View Full Version : Clapton for mando
Hello everyone.
This might be a bit selfish, but my favorate rock guitarist has always been Clapton The way he just *feels* it cannot be put into words.
Is it possible to arrange some of his his electric, high-pitched stuff for mandolin, or is simply too "strat" to be acoustic? Is everybody going to just going to tell me to buy an electric guitar?
His acoustic guitar stuff is also something I'm wondering about.
JimRichter
Sep-09-2007, 9:19pm
Being an electric guitarist, I've had a lot of fun arranging rock guitar stuff for mandolin. You can check out my YouTube channel to see a version of Voodoo Child.
One of Clapton's tunes that I play out is "Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad?" I also do Can't Find My Way Home and have occasionally done Badge.
Clapton's style--which is Freddie and BB King based--is excellent for mandolin. Again check out some of my blues mandolin videos on YouTube and you'll hear his licks sneak in there.
Jim
Hey, Jim. I've seen some of your Hendrix work on youtube. Real funky is all I can say. What about more famous Clapton stuff like Layla or Cocaine or (Marley, but Clapton interpretation) I Shot the Sheriff?
djidaho
Sep-09-2007, 9:32pm
Just do it! I have a lot of fun adapting any song/melody to the mando (plugged in or not)
mandocrucian
Sep-10-2007, 1:48am
It can be done, but to make it sound convincing will probably involve a lot more work than you expect. It's not just the pitches involved; you've got to find the right place on the neck to do them - like working doublestop positions rather than a "single line" approach, add the slurrings and some string bending, develop a nice singing vibrato, etc. etc. What you are after is that it sounds like EC picking up the mandolin and doing his thing on it.
Most people that would tell you to "just buy an electric guitar" say that because they are unimaginative morons who think that guitar stuff must be played on a guitar, and fiddle stuff must be played on a fiddle, etc. etc.
I, on the other hand, have come around to offering similar advice (get an electric guitar), not because you can't do it, but because your efforts will probably be unappreciated, dismissed, and disparaged by those same idiots who will "reward" you in that manner for rejecting the 'normal' "instrument caste system" by marking you as an "outcast." #
It'll take at least twice (make it thrice) as much work to pull off something convincingly on mando that was done on an electric guitar, and all it will do is tend to piss other players off. #The guitarists will resent you for trespassing on their turf, and mando players will file you under irrelevant ("he's 'way out' there") as far as mando playing goes.
If you're into elctric guitar type stuff, as far as the type of music you want to play, you'll make life a lot simpler for yourself all the way around, and save yourself a lot of grief, by strapping on a strat, SG or Les Paul.
But if you're hard-headed you're gonna try doing it on mando anyway. But if you do, you really need to become a decent singer so you won't be at the mercy of anyone in regards to the material you want to play. If you can pull off a solo, then you can probably find a bassist and drummer to back you.
I do "Crossroads", "Sunshine Of Your Love", "Born Under A Bad Sign" and some other Clapton stuff. Don't neglect his playing with John Mayall either. (I think Peter Green - original Fleetwood Mac - was just as good as EC back then, and like his stuff better.)
I also do Hendrix stuff ("Little Wing", "Purple Haze", "Wind Cries Mary", "Fire",...........), Santana, SRV, Angus Young, RT, John Cippolina (Quicksilver Messenger Service - getting his Bigsby whammy bar vibrato on 8-strings with just the fingers was such a bear). The usual initial reaction from mando players is "I've never heard anyone play an mandolin like that." but it never seems to translate to album sales, or even commentary on forums (with a few notable exceptions like Rene ("Bluesmandolinman")
(8 or 9 years ago, I was gonna throw the mando overboard and work on putting all that electric guitar stuff I'd learned on mando, onto electric guitar and actually make some bread playing. And would have had I not started developing a painful left hand RSI, forcing me to put the guitar back into the case.)
Niles H
<span style='font-size:8pt;line-height:100%'>BTW: The Electric Mandolin instruction method I did with (the) Richard Thompson back in '83 was not a very popular item in terms of sales. Never even sold out the print run - the remainder was ruined by water damage while in storage. Out-of-print now forever. (but not "public domain")</span>
JimRichter
Sep-10-2007, 6:06am
I agree with Niles on finding the right position to play out of. I am very much into closed positions. I can control the attack of the string better, work in finger vibrato, give some "slap" to the string (like on an electric guitar), and control the amount of sustain. You'll notice that I play third position a lot and that is part of the reason.
Music is music. What can be played on electric guitar can be played on mandolin, tuba, or kazoo.
Jim
"like working doublestop positions rather than a "single line" approach"
Do you mean like holding down a g and a (in g), for example and playing other notes in relation to this pair, using the double stop as the home base?
mandocrucian
Sep-10-2007, 8:07am
[quote]Do you mean like holding down a g and a (in g), for example and playing other notes in relation to this pair, using the double stop as the home base?[quote]
Possibly... or instead of playing a single line of notes staying in one position...
<span style='font-family:courier'>Single line (fiddle tune approach)
====================|===================|====
===5=2=5=5==3=0=3=3=|==2===2=2==0===0=0=|====
====================|====5========4=====|=5==
====================|===================|====
same notes, working the neck with moving doublestops (ala electric guitar) and, if you wish, allowing the notes to ring over each other for an ultra-smooth pedal-steel sound
===================|===================|=======
==5===5=5~~3===3=3~|~2===2=2^=0========|=======
====9========7=====|===5===========7=7~|~5======
===================|============11=====|========
.#i r i i~~i r i i~~~i r i i # # r i i~~~i
~ slide, #^ hammer-on or pull-off
i = index (1)
m = middle (2)
r = ring (3)
========================0===========
==2===2=7=5=======2===2===5=========
====5===============5===============
==================================== (boring!)
==========================
===2=====7^5==============
=====5~9==================
========================== (much better!)
.# i r~r m i</span>
NH
Keith Miller
Sep-18-2007, 4:15pm
I have played a lot of Clapton stuff on mando, works fine for me http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif
Not being a believer of putting music styles into boxes with "right or wrong" instruments I will try anything, T rex Life's a Gas works as does Satriani stuff
pick up that mando and play !
Keith
Niles,
I, for one, would really like to see some instructiional material from you on blues/blues-based rock stuff. Ever consider doing it? Or did the experience with the electric method convince you that there's not sufficient interest to make the enterprise worthwhile?
mandocrucian
Oct-13-2007, 1:46pm
The last couple times blues mando instruction (including the vocab derived from electric players), has been offered in a camp, they were cancelled for lack of interest. It seems what people really mean (want) is "bluesy bluegrass mandolin".
Or if it is printed material, something that comes from some established BG/NG player would probably be more "acceptable".
But I will teach this stuff privately (until I hang up the teaching), but for all practical purposes, I think the route I've gone in my mando playing will prove to be an evolutionary dead end
NH.
It can be done, but to make it sound convincing will probably involve a lot more work than you expect.
Good stuff here. Really good.
I am NOT saying that music should stay in its original boxes, but if you are going to emulate another instrument, you need to concentrate on doing something unique and wonderful with the material, that can only be done on the mandolin. Other wise you are just a pale comparison of what someone has already done, and the mandolin, electric or otherwise, becomes a sort of almost guitar.
Nothing wrong with pale comparisons, if they are for fun or a parady. But to make them music takes more work.
Just my take.
mandocrucian
Oct-14-2007, 7:33am
I am NOT saying that music should stay in its original boxes, but if you are going to emulate another instrument, you need to concentrate on doing something unique and wonderful with the material, that can only be done on the mandolin. Other wise you are just a pale comparison of what someone has already done, and the mandolin, electric or otherwise, becomes a sort of almost guitar.
Nothing wrong with pale comparisons, if they are for fun or a parady. But to make them music takes more work.
Can we agree that a "violin" and a "fiddle" are the same instrument? Good. To simplify the refuting of Jeff's theory, I will stay on the same instrument, and something most folks can relate to as having encountered it personally. We got the paper trained classical violin player who, for whatever reasons, decides to go to "play" other types of "fiddle" music. #It could be Irish, it could be old-time or bluegrass. Maybe it's jazz. While this person has technical chops (probably surpassing the best player at the jam), it almost always comes off as a pale comparison to real OT, BG, Irish, jazz fiddling. #But the violin and the fiddle are the same instrument! #Why? #Because the classical player has a different vocabulary and aesthetic in terms of technique and "desirable sound". The techniques, pitch intonation and tone qualities highly prized by, say an OT player, are, in the classical realm, "mistakes", "poor technique" etc.
So you have a violinist who has spent 20 years developing the skills to play "tennis" while the OT player has spent the 20 years developing the techniques to play "soccer". Who in their right mind(s) is going to think that overnight someone is going to be able to do the other without having to backtrack and put in a lot of remedial time to play that other genre?
You want to know why mandos emulating other instruments (or other genres) sound like a pale comparison? #Same reason an OT player doing classical sounds like a "parody" and vice versa - classical player doing OT. Or a clssical player attempting to improvise jazz.
It's not just the different instrument. Your average every-note-with-the-pick, chop-heavy-rhythm mando player is severly lacking in the techniques (and vocabulary) that are part of the other style (rock, or blues, or R&B etc). While mandoguy spent hours and hours playing "Salt Creek" at 150mph, the guitar guy was spending his hours and hours getting that singing vibrato, or bending strings, or refining the rhythm riff moves. Of course it is going to sound corny when mandoguy plays everything with separate pickstrokes, ultra clean attack and even fiddle-contest tone, when it requires vibrato, bending, slurring, gritty attack and variations in volume to make it sound "right"
It all goes back to the BB King syndrome. #Mandoguy says BB's playing is "simplistic" cause there aren't a ton of notes. #Fine, then how come mandoguy doesn't sound like BB when he tries it? #If it's so simple, then he should be able to nail that sound within the first 10 tries. #I bet if you handed BB a mandolin and said play something, in spite of all the clunkers he would hit because of the different tuning, it would still sound like BB.
"doing something unique and wonderful with the material, that can only be done on the mandolin" - What does that imply/mean? #Playing stuff with lots of tremolo? #Playing it devoid of vibrato? No bending or heavy slurring? No palm muting? Sticking with the stuff that still sounds good without having to put in time developing any of the above?
And then there is the consideration of whether one will be rewarded (and to what degree) for putting in the training time on these new (maybe) to the instrument techniques and whole different set of vocabulary, or just ignored, or worse yet, ridiculed (Heresy! heresy!...burn the witch!).
But as Corncob Hiram sez...."Cos that's the we we always dun it!"
NH
JimRichter
Oct-14-2007, 9:23pm
I second what Niles said.
Jim