voicings associ- The well-constructed Concert Tone boasts a
ated with 20th-century art music. Remo Renaissance head stretched to the perfect
Planetary tuners The banjo has a bit of a longer neck than tightness, and the 24 hooks and other hardware
the standard guitar—the Concert Tone has a require no adjustment. The frets are smoothly
Gloss polyurethane finish 26.4-inch scale and 22 frets. And it’s a lot crowned and have no jaggedness at their edges.
burlier too: The review model weighed in at a All of the inlay work has been cut and glued
EXTRAS whopping 12 pounds, seven ounces. But with great precision, and while the gloss poly-
D’Addario J-61 strings somehow it’s not difficult to transfer between a urethane finish feels a little heavy and detracts
(.010/.012/.016/.023W/.010) guitar and the Concert Tone, and when played slightly from the banjo’s old-fashioned detail-
in seated position, it’s easy to forget about the ing, it has been faultlessly applied.
Deluxe hardshell case instrument’s relatively great mass. With an advertised price of $1,349.99, the
Compared with a guitar, the neck feels Premium Concert Tone 59 banjo isn’t exactly a
PRICE accommodating, the 1.69-inch nut giving the bargain for an imported instrument, but with
$1,349.99 advertised fretting fingers ample space to move between its pro-level sound and playability, not to
the strings. The banjo’s relatively slinky mention its snazzy looks, the instrument would
Made in China strings—the highest pitched sized at .010— make an excellent choice for the guitarist
make it easy to play high-velocity runs up and looking to double on the banjo in any capacity.
fender.com down the neck. In short, it’s a winner. AG
86 April 2015
music.
moments.
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88 April 2015
GREAT ACOUSTICS
S
IV E
H M TH
E
O
FR
C
R
Ahead of
A
Its Time
Jean Larrivée’s 1975
steel-string cutaway
was a true trailblazer
BY DAVID WREN
n 1963, a young Jean-Claude Larrivée left his

I hometown of L’Abord, Quebec, Canada, and
moved to Toronto. A few years later, he met
world-renowned classical luthier Edgar Mönch
at a concert, and within a week he was studying
guitar building with the maestro himself. By
1970, Larrivée had already started to develop
his steel-string guitar concepts, which were
received enthusiastically by the area’s profes-
sional musicians. One of Larrivée’s first steel-
string customers was Bruce Cockburn, for whom
he ultimately made three instruments, including
his first cutaway model, pictured here.
I can remember, as a young Larrivée appren-
tice, hearing Cockburn try to explain a body
shape that would allow him better access to the
upper registers of the fingerboard. Everyone
present thought it was a bit of a crazy idea, as
none of us had yet been exposed to a cutaway
flattop guitar. When the time came to turn this
idea into an actual guitar, Larrivée bent the
sides on a hot pipe—without the aid of even a
rough sketch—and fashioned an instrument
that was far ahead of its time.
The guitar’s construction is not dissimilar to
today’s Larrivées. The brand’s distinctive sym-
metrical bracing system was almost fully evolved
even at this early stage in Larrivée’s career, as
was his use of the hand-fitted dovetail neck
joint. However, there are some notable differ-
ences: The guitar has a nonadjustable truss rod
instead of the contemporary adjustable variety;
it’s built with a European spruce top (possibly a
residual influence of his German-born mentor)
instead of Sitka; and it features a spectacular set
of dark, completely quarter-sawn, old-growth
Brazilian rosewood back and sides.
If you had to pick a pivotal instrument in
Jean-Claude Larrivée’s career, this would cer-
tainly be it. Larrivée’s unique Florentine
cutaway design was exposed to audiences by a
gifted musician’s extensive touring and blazed
a trail for luthiers and players alike for decades
to come. AG
This article was first published

in the December 2006 issue.
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92 94 98 PLAYLIST
Playlist
James McMurtry’s
gamesmanship
Playlist
Julian Lage’s
solo-guitar set
Final Note
David Bromberg
on David Bromberg
MIXED MEDIA
JOEY LUSTERMAN PHOTO
Jorma Kaukonen, p.91
SHANE MCCAULEY PHOTO
PLAYLIST
James McMurtry
Acoustic First
The literary songwriter softens the edges of his sound
to bring more edge to his stories James McMurtry
Complicated Game
BY MARK SEGAL KEMP Complicated Game
here’s not a better living American song- locking into the repeated descending chord pro- Street-era Rolling Stones, fronted by Lou Reed
T writer than James McMurtry, whose literary
bloodline—son of Pulitzer Prize-winning
gression that carries such gritty, hyper-real cou-
plets as, “Empty storefronts around the square
with a Texas drawl. “You got to me,” McMurtry
sings, “brought all this emptiness down on top of
novelist Larry McMurtry (The Last Picture Show, / There’s a needle in the gutter and glass every- me / Off on a thousand-dollar odyssey / And I
Lonesome Dove)—makes a damn good case for a where.” On Complicated Game, McMurtry puts know a thing or two now.”
genetic predisposition for telling great stories. full emphasis on his warmer acoustic sound, Elsewhere, McMurtry’s protagonists ques-
Combining everything that’s righteous in the fingerpicking or strumming an old Gibson tion their existence in the world (“Ain’t Got a
story-songs of Steve Earle or Bruce Springsteen, dreadnought he got from Ani DiFranco, making Place”), contemplate change (“Deaver’s Cross-
but putting a brutally dark spin on them, only the sparest use of electric guitars to ing”), return disillusioned from war (“South
McMurtry’s vignettes reveal unvarnished truths provide coloring to a set of songs that are much Dakota”). One of the standout tracks is the
about America, circa now. The country’s oldest more personal than political. The shift in album’s most electric moment, “How’m I Gonna
and most respected leftist weekly, The Nation, McMurtry’s musical focus underscores the vul- Find You Now,” which finds McMurtry talk-
has named McMurtry’s classic blue-collar nerable side of his writing. singing the exploits of a wide-eyed crazy who’s
anthem of 2004, “We Can’t Make It Here,” one In the first few tracks, McMurtry tells of “smoking into town like a Molotov cocktail,”
of the best protest songs ever. No matter what love’s myriad personae: the passionate young with quavering tremolo guitars approximating
your political perspective, it’s hard to disagree marriage that couldn’t possibly survive limos the protagonist’s sleep-deprived insanity.
with that. that “smelled like cocaine sweat, cheap cologne, Blue-collar struggles remain at the heart of
McMurtry’s musical stock-in-trade is and aftershave” (“You Got to Me”); a more Complicated Game (as they do on all of McMur-
weaving together acoustic and electric instru- mature blue-collar marriage rooted in persever- try’s albums), but with a warmer, acoustic-
ments in ways similar to his use of language, ance (“Copper Canteen”); a marriage with based sound, the songwriter is able to bring
employing brash electric-guitar fuzz, distortion, agreed-upon infidelity that burns holes in one’s more of the nuances of personal relationships
or dissonance to put just the right emphasis on self-esteem (“She Loves Me”). The one refrain to the fore. To be sure, McMurtry has played
a key word or phrase. “We Can’t Make It Here,” that ties together all of these complicated games plenty of all-acoustic shows, and acoustic
for instance, begins with spiky electric and comes over the strummed guitars, keyboards, guitars have been at the core of everything he’s
acoustic guitar notes over a thudding bass line and drums of “You Got to Me,” which sounds as ever recorded. But Complicated Game is acous-
to suggest a raw, emotional prickliness before if it was plucked straight from Exile on Main tic first, and that makes all the difference. AG
92 April 2015
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Jorma Kaukonen
Ain’t in No Hurry LuthierFrankenstein AG 245.indd 1 3/5/13 3:51 PM
Red House
On new solo outing, Jefferson Airplane/

Hot Tuna guitarist takes his time
Before Jorma Kaukonen electro-shocked folk
into psych-rock with Jefferson Airplane, he
fingerpicked an acoustic guitar, inspired by the The Capo Company
fretwork of the Rev. Gary Davis. Though his
longtime Airplane spinoff Hot Tuna has flirted
with amplified lava-lamp boogie, the band’s
excursions into stripped-back electric and
acoustic blues have proved more durable.
But Kaukonen, now 74, is at his purest on
his solo acoustic recordings, with JA/Hot Tuna
bassist Jack Casady in tow to provide his signa-
ture deep, guttural growl.
Ain’t in No Hurry, Kaukonen’s third album for
Red House, simply reinforces the portrait of a
master comfortably ensconced in his roots. The
elegiac “In My Dreams” weaves the guitarist’s
grainy, smooth-as-single-malt vocals with his
nimble, silvery picking, distilling mortality and
memories of sun-dappled psychedelia in one
phrase: “We never seem to age in my dream.”
But Kaukonen’s lackadaisical touch can’t
conceal his propulsive drive. For every familiar
touchstone—on a few cuts he plays his 1958
Gibson J-50, the guitar he used on the Air-
plane’s “Embryonic Journey”—there’s a fresh
wrinkle: the bad-ass bent notes and chugging
coal-train picking on “Where There’s Two
There’s Trouble,” the pedal-steel drenched
countrypolitan pop of “Bar Room Crystal Ball.”
Performance 2
Smaller, lighter, faster
Kaukonen and his sidemen play loose and
elastic, and their invigorated takes on old folk
and blues shun reverence. The Depression-era
clarion call “Brother Can You Spare a Dime” is
pointedly topical, but also turns playful in the www.G7th.com
knotty weave of Kaukonen’s Spanish-flavored
guitar and Barry Mitterhoff’s trilling mandolin.
Kaukonen’s in no rush to speak his mind on G7thTheCapoCompany TheCapoCompany
Ain’t No Hurry. Instead, he lets each moment @G7thCapos G7thcapo
sweep you up. —Pat Moran
PLAYLIST
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Shipped fast
Rock-solid guarantee Julian Lage Iron and Wine
World’s Fair Archive Series Volume No. 1
Modern Lore Black Cricket
The child prodigy finds nuance and Home recordings explore

maturity on first all-solo guitar set Sam Beam’s formative years
Julian Lage may be the most down-to-earth Iron & Wine (aka Sam Beam) fans who miss
guitar virtuoso ever. When he plays—or talks the homespun simplicity of his early efforts—
about his playing—there’s not an ounce of specifically his much-loved 2002 Subpop
pretentiousness in his demeanor. He breaks into debut, The Creek Drank the Cradle—will surely
Where the pros shop, since 1969 a big smile when he finds a particularly sweet embrace this first archival release from his new
stewmac.com spot on the fretboard. He’s naturally inquisitive; label. It consists of 16 songs from that time
he listens intently. That’s perhaps why Lage, when Beam was making his albums alone at
groomed since he was 12, has become one of home on a four-track cassette recorder, often
the guitar world’s finest players. overdubbing banjo and slide-guitar parts on
On his first set of all-solo acoustic-guitar top of his acoustic picking.
pieces, Lage brings together folk, jazz, and The recording is decidedly lo-fi (more on
other musical references in 12 improvised, some songs than others), but the overall feeling
though compact songs (none much longer than is still warm and intimate thanks to the imme-
four minutes) with deceptively simple melodies diacy of his vocals, many of them nearly whis-
that connect on a deeply emotional level. pered. There’s bright fingerpicking on tunes
Opening track “40’s” is a sweet folk melody that such as “Loretta” and “Sing Song Bird,” while
arrives on a breeze of melancholy, as if through others feature mesmerizing guitar-banjo-slide
an open car window during a summer drive interplay. “Judgement” even adds a track of
into the country. Lage’s guitar runs like water guitar-tapping percussion to nice effect.
over “Gardens,” and on “Red Prairie Dawn” he For me, the most effective songs have an
seems to be jamming with himself on a blue- almost nostalgic glow, capturing the joys and
grass hoedown. Even the coiling guitar in the uncertainties of relationships with lovers and
album’s most experimental track, the brief friends from days gone by.
“Doublesteps,” is accessible enough to thrill the In the pretty opener “Slow Black River,” he
most serious love of melody. sings about “your hand in mine forever”; in
Lage named the album World’s Fair for the “Quarters in a Pocket,” he quietly intones:
sense of nostalgia it conjures, and these songs “Time spent with you feels like sketches for a
surely live in another time. But Lage is a painting / that you won’t let me see.” Then
product of the modern world—a virtuoso with there’s “Everyone’s Summer of ’95,” about
an attention span that’s brought him from Beam and his buddies whiling away their days,
helping to breathe new life into the career of “halfway home and going nowhere.”
vibes legend Gary Burton to performing dizzy- Though I personally prefer Beam’s more
ingly experimental free improvisations with elaborate and musically adventurous recent
avant-jazz-rock guitarist Nels Cline (Room) to a albums, these early songs have a quiet grace and
recent country-folk collaboration with Chris power that is both appealing and compelling,
Eldridge (Avalon). On World’s Fair, Lage rolls and they provide glimpses into the heart and
alone on a set that feels so warm and intimate, soul of one of music’s most interesting eccen-
it’s as if he’s sitting across the room playing just trics. (Available through ironandwine.com.)
for you. —M.S.K. —Blair Jackson
94 April 2015
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96 April 2015
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SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1990 MARK POKEMPNER PHOTO
Acoustic Guitar (ISSN 1049-9261) is published monthly by String Letter Publishing, Inc., 501 Canal Blvd., Suite J, Richmond, CA 94804. Periodical postage paid at Richmond, CA 94804
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98 April 2015
GET TO KNOW THE MUSIC, MUSICIANS,
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