A primer on slide playing

[T.T. Brown]

Picked up a ceramic slide this past weekend and have had trouble doing anything satisfying with it. I don't have any background knowledge of the guitar and am also ignorant when it comes to alternate tunings. Despite this, I'd love to at least learn a couple of licks to mess around with and figure out how to use my index, middle, and ring (?) fingers while using the slide. I would be grateful if any tips on tuning were very elementary. I can tune by ear to an extent, but am still pretty reliant on my tuner. Thanks in advance. As a 26 year old beginner, I love this place.

[John Rosett]

you could start with an open D tuning. tune your G string(s)
up to A, and your E string(s) up to F#.

[arbarnhart]

E up to F#? Better put your safety glasses on! GDBD is an open G that is a little heavy on 5ths.

But for starters, you can leave the tuning alone and only use the GD pair (just rest other fingers on AE to mute). Hold the slide over the second fret and strum a few As and then slide up to 7 to play a D. E is at 9 and you can do some simple 12 bar stuff. As you are sliding, you can pick individual strings as you cross notes that are in an A scale (blues or pentatonic).

I bought a stainless steel slide from the specialty hardware section at Lowes for about $2.

If your action is low, it can be difficult. I like using it better with my kids' Rogue than with mine.

[John Rosett]

E to F# isn't any more of a stretch than G to A. you should be careful tuning up, but this isn't very extreme, and i've done it many times. you could also tune the E down to D and have DADA, which i've seen people do, although i prefer having a chord with a 5th and a 3rd.

[Guitar Jeremy]

Sam bushes uses the Open D tuning DADA (high to low) on Hold On, We're Strummin'.

This is from another post on the same subject that I saved to a Word doc. #I haven't tried it yet, but it sounds amazing.

*****

The Two Slide Solution
By Niles Hokkanen

I came up with the Two Slide Solution ten years or so ago. (Maybe it was even longer). This is a result of thinking function. The question was not "How much can I get out with the (conventional) slide)?", but rather, "What is it that I'd want to do, utilizing a slide type technique?" The first question concerned itself with mechanics, while the second is about overall sound without preconceptions of how it was to be done.

Even in an open tuning (GDGD) your doublestops are 5ths and 4ths. #You've got the 5ths in standard tuning anyway. Unless there's 3rds in the tuning, there's going to be a lot of jumping around with the slide, unlike on (open tuned) guitar where you are only 1 or 2 frets away, in either direction, from the note you want. If you want to do that sort of Bob Brozeman 30's Hawaiian/swing stuff, it doesn't matter cause lots of fast single string lines moving up and down the neck with the slide gives you that sound.

On single strings, slanting the slide of bar is standard technique, but if you do it on an 8 string mando, the slant is going to put the pair slightly out of tune, which is why Bush uses only 4 strings.

Conventional slides also keep you from using open adjacent (higher) strings while playing a note with the slide. #Because I can use the rounded tip to play notes, I don't block adjacent strings. #It's like using a steel guitar "bullet" to play on just one string. #So I can do dobro licks and such. #I can also split strings with the slide.

As far as barring, in standard tuning, it's pretty much perfect 5ths, so the slide doesn't need to be long. If it can cover 2 courses, that's as much as you need. #So, the question still remains: How can I get all those other intervals with a slide, whether it is blues guitar, or country lap steel vocabulary? Alternate tunings? That gives you a little bit more. #But that's still thinking inside the box.

But TWO SLIDES ....... I can play a whole variety of doublestops including the 4ths and the major and minor 3rds. And when 5ths are included, triplestops with the slide(s). And because I'm not having to slant the bar/slide, I avoid throwing the courses out of tune.

Plus because I have two slides, there is an alternative to the stacatto, lots of shifting one slide, approach. With two slides, I can transition in the 2nd slide fairly seamlessly (sonically), between notes or runs. Hence "Vigilante Man" ala Ry Cooder type stuff is now on the menu.

Incidentally, the bottom half of the slides are cylindrical for playing on two strings. Keeping the hex edges on the top half, rather than grinding them down as well, was just to retain that little extra bit of weight/mass. It the slides are too lightweight, it's hard to get anything out of them. #The inside threads were drilled out and the holes enlarged so they can fit over the fingertips.

My National is still tuned in 5ths, but low, either down to E (E-B-F#-C#) or to Eb (Eb-Bb-F-C). #With regular mando strings, this is where it just sounds the best, something I discovered accidentally when messing with it after it had sat 6 months unplayed in the closet.

I was doing something like "Vigilante Man" and the instrument sounded better than it ever had before. Very Ry Cooder (guitar) sound. When my wife picked up an instrument to play along, it became obvious that I wasn't in G anymore. #Over the months it dropped down to somewhere around E or Eb, where the whole instrument came alive. #So, instruments may have their own "voice" and vocal register. And if there's where the instrument sounds best, that's what it should be tuned to. (more function thinking)


I keep it tuned standard - GDAE, unless I've got the National out, in which case I'm tuned down a major or minor third to Eb Bb F C or E B F# C# #(because that instrument sounds better lower).

Slides on the 1st and 3rd fingers. Each slide can 'fret' two adjacent pairs, or if used on the tip, one pair or strings while leaving the adjacent strings free to ring open. I can slide doublestops of 3rds, or 4ths, (not just 5ths), skip strings, and even split the strings! I can also transition between the two slides, eliminating audible shifts or having to momentarily damp strings.

(This is a good example of of freeing your mind, by asking "What is the underlying sonic purpose?, not the 'traditional' mechanics?" and then arriving at another way of doinging it, hopefully removing some, or many, of the limitations of the 'standard technique’.)

[arbarnhart]

E to F# isn't any more of a stretch than G to A. you should be careful tuning up, but this isn't very extreme, and i've done it many times. you could also tune the E down to D and have DADA, which i've seen people do, although i prefer having a chord with a 5th and a 3rd.
I have broken E strings just tuning them to E. I have never broken any other string while tuning. That is why I have concern about tuning it high.

[T.T. Brown]

Thanks for the replies/ideas. I've never tuned my mandolin to anything other than the conventional EADG and don't know much about reading music/chords/roots etc. If someone could just dumb it down to something like "Using your tuner, tune the E string to __ ..... and then it should sound like this.", that would be great. And then what might be a good, easy tune to start trying to incorporate the slide into?

[John Rosett]

you could also tune down the D and A strings to C and G. this would give you a nice open C chord.

[Pedal Steel Mike]

I don't know about slide mandolin, but if you want to learn slide guitar, listen to Fred McDowell.

[Guitar Jeremy]

Tune the E down to D
Tune the G up to A
Leave the A and D strings as they are

From low to high, you will have ADAD, which is a D major chord. #Thus, the open strings play a D. #The 5th fret across all four strings is your G chord, and the 7th fret across is your A chord. #You can now play any simple 3-chord song with D, G, and A. #Try a blues number like Sittin' on Top of the World or Muleskinner Blues. #Experiment and find the notes that you like. #Listen to Sam Bush on Hold, On We're Strummin' for more ideas. #I hope that helps.

Oh, and Fred McDowell owns. Blind Willie Johnson is the greatest slide player ever IMO.

[evanreilly]

Bill Monroe's tuning for 'Get Up John' is an open D tuning. I've played around with a slide a few times when I have the mandolin retuned .