|
Please note this is an archived topic, so it is locked and unable to be replied to. You may, however, start a new topic and refer to this topic with a link.
Page: 1 2
Rene - Posted - 01/30/2010: 16:26:12
I've been at several jams lately fiddling my little tunes and someone will stop me during a song and ask me what chord that is. I know what key I'm playing in but the question is always (as I'm partway through a song) what chord is that you are playing, I'm not playing a particular chord, I'm playing the melody. Any help here, I think I'm missing something.
bj - Posted - 01/30/2010: 17:00:25
You're not missing something. They are. 
Just tell them that fiddles don't play chords since you can only play two strings at a time (well, I've seen more played, but not very many can pull it off!) You can tell them what key you're playing in. If they know what key they're supposed to be playing in, it's easier to figure out which chords to play.
I can play guitar, so can call chords (though my fiddling usually goes all to hades when I do, since I have trouble doing anything else when I'm fiddling!)
Rene - Posted - 01/31/2010: 05:10:50
That's what I keep telling them. I thought I was mixed up (which I usually am)
UsuallyPickin - Posted - 01/31/2010: 05:23:38
Some fiddlers and other stringed instrument players play out of chord positions. Some play out of scale patterns. It depends on how you were taught or how you learned. Classic violin education is scale / note / mode approached. Folk or self taught is more cordally approached. Improvisation is approached from both directions. I am able to play with songs that are new to me more effectively if I can use both the chord and scale structures within the melody. THink of the chords as the bases on a baseball field and the notes as the steps in between the bases. Simplistic I know, but a sound simile. R/
DougD - Posted - 01/31/2010: 05:36:40
Rene, they are asking you what chord they should play, although as the poster above said, there are chord positions on the fiddle (that's how I often play). Most fiddlers have a good idea of what chords they'd like to hear and where.
Alternatively, just tell 'em to figure 'em out themselves, and then get on 'em when they don't suit you. That's been a source of innocent amusement for fiddlers for generations!
mudbug - Posted - 01/31/2010: 06:40:02
Hey, Rene! The chords that go along with a melody are sometimes open to interpretation. Sure, that IS the guitar player's job to play chords behind you, but if you leave it up to THEIR interpretation, you might not like the result. Also, some guitarists don't do well at attempting the chords to a tune that they've never heard before. I'll usually figure out the chords on guitar to a tune that I'm working on. That way, when I get together with a guitar player, no matter their ability, they'll be able to follow and play the chords that I want to hear. If you don't play guitar, you could always buy a cheap ukelele and learn chord voicings, or just take your chances with whatever guitarist ( and chord interpretation) you get.
jehanna - Posted - 01/31/2010: 07:48:11
Rene I am a bass player. I can pick chords out of the air for anything even if I have never heard it before. I sit in with groups, live, amplified, who regularly throw the set list out the window and play obscure request. When I go to fiddle, however, the chords are forgotten. My fiddle does not know them. I would have to put the bow down to call chords. I am of the opinion if the novice fiddler can keep up with the tune then someone else needs to be responsible for chord changes. Good grief, ask them if they want to take the squeaky thing and try to get music out of it.
Rene - Posted - 01/31/2010: 08:02:08
quote:
Originally posted by jehanna
. Good grief, ask them if they want to take the squeaky thing and try to get music out of it.
Love it.
hanknc - Posted - 01/31/2010: 08:27:01
Anytime you get asked "what chord?" just say E7; pretty soon they'll stop asking.
carlb - Posted - 01/31/2010: 08:41:54
quote:
Originally posted by DougD
Rene, they are asking you what chord they should play, although as the poster above said, there are chord positions on the fiddle (that's how I often play). Most fiddlers have a good idea of what chords they'd like to hear and where.
Sometimes however, I've had guitar players come up with a chord, somewhere in the tune, other then the one was thinking of and the result was marvelous. Guitar players can think, and find chords, for themselves. If it's a performance situation then you might feel more strongly about your choice of chords. Other then that, a jam is for all musicians to find what they can contribute to the session. If you really object to the selection of chords from a particular guitar player, you can talk about to them afterwards for the next time.
wormbower - Posted - 01/31/2010: 09:04:08
Aside from any jam etiquette issues, it seems to me that it would be a useful exercise for a fiddler to think about what chord would be appropriate for a particular measure or note in a tune (not that I can do it). The first thing would be to identify the note, and then think about what common chords (most likely those common to the key) fit with that note (right?). Not only would that skill help other jammers, but it would help us all figure out what alternative notes and phrases we can use in improvisations.
Paul
hendrid - Posted - 01/31/2010: 09:07:25
Kirk over on guitarforbeginners.com/ talks about partial chords which are two of the three chord notes or what we call double stops and sometimes maybe drones to us fiddlers. Kirks plays his guitar songs with lots of double notes up and down his guitar fretted neck.
I tend to be a single note at a time melody player mostly, but the big thing these days seems to be to accompany your melody with a second string. Puts a little more meat in your music I guess. Chord tones are useful for accompanying your melody and for playing behind a lead fiddle player down a string or two lower in pitch so as to not overpower the lead fiddle player with your loud fiddle.
A chord strictly speaking is defined as 3 or more simultaneous notes. The or "more notes" are another subject for now. The basic chord notes are the root, third and fifth, 1, 3 and 5 or in the key of G for instance the notes G, B, D; and in the key of A, A, C and E.
I play Cripple Creek in the key of A and was wondering yesterday where the two beats of the G note in my last B part phrase came from chord wise as related to the key of A chords which are the A, D and E chords, 1, 4 and 5 chords. Guess on reflection that G is a 7th note of the A key and that is sometimes a note in the A chord, 1,3 5,7 chord notes or any two of these in partial chords and in any order works, whatever sounds good to you, i.e. A, G notes or G, A notes or A, E or E, A notes and on and on.
Well enough rambling. Don
Rene - Posted - 01/31/2010: 09:09:15
I'm too busy worrying and fretting (or not fretting :) ) about my playing to be worried about their chords. I thought it all tied in somehow to what note I was playing.
If I'm playing the melody line and a G chord is called for, does that mean the notes in my melody line are only the notes found in the G chord (i.e. G B or D)? I don't think so, but then I'm just flailing away most ofthe time by ear and am clueless on that.
Which brings me to another subject along the same lines (can you tell I've been snowed in for a few days), when I want to add an run or a few extra fill notes, do I use only notes that are in that chord being played at the time? I've really struggled with this fill note stuff, everyone's pat answer is just find something that sound good.
coelhoe - Posted - 01/31/2010: 09:44:50
Hey, Don (and others): " Hendrid " (above) wrote: "The basic chord notes are the root, third and fifth, 1, 3 and 5 or in the key of G for instance the notes G, B, D; and in the key of A, A, C and E."
You can't really abandon the notes that are in the scale of the chord. An A major chord contains 1st, 3rd and 5th of the major scale, for example, the A major scale contains the notes A B C# D E F# G# A. If you leave out those sharps, then you are playing A minor, relative to the key of C. A flatted 7th ( G natural instead of G#) puts you in modal territory, which may not fit he melody of the tune at hand.
In "Cripple Creek" that two beat note is a G# (If you are in the key of A that is. However, many banjo guys, including Earl Scruggs himself, play the tune in the key of G, in which case it is an F#). The G# in A is part of the V chord (chords are usually signified by Roman numerals, scale elements by Arabic numerals).
The V chord in the key of G is D major: D F # A. The V chord in the key of A is E major E G# B. If you write out the notes that in the I. IV and V chords in any key you will see that those three chords contain all the notes of the scale.
It wouldn't hurt for fiddlers to take a look at The Fiddlers' Companion, or The Fiddlers' Fakebook to get a sense of the harmony pattern for the tunes they play.
Most old dance fiddlers could double on guitar or piano, and they mostly talked about harmony in the same way, but the vocabulary varied quite a bit around the country, which is one reason why studio players started using this number system. No matter what instrument I am teaching, I take one lesson after about a month and just teach the harmony system, which is known in the music business as the Nashville number system though it used pretty much every where.
hendrid - Posted - 01/31/2010: 09:45:37
Kirk above mentioned those pesky passing notes or tones. Those are the not chord notes which we use all the time. Then comes the dreaded by us beginners SCALE word. Key of A, the notes are ABC#DEF#G#, in G GABCDEF# scales, and where do your fingers go on the fingerboard for the different keys or ther fingering patterns with sharp notes. People also talk about Pentatonic notes or the fifth notes which skip some of the scale notes. Another subject.
The thing about chord notes is, to me, they are the anchor notes or notes that you mostly start or end a music phrase or series of notes on. If you are sitting or standing there trying to finger and bow out a melody by ear, you generally want to end your song on your selected key note,
Where on the fingerboard do you bow and finger the notes so that you end on the key note or where or which note it sounds right to start or end a particular phrase or string of notes of your melody or song.
Take a look at your sheet music or tabs or fingerings or in your mind on songs you have memorized and see what note you are playing to start and end each phrase or bar. Could be they are mostly chord notes or tones.
Edited by - hendrid on 02/01/2010 06:25:10
hendrid - Posted - 01/31/2010: 09:50:33
Dennis I was putting together my last while you posted your reply. Guess we passed in the night. Don
BanjoBrad - Posted - 01/31/2010: 12:15:33
Then, you can always refer them to my Tucson Old Time Music Circle page where they can download a pdf file of chord charts for many common Old Time tunes. Not gonna guarantee that all the chords are right, but it helps me when we don't have guitar player show up and I have to pretend I can play guitar.
-Brad
Rene - Posted - 01/31/2010: 16:00:16
I guess I'll tell them "just play whatever sounds good"
I have been playing some backup with my mando so I get the feel of chords and when to change etc.
Peghead - Posted - 02/01/2010: 10:29:42
Be careful, working backwards from the melody note to the chord and assuming it is a member of the chord (playing "in") is generally reliable but is not necessarily or always true. In fact some of the coolest sounding and most striking original arrangements happen when the chord has less than a direct relationship to the note that it lands on. I think of the Buddy Thomas version of Kitty Puss where the guitar plays an E major chord over the G melody note. It just dosn't get any better than that! (IMO) As a guitar player, I try to take in the whole tune a few times around and listen for the overall motion and tonal shifts before I take my stand. Sometimes a simple base note will suffice for the 5 chord if it's moving quickly. Chords can be overrated too, they have the definite effect of putting the tune in a tonal box. Sometimes banjo and fiddle get great effects from overtones when "out of the chord " open strings on the banjo continue to ring out over the fiddle melody. It's a special fragile thing and unfortunitely guitar chords (or any chords) will wash it all out. Most of the Trad. tunes have their chords worked out with some regional variations. Regarding chords, and modal tunes - sometimes nothing is the right thing to do depending on the tune. (All IMO)
Edited by - Peghead on 02/01/2010 11:34:48
wooliver - Posted - 02/01/2010: 11:45:56
It's easy to set a guitar picker right, if it's a standard two or three chord tune.
But you have to know a little something yourself. Google "nashville notation" or "nashville numbering."
90% of tunes are of the I, IV, V variety or some variation. Doesn't matter the key.
But you should know your key. i.e. If you're in G, the first change is either a C, or D.
So it's better than a 50/50 guess if you've got an ear.
This is just "working knowledge." You have to be able to comunicate a little bit to the others players so y'all can play together. Otherwise it is just thrashing. Know your key. Hopefully your picker knows his 1,4,5. But if he doesn't, y'all aren't stuck, if you know.
abinigia - Posted - 02/02/2010: 17:51:34
Hi. If you had learned a chord instrument before going to fiddle calling chords would come much easier to you. Some people are better at it than others anyway. But I think it's worth training your ear to hear the changes. It will improve your playing to know what the changes are. Once you learn the basic changes you will start hearing them in every tune, and you'll find you can learn new tunes better because of it.
Instead of learning the chord names in every key I suggest you just learn to hear the changes, then it doesn't matter what key you're in. You can figure the chord names from the numbers later.
Your home or tonic is I, and the common chords around that are IV, V II, relative minor (VI), and sub-tonic (flat VII counting up, but usually means one whole step down).
It's not that complicated once your ear gets used to the intervals. Also, any chord figured above the tonic will be a number equal to 9 going the other way, i.e. a 4th above is a 5th below, a 3rd above is a 6th below, A third below is a sixth above. etc.
bsed - Posted - 02/03/2010: 17:36:11
Absolutely! I was going to make that point if someone else hadn't. I really wish I'd learned guitar first.
But over the years I've learned a smattering of guitar, but more importantly I've learned how to listen for chord changes and I know when they happen. If you fiddle in a band you can't chuck rhythm without being able to hear that. The best way to learn how to do that, IMO, is just to play with people, but don't always play melody. I learned how to do it largely by playing with a few old country musicians who lived nearby.
bj - Posted - 02/03/2010: 20:14:07
quote:
It's easy to set a guitar picker right, if it's a standard two or three chord tune.
LOL! You've never played with the guitarists I've played with!!!!
Noel - Posted - 02/04/2010: 01:13:07
Another problem that no one has touched on (though not really relevant to the OP), is that the guitar is a relative latecomer to fiddle music, and in truth, a lot of the time when a guitar is accompanying older tunes, the accompaniment is a compromise at best. This is really obvious when dealing with modal tunes and the whole "issue" of whether they are minor or major, and how some fiddlers will have a conniption if you do it one way or the other (most often I have found people who are "pro" major chords get more upset).
The banjo does better, with its ability to utilize a more rhythmic approach to the melody while not being specifically "chordal". But with some of the really old tunes, that emphasize "wolf" or "wooden" tones (tones that are not included in the classical scales), the banjo is also at a complete loss (well maybe not completely, but you would need one hell of a banjo player to keep up).
The only instrument that can truly keep pace with the fiddle is the bass, but it is a true newcomer to this music, and most of the time comes off sounding very modern (which can be cool as well).
As a fiddle, banjo, and guitar player (getting back to the OPs question), I think it is useful to know the chords when we are playing fiddle to enable others to be able to play along more easily. I have absolutely no one to play with in Taiwan that knows this music, so when I play with people, I need to teach them what chords to play (and for the average rock/folk player, for some reason Old-time fiddle can be incredibly difficult to follow!!). Most of the time, just knowing the I and the V chords (in our case double stops) is enough to let the guitarist figure it out. It also expands your music knowledge in general, which is always a good thing.
wooliver - Posted - 02/04/2010: 05:59:32
im sure not bj, but what are you talking about? Are they hard to communicate with. or do you play four and five chord tunes? i can make any tune a 3 chord tune, save the 2 chord tunes. The rest of them chords is just for pretty. 
coelhoe - Posted - 02/04/2010: 07:31:20
Noel: Can you give us an example of a fiddle tune (s) that contains notes which can not be harmonized by chords on a standard tuned guitar? Just curious.
bj - Posted - 02/04/2010: 08:47:04
quote:
im sure not bj, but what are you talking about?
I'm talking about the guitars getting it wrong, me calling out the right chords and them finally getting it right for a couple times through as I'm calling them . . . only to have them fall back to whatever discordantly wrong way they were doing it on the very next round when I stop calling ( which I need to do so I can really get into my fiddling!) To compound the error, none of 'em are playing the same wrong chords as any of the other guitarists, and we usually have two or three guitars show up. We're talking chordal mush here. I've been trying to just completely ignore what they're doing but that's not exactly what jams are for, and I can't tune out completely since I do want to hear the other fiddlers and our stellar banjo and mando and bass. And yes, these are standard two or three chord tunes. One or two of them are even ONE chord tunes . . . and they still screw 'em up.
Edited by - bj on 02/04/2010 08:48:23
wooliver - Posted - 02/04/2010: 09:11:44
quote:
I'm talking about the guitars getting it wrong, me calling out the right chords and them finally getting it right for a couple times through as I'm calling them . . . only to have them fall back to whatever discordantly wrong way they were doing it on the very next round when I stop calling ( which I need to do so I can really get into my fiddling!) To compound the error, none of 'em are playing the same wrong chords as any of the other guitarists, and we usually have two or three guitars show up. We're talking chordal mush here. I've been trying to just completely ignore what they're doing but that's not exactly what jams are for, and I can't tune out completely since I do want to hear the other fiddlers and our stellar banjo and mando and bass.
And yes, these are standard two or three chord tunes. One or two of them are even ONE chord tunes . . . and they still screw 'em up.
ROFLMAO  Coffee up the nose burns. Herding cats, comes to mind. Be strong.
DougD - Posted - 02/04/2010: 09:50:04
Its not so much the number of chords, but where they change that's important.
Noel, I would think that a fretless banjo can go almost anywhere a fiddle can. I think the major advantage of a banjo over a guitar, other than its more melodic orientation, is that if you tune that second string up to C (in G tuning) you eliminate the problem of the major vs. minor third for some tunes.
I've also found that some players are much easier to follow than others. Several times I've been asked to accompany very good players in styles I'm not too familiar with. My response was "But I don't know your tunes" and theirs was "Sure you do." And sure enough I did, at least part of the time. I guess it was body language or emphasis of the changes in the tune that made it easy. Of course the fiddler (or in one case a great accordion player) had to know where they wanted the changes to begin with. Many traditional players used to indicate the change from A to B part with a little lift of the peghead, and the same sort of thing with chord changes.
I think Woody Guthrie said you could get through a whole night's dance with just a D chord. Maybe so if you know what you're doing!
bj - Posted - 02/04/2010: 15:06:28
quote:
Its not so much the number of chords, but where they change that's important.
That's what drives me nuts. The guys I'm talking about know where the changes go, they just don't know which chord to change to. Which drives me nuts. I do think that "lift the pegbox" thing might be good for brand new tunes. I don't think it'll help for Old Joe Clark though.
DougD - Posted - 02/04/2010: 16:07:34
Well, I'm not sure I could play the right chords to "Old Joe Clark" either.
You can also try the method of sitting straight up for the tonic, leaning your head one way for the V chord and the other way for the IV. I don't know what you do for the flatVII though. Maybe bow your head in prayer?
bj - Posted - 02/04/2010: 16:49:18
ROFL! The issue with all this is that when I call the chords I can barely fiddle (badly!) Add in me trying to remember the magic code and it's for sure gonna make me sound a lot worse than the errant guitarists!
I can remember my first jam. We lift our foot here to signal the last go round on the tune. The minute I did that, I couldn't hit the right note to save my soul!
Leon Grizzard - Posted - 02/04/2010: 18:30:44
With American Old Time, I think the problem is not so much with I, IV and V, it's with the minor chords, especially if they are of short duration.
For the question of examples of where guitar doesn't quite fill the bill, I think it is not so much the instrument, as the ambiguity of the best chord. In Irish music, for example, a tune in A Minor (aeolian) could have a measure where the prominent melody notes are E, G and D. Is it better to play Em, which has the E and G, or G, which has the G and D? Or Em7, which has all three? Sometimes none of those chords may sound quite right.
masameet - Posted - 02/05/2010: 00:39:57
Honestly I think every jam session should include at least one musician using his or her hand and fingers to count out the chords (I, IV & V) at all the chord changes. Really makes it easier for folks who don't know what they are doing because they can't follow the song and hear its progression.
wooliver - Posted - 02/05/2010: 06:05:22
Well, it does help to have one picker with a clue, the rest can watch his hands. That's usually done. im no picker. i do it out of nessesity, when required. I don't go nuts with passing chords. If i don't know the tune, i may chop or chunk on the root chord all the way through the first time. The percusive sound gives them mostly what they need. A beat. The next time through i may pick up that last change. In most of those fiddle tunes in D, there's a quick little change to an A and back to D.
Not forsaking the beat. Just like the rules say. I hate say it, but from what i've found, fiddle players make the best back up guitar players.
Edited by - wooliver on 02/05/2010 06:06:25
BanjoBrad - Posted - 02/05/2010: 11:40:22
quote:
Originally posted by masameet
Honestly I think every jam session should include at least one musician using his or her hand and fingers to count out the chords (I, IV & V) at all the chord changes. Really makes it easier for folks who don't know what they are doing because they can't follow the song and hear its progression.
Except, for me, that means one more translation I have to attempt to do quickly: "Ummm, IV is, um, let's see, we're in D so that means I need to change to a (D, E, F#, G), ok, G. Oops, too late, where are we now?" [added afterthought] Even then, I'm apt to change to the wrong chord - my fingers don't always get it right. That's why I have a book of chord charts. I learned to play guitar first, but never got the Nashville Numbering system down, I played from notation (classical) or by learning the chord sequence by names in the folk songs we did. -Brad
Edited by - BanjoBrad on 02/05/2010 11:42:03
wooliver - Posted - 02/05/2010: 11:52:02
Brad,
To find my 4th & 5th, i use my hand.
Say, your key is D.
D is your thumb.
E is index(1st).
F is middle(2nd).
G is ring (3rd).
A is pinky (4th).
im too stupid to consider flats and sharps.
coelhoe - Posted - 02/05/2010: 15:15:06
Maybe this is a regional thing. I mean, who would come to a fiddle jam session with his or her guitar if they couldn't play back up? I've seen lots of banjo players do this in hopes that they could fake it in keys of G and C, or maybe just G, but guitarists,....well, they just gotta know.
Those Tucson materials that Brad posted are just great, but if you are going to carry a guitar around fiddlers, you just gotta learn the chords, or pick 'em up real fast. Fiddlers mostly play in four keys: A, D, G, C. So that means you have only got to remember four IV chords, four V chords (which, after all, are only a whole step up from the IV chords), and four VIm ( the IIm would be useful also ).
C'mon, Brad, you can do this.
BanjoBrad - Posted - 02/05/2010: 17:38:15
coelhoe -
I've played guitar (classical and finger-style folk) since the late 1950's. I came to stringed instruments from piano, with a good grounding in notation. Self-taught on all stringed instruments. I started banjo in 2000 and fiddle in 2003.
I know the chords, but at 66 and counting, I just figure I don't need to put the time into memorizing I, IV and V as another method of sequencing. If the tune is in G, I know I need G, C, D(7) - A is A, D, E(7). Do I really need to try to remember what one number stands for in chords for 4 or more keys?
And, I bring the guitar because usually we have 5+ banjos (my first choice), 3+ fiddles, and nobody else brings a guitar. I wind up being the default guitarist because I'm no where good enough to bring my fiddle out for more than a tune or 2 that I can, perhaps, make my way through, and one more banjo just becomes a noise maker, not a musical instrument.
-Brad
coelhoe - Posted - 02/05/2010: 20:03:37
Brad (Fred) I sent you private note on this. My remarks were meant to be light hearted, and hope taken that way.
Noel - Posted - 02/06/2010: 02:15:16
Doug, of course you are right about the fretless banjo, it just didn't enter my mind at the time.
As for examples of tunes with wooden notes, there are tons of them if you listen to older fiddlers, especially from Kentucky or West Virginia. I was just working ona tune tune today called Rattletrap, from Joe Birchfield of the Roan Mountain Hilltoppers, which has a most definite c natural that is about a half of a semi-tone sharped. If you play it as a C naturalk or a C# , it is wrong for the tune. It is hard to explain why exactly, but it has a lot to do with thew overall blues-like tonality of the tune.
If you look at a lot of the older Kentucky tunes, say most of Bruce Greene plays, you find a whole pile of them that don't really take well to accompaniment. I guess this was more my point. Does the accompaniment add to or subtract from the music? Something to think on. More is not always better.
hanknc - Posted - 02/06/2010: 06:50:10
quote:
Originally posted by BanjoBrad
I know the chords, but at 66 and counting, I just figure I don't need to put the time into memorizing I, IV and V as another method of sequencing. If the tune is in G, I know I need G, C, D(7) - A is A, D, E(7). Do I really need to try to remember what one number stands for in chords for 4 or more keys?
-Brad
The whole point of the I, IV, V directions is that it makes it simpler. It's the minimum theory needed to communicate chords.
P. T. Porter - Posted - 02/06/2010: 07:18:12
The numbers make it easier if there are two or more guitar players and say one of them is playing out of an open position and another is capoed. Which is better sounding to layer the sound.
This whole discussion brings to mind: although the players at the big picking contest at Winfield play with an accompanist, the judges hear only the contestants playing, none of the rhythm accompaniment. And the judges will mark down a player if the player can't frame, so to speak, the chord changes in the tune they are picking.
I came to the fiddle from guitar, and the more I play the fiddle the better I can hear the changes. But that being said, sometime the players I've backed up are not playing the changes themselves - the tunes are very ambiguous and difficult to follow unless you play a standard progression for tune being played.
My $0.02 while watching 2 feet and counting of snow. Perfect day for fiddling!
PT
P. T. Porter - Posted - 02/06/2010: 07:25:36
The numbers make it easier if there are two or more guitar players and say one of them is playing out of an open position and another is capoed. Which is better sounding to layer the sound.
This whole discussion brings to mind: although the players at the big picking contest at Winfield play with an accompanist, the judges hear only the contestants playing, none of the rhythm accompaniment. And the judges will mark down a player if the player can't frame, so to speak, the chord changes in the tune they are picking.
I came to the fiddle from guitar, and the more I play the fiddle the better I can hear the changes. But that being said, sometime the players I've backed up are not playing the changes themselves - the tunes are very ambiguous and difficult to follow unless you play a standard progression for tune being played.
My $0.02 while watching 2 feet and counting of snow. Perfect day for fiddling!
PT
tonyelder - Posted - 02/06/2010: 08:28:15
quote:
Originally posted by P. T. Porter
The numbers make it easier if there are two or more guitar players and say one of them is playing out of an open position and another is capoed. Which is better sounding to layer the sound.
This whole discussion brings to mind: although the players at the big picking contest at Winfield play with an accompanist, the judges hear only the contestants playing, none of the rhythm accompaniment. And the judges will mark down a player if the player can't frame, so to speak, the chord changes in the tune they are picking.
I came to the fiddle from guitar, and the more I play the fiddle the better I can hear the changes. But that being said, sometime the players I've backed up are not playing the changes themselves - the tunes are very ambiguous and difficult to follow unless you play a standard progression for tune being played.
My $0.02 while watching 2 feet and counting of snow. Perfect day for fiddling!
PT
Amen to this! The problem is not always the guitarist's (or other back up instrument) fault. The biggest problem is usually just not being familiar with a tune and trying to pick it up on the fly. If the melody instrument can't phrase things to give a hint to what is happening with the tune, don't expect the back up to be there with you. Especially if the tunes are being played with too much "heterophony" texture and not in unison. Who / what are you going to follow? Too much heterophony from the melodic instruments and it can sometimes sound like (as someone said) chordal mush. But even in unison - the progression can be a bit obscure and hard to follow at times if you aren't familiar with the tunes. This was true for me at times when I attempted to play back up for an Irish group. I consdier myself to be somewhat accomplished as a guitarist (relatively speaking) and I gave it my best shot for a while. But I never had much confidence in what I was doing. Maybe dumb the problem tunes down some and play them without the embellishments enough to make sure you have folks behind you before launching into all the frills and fancys at 300 bpm. But if a tune gets played oftened enough - most everyone will figure out what they need to do eventually. ...except for the musically challenged and the overly expressive and creative artists.
bj - Posted - 02/06/2010: 12:40:22
quote:
I hate say it, but from what i've found, fiddle players make the best back up guitar players.
ROFL! You're RIGHT! quote:
The biggest problem is usually just not being familiar with a tune and trying to pick it up on the fly. If the melody instrument can't phrase things to give a hint to what is happening with the tune, don't expect the back up to be there with you. Especially if the tunes are being played with too much "heterophony" texture and not in unison.
Guitar is NOT my main instrument, and I have no problem in picking up guitar changes on the fly to tunes I've never heard. I have no problem picking up melodies on the fiddle to tunes I've never heard, heterophony or not. And it doesn't seem to matter whether there is only one fiddle there (me) or many fiddles there, some of whom are much better players than I am. In other words, if you're going to take up an instrument and expect to jam with it, this playing on the fly stuff is an ** essential skill **, and, quite frankly, not a difficult one, though yes, there is some room for creative interpretation. However, some tunes are dead simple in what can and should be played, and many of the tunes we play fall into that category. I, IV, V. What's so dang hard about that??? This is why I have such a hard time understanding when guys who have no problem playing difficult fingerstyle passages by rote can't intuit a simple three chord progression on a dead easy tune. Brad, take a peek at Kate's Avatar. Might should ya do something similar? fiddlehangout.com/myhangout/ho...p?id=1759
BanjoBrad - Posted - 02/06/2010: 13:56:00
coelhoe - Yeah, I knew. I'll get back to you soon.
PT - Maybe easier to learn the numbers if you learn them from the start. But, when I started playing, I learned chord names and they are ingrained in my mind along with the muscle memory of the chord shape. To try to learn them now is just adding another layer to the translation. I've sat in where somebody called the chord by number - by the time I've got the number associated to the key and then the chord shape, it's too late!
by - Not on MY Martin 000-15S, you won't! 
hanknc - Posted - 02/06/2010: 14:32:09
Actually, it's one less layer to the "translation". The numbers are not associated with keys. They are associated with shapes. If you are playing a "C" shape chord on the third fret and I show you four fingers you go to the "F" shape chord. No need to even care if it's Ab or not.
And on fiddle/mandolin it's even easier.
tonyelder - Posted - 02/06/2010: 19:10:33
quote:
Originally posted by bj
In other words, if you're going to take up an instrument and expect to jam with it, this playing on the fly stuff is an ** essential skill **, and, quite frankly, not a difficult one, though yes, there is some room for creative interpretation. However, some tunes are dead simple in what can and should be played, and many of the tunes we play fall into that category. I, IV, V. What's so dang hard about that??? This is why I have such a hard time understanding when guys who have no problem playing difficult fingerstyle passages by rote can't intuit a simple three chord progression on a dead easy tune.
So, you're telling me that these are dead simple tunes - straight up square I, IV, V tunes that your guitar players can't pick up on? NOT even a one chord tune? But all the other instrumentalist are spot on - no problems. That's pretty sad bj - and a little surprising too! That being the case - I can understand your frustration! That's not a real problem around here - and never been a problem anywhere else I been for that matter - except maybe the sure 'nuff beginners. I feel your pain.
Edited by - tonyelder on 02/06/2010 19:14:25
BanjoBrad - Posted - 02/06/2010: 19:28:56
hanknc -
Not to me, an F chord is an F chord. When I move it up the neck and bar it, it becomes a G chord.
Sorry, 40+ years of playing this way is too ingrained. Page: 1 2
|
Feeds
