View Full Version : Fingerpicking advice
I am trying to fingerpick my way through "House of the Rising Sun". I can play the melody line by itself, and the rhythm line by itself, but when I try to put them together, it just doesn't work. Specifically, there are a number of spots where the background pattern will want a note that the melody line has as a sustained note. I have tried getting the note going on two strings and it doesn't sound right, and I have tried sounding it on only one string, and it doesn't sound right.
There are also spots where the same note is an eighth note on both lines, and those suffer too.
Any tips, tricks, or advice (short of "give up")?
Image of the arrangement went awry.
mandocrucian
Aug-07-2006, 11:57am
More mando fretboard friendly arpeggios which stay on the lower end of the instrument.
<span style='font-family:courier'>==============|=============|=============|======= ========|
========0=====|=======3=====|=======0=====|======= =0======|
======2===2===|=====2=5p2===|===0h4===4p0=|=3===3= ==3=====|
==2h5=======5=|=0h5=======5=|=2===========|=2h5=== ====5===|</span>
Some slurring (h=hammer-ons, p=pull-offs) can keep a more flowing sound when there are two successive notes on the same string.
Niles Hokkanen
<span style='font-size:8pt;line-height:100%'>Blues Mandolin Boot Camp (http://www.ext.vt.edu/resources/4h/holiday/mandolinbuilding.html), Oct 1-4, 2006
Mandocrucian catalog (http://http://www.users.waitrose.com/~john.baldry/mando/hokkanen.html)</span>
I can see the basic theory of your change: keep the rise and fall pattern, keep the chords, but don't worry about keeping the exact notes and intervals. The two spots where you doubled up: is there some piece of theory that justifies them, or is it just a nice little flourish that you like?
Spent my practice time going through the arpeggios, bringing them down and reworking them. I'm not quite happy with my version of an E7 yet, but I'm miles ahead of where I was this morning. Thanks.
mandocrucian
Aug-07-2006, 8:30pm
The two spots where you doubled up: is there some piece of theory that justifies them, or is it just a nice little flourish that you like?
C chord --- It just sounds better if it rises to the C note, rather than top out on G. #But it sidestep having a wide interval jump (e to c to e).
F chord. #Having it start on a low root (F) would be preferable, but you still want to start low. But my ear doesn't like the third (A) alone, so I add the F note above it so anchor it down more to the F chord sound right from the start.
Flow is what it's about, rather than a replication of a particular guitar part.
NH