Blues Guitar Unleashed Posts Muddy Waters Tribute Blues Guitar Lesson
Blues guitar players for generations have been inspired by the sounds of Muddy Waters. Blues Guitar Unleashed has posted a new lesson on Muddy's legendary style, tone, and tunings.
Blues Guitar Unleashed Releases Muddy Waters Tribute Blues Guitar Lesson
With the birthday of McKinley Morganfield, AKA Muddy Waters, passing on April 4th, Blues Guitar Unleashed has posted a blues guitar lesson focusing on Waters' slide style and his acoustic and electric guitar tone.
"Whether it was listening to Muddy Waters' original recordings, or hearing other artists record his music, Muddy has been a huge influence on at least 2 or 3 generations of blues guitar players" explains Griff Hamlin, the primary guitar teacher behind Blues Guitar Unleashed.
The blog post was inspired by a post from the Gibson guitars website at http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Features/muddy-waters-0404-2011/, and includes additional commentary by Griff on the blog.
From the post, original author Ted Drozdowski writes, "Early on in his career, Muddy played an acoustic archtop guitar, like a Gibson L-5, with a screw-on D'Armond "Rhythm Chief" pickup, through a small amp of about 5 watts. Similar to the 5 watt Gibson GA5 Les Paul Junior Combo. That particular setup would be almost identical to the equipment Waters first used in the Chess studios in 1946.
Less than a decade later, however, Waters was famously photographed brandishing a 1952 Gibson Les Paul Gold Top. That historic solid body model set on the rhythm pickup cuts right into the same territory thanks to the superb sound of its P-90 pickups, which were standard issue in the early and mid-1950s. With a small amp like the GA5 and some volume, the result is super-rich harmonic distortion.
Here's a tip: don't use a pick; use your fingers. If you don't finger pick and you're looking for the early Muddy sound, well, now's the time to start.
On songs like "Louisiana Blues," where Muddy played nasty, keening slide, he'd shift the D'Armond pickup up to about 25-percent of the distance between the bridge and neck, up from the bridge. On a solid body, try the middle pickup setting to get into the same zone.
Besides his dark, rolling, Delta-born finger picking single-note style, slide remained an essential and highly influential part of Muddy's bag throughout his career from his Chess years to the final trio of albums he made with Gibson Firebird legend Johnny Winter: 1977's Hard Again, '78's I'm Ready, and '81's King Bee. When it comes to slide, Winter, Eric Clapton, Billy Gibbons and Keith Richards are among Muddy's high-profile disciples, although the two players who play closest to his keening attack were men who stood next to him on stage for years: former Muddy Waters Band members Bob Margolin and Paul Oscher."
Griff says, "if you've ever thought of learning to play slide guitar, or sound at all like Muddy, you have to experiment with his open tunings so I wanted to make those available."
Blues Guitar Unleashed provides blues guitar lessons and instructional DVDs online. You can sign up for the popular "4 Note Solo" guitar lesson series and more at http://bluesguitarunleashed.com.
Griff Hamlin
Blues Guitar Unleashed
866-531-4741
http://bluesguitarunleashed.com
PR Courtesy of Online PR Media: http://bit.ly/eo2HN1
Blues Guitar Unleashed Releases Muddy Waters Tribute Blues Guitar Lesson
With the birthday of McKinley Morganfield, AKA Muddy Waters, passing on April 4th, Blues Guitar Unleashed has posted a blues guitar lesson focusing on Waters' slide style and his acoustic and electric guitar tone.
"Whether it was listening to Muddy Waters' original recordings, or hearing other artists record his music, Muddy has been a huge influence on at least 2 or 3 generations of blues guitar players" explains Griff Hamlin, the primary guitar teacher behind Blues Guitar Unleashed.
The blog post was inspired by a post from the Gibson guitars website at http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Features/muddy-waters-0404-2011/, and includes additional commentary by Griff on the blog.
From the post, original author Ted Drozdowski writes, "Early on in his career, Muddy played an acoustic archtop guitar, like a Gibson L-5, with a screw-on D'Armond "Rhythm Chief" pickup, through a small amp of about 5 watts. Similar to the 5 watt Gibson GA5 Les Paul Junior Combo. That particular setup would be almost identical to the equipment Waters first used in the Chess studios in 1946.
Less than a decade later, however, Waters was famously photographed brandishing a 1952 Gibson Les Paul Gold Top. That historic solid body model set on the rhythm pickup cuts right into the same territory thanks to the superb sound of its P-90 pickups, which were standard issue in the early and mid-1950s. With a small amp like the GA5 and some volume, the result is super-rich harmonic distortion.
Here's a tip: don't use a pick; use your fingers. If you don't finger pick and you're looking for the early Muddy sound, well, now's the time to start.
On songs like "Louisiana Blues," where Muddy played nasty, keening slide, he'd shift the D'Armond pickup up to about 25-percent of the distance between the bridge and neck, up from the bridge. On a solid body, try the middle pickup setting to get into the same zone.
Besides his dark, rolling, Delta-born finger picking single-note style, slide remained an essential and highly influential part of Muddy's bag throughout his career from his Chess years to the final trio of albums he made with Gibson Firebird legend Johnny Winter: 1977's Hard Again, '78's I'm Ready, and '81's King Bee. When it comes to slide, Winter, Eric Clapton, Billy Gibbons and Keith Richards are among Muddy's high-profile disciples, although the two players who play closest to his keening attack were men who stood next to him on stage for years: former Muddy Waters Band members Bob Margolin and Paul Oscher."
Griff says, "if you've ever thought of learning to play slide guitar, or sound at all like Muddy, you have to experiment with his open tunings so I wanted to make those available."
Blues Guitar Unleashed provides blues guitar lessons and instructional DVDs online. You can sign up for the popular "4 Note Solo" guitar lesson series and more at http://bluesguitarunleashed.com.
Griff Hamlin
Blues Guitar Unleashed
866-531-4741
http://bluesguitarunleashed.com
PR Courtesy of Online PR Media: http://bit.ly/eo2HN1
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