I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

[More-Gear-Than-Skill]

Also is it essential to have a non radiused setup?
I have an Ibanez EX with a F-rose, so no individual saddle height adjusts.
Is it okay to have a bit of contour? It's alot flatter than my strat.

High action? How high?

Most important: Which open tuning is most useful, easy for bluesy/White Stripes like stuff? Ive heard that open D is good.

Any other slide starter help would be, well, helpful.

Thanks guys

 

[MikeRocker]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

High action, absolutely. If it's not high enough, the slide will clunk against the frets. The tuning is up to you, most use Open E, Open G, or Open D. You can even try standard. As far as radius, try it and see what you think. I highly recommend putting the slide on your pinky. The ring finger felt natural to me, but I forced myself to use my pinky, and I'm really glad I did. It feels right now, and I can still play chords and leads with my strongest three fingers while wearing the slide. Good luck.

 

[That90'sGuy]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

+1 to everything MikeRocker said, right down to the open tunings.

 

[More-Gear-Than-Skill]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

Aha!! I just got a glass slide (by Gibson, no less) and immediately it got slipped onto the ring finger. Then i noticed how that only left two fingers available. And one of those felt spastic cause it wants to be bent With the third. So pinky I will persevere...
Many thanks. Hybrid picking seems to be the order here too....

 

[Rich_S]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

I've been listening to Sonny Landreth's Grant Street live album a lot lately. He has basically invented a whole new way of playing slide guitar that is light years beyond what anyone else has ever done. Helpfully, Guitar Player magazine published a list of the tunings he used in an article recently. If you're interested, I can dig it out.

The other thing that I noticed, looking at the CD jacket, is that Landreth doesn't stick to a single method of playing. It's kind of hard to see in the little pictures, but I think sometimes he's using a thumb pick, sometimes a flat pick, sometimes no pick. In some photos, he has the slide on his pinky, in others, his ring finger.

Don't limit yourself to one style, or setup, or tuning. Experiment.

And for God's sake, don't play slide on a Floyd. Get yourself a cheap MIM Tele or something. The height-adjustable saddles should allow you to flatten the bridge radius even if the board isn't flat. The MIM necks have a 9.5" radius, which isn't great, but at least it's better than a true-vintage 7.5". Cheap LP Junior knock-offs (i.e. Agile) make great slide guitars. too.

 

[Bludave]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

There are all good points here in learning to play slide. One of the most important is to experiment. Find what works for you.

When I play slide I feel most comfortable playing slide on my acoustic guitars. Electric guitar are much more forgiving in many respects. Here are some things you should experiment with.

1. Slides.... Not everybody will want to use the same type of slide. Experiment with glass, metal, brass, and porclean. I prefer either glass or Dunlop Mudslides. The mudslide I feel sound better than glass with more sustain yet they are not heavy like brass is. If you choose to use glass buy a slide that has a very thick wall, this will add a lot of sustain to your playing.

2. Guitar setup. High action will certainly make you play cleaner. Use Heavier gauge strings. I use 12's on my electric guitars and 13's on my acoustic guitar. Keep in mind you will not be doing a lot of bending when you play slide but you will be dropping the tuning in many cases, so a heavier string will behave better when you drop the tuning down. Initally you may choose to raise the tuning instead of drop it. This will have the same effect with 10's or 11's.

Tunings: Open D 6=D 5=A 4=D 3=F# 2=A 1=D
Open G 6=D 5=G 4=D 3=G 2=B 1=D
Experiment with minor tunings as well. I use about 6 different tunings in all.

Muting. Muting behind the slide is essential to clean slide playing. I wear my slide on my ring finger mostly, but occassionally wear it on my pinky. Having it on the ring finger for me puts the slide at a better angle and puts less stress on my wrist, but I agree with the other guys who suggest it gives you more fretting capability wearing the slide on your pinky. The bottom line it needs to be comfortable for you. I use all my fingers behind the slide to deaden the strings I do not want to sound. This also becomes essential with your picking hand. I do most of my picking with my index finger. Iuse the thumb and middle finger to rest on the strings on either side of the string I am picking. This gives me the ability to alternate pick and sound only the note I want top play while muting all the others behind the slide as well as with my right hand fingers. There are other ways of doing this. On occasions I will use a flatpick and mute with the palm of my right hand, but I find that less versatile than muting with the fingers.

Guitars: Any guitar that has the ability to sustain well will work for a slide guitar. My main Electric slide guitar is a 1956 Harmony H44. I use this in open G and I use 12's on it. It has one single coil PUP and it has a very cool tone to it for slide. I am planning on picking up a Les Paul Special with 2 P90's which will be my open D slide guitar. I also use a Strat in standard tuning from time to time. IF you just listen to a varitey of slide players you will hear just about every major guitar used.

REQUIRED LISTENING:

1. Bonnie Rait. Probably the most under rated slide player on the planet.
2. Johnnie Winter. The guy is a monster slide player
3. Sonny Landreth. Taking slide to a new level for sure
4. Ry Cooder One of the best slide players ever
5. Little Feat with Lowel George. He died a long time ago, but he was a great sldie player
6. Duane... What can be said that hasen't already been said.
7. Son House.... The guy who influenced Robert Johnson.
8. Muddy Waters. Most people will never consider him a great slide player.. I disagree his slide playing was very Raw.
9. Derek Trucks... The kid is scary good!
10. Warren Haynes. Not only a great slide Player, but a great all around player. It would be worth your time and money to buy Warren Haynes instructional video on playing slide.... He is one of the best out there now!

Good luck and Have fun!!!

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

I play mostly in open D or open G. I have a couple of National Resonators: a newer Delphi and a real '29 or '30 Style O and also a newer National Resolectric. I use the D'Addario Phospher Bronze strings designed especially for Resonator guitars. Wound G string. D'Addario makes two sets: one has semi flatwound strings and one has round wound strings. The semi-flatwound set sounds dead...I don't like them. I use the round wound set. If you're using a standard electric guitar and not an acoustic you'll probably not want bronze strings as your pickups will respond to standard steel strings better than bronze. But do go for a set with at least a .012 high e string (.013 sounds better...) and a .056 low E string and a wound G string. Tuning to Open D allows me to play in the keys of D and A pretty easily. If I need to I'll use a capo to play in E or higher keys. Lew

 

[philthis]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

for electric go get a Dunlop thick ceramic slide-light weight, great sustain, wont weigh down on your frets, made for electrics-eather get a mud slide or a moon slide-blue. The thicker the more sustain. You cant realy do alternate tuneings well on a floyd guitar so you will have to probably use standard tuneings. there are video's that teach you slide on standard and alternate tuneings. I would highly suggest these video's cuz it will save you years of time learning stuff on your own.
next listen to some slide players. dont try and copy them note for note just listen and get a feel for what they are doing and how they are useing the slide. You need to understand how it can be used so you can come up with your own style. A very good and easy song to do this is "Tush" by ZZ Top. Also check out "Bad to the bone" by George thurogood. his greatest hits collection "double cd" has several easy fun slide songs on it. a very cool but hard song is "slip slidein slim?" by stevie ray vaugn. its harder to follow but its very cool as well. Good luck and keep us posted on what you come up with
:beerchug:

 

[philthis]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

oh for a quick example go get the movie "crossroads" with Ralf Machio. I know, I know, its the freakin karate kid but close ups of fingers on fret boards useing slide are Ry Cooder and Steve Via. Trust me its worth watching to see and hear Ry Cooder play plus there is an awsome guitar duel at the end. There is some great slide tone on the sound track as well.
:beerchug:

 

[CapoFirstFret]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

REQUIRED LISTENING:

1. Bonnie Rait. Probably the most under rated slide player on the planet.
2. Johnnie Winter. The guy is a monster slide player
3. Sonny Landreth. Taking slide to a new level for sure
4. Ry Cooder One of the best slide players ever
5. Little Feat with Lowel George. He died a long time ago, but he was a great sldie player
6. Duane... What can be said that hasen't already been said.
7. Son House.... The guy who influenced Robert Johnson.
8. Muddy Waters. Most people will never consider him a great slide player.. I disagree his slide playing was very Raw.
9. Derek Trucks... The kid is scary good!
10. Warren Haynes. Not only a great slide Player, but a great all around player. It would be worth your time and money to buy Warren Haynes instructional video on playing slide.... He is one of the best out there now!

Good luck and Have fun!!!
__________________

You forgot Eric Sardinas, definitely need to hear Eric Sardinas

 

[FenderBender03]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

Thanks for all that info Bludave..... I've been contemplating on getting into some slide myself.

But anyway... thats a pretty good list of sliders you got there, but theres one guy i'm a pretty big fan of when it comes to slide. A country player by the name of Lee Roy Parnell..... he's almost constantly seen burnin up an early 60's Stratocaster with what looks to me like an old fashion "pill bottle" type slide...... this guy can really smoke 'em!


FenderBender

 

[psy]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

Here's my current slide-setup:

- strat with 12" fingerboard
- thin strings 10-46
- low action (like for normal playing)
- mainly open e tuning (no need to tune any string below standard tuning)

No problem with the low string action. Sure I cannot play as rude as with a dobro with strings >=14, but it's ok for standard blues and country stuff.

For beginners I would recommend a steelstring acoustic: everybody has one, nobody uses it ;-) and in general they can bear thicker strings than e-guitars.

As with all new techniques: play slow, play clean and have lots of fun

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

oh for a quick example go get the movie "crossroads" with Ralf Machio. I know, I know, its the freakin karate kid but close ups of fingers on fret boards useing slide are Ry Cooder and Steve Via. Trust me its worth watching to see and hear Ry Cooder play plus there is an awsome guitar duel at the end. There is some great slide tone on the sound track as well.
:beerchug:

That's Steve Vai dueling with himself at the end. He recorded both the part Ralph pretends to play as well as the part Steve plays on camera. Steve said he didn't really care for the way that movie resolved with the Ralph Machio character reverting to his classical training on guitar in order to beat the character played by Steve Vai. But in any case, that's Steve Vai playing the actual guitar for both characters.

 

[wickedmartini]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

You forgot Eric Sardinas, definitely need to hear Eric Sardinas

Better yet, see him live... I've seen him here (Rochester, NY) at a bar and could walk right up to the dude... I learned more about slide by just standing there and watching his every move... Also, check out the Dunlop model Sardinas brass slide...

 

[Sabe]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

I have an SG that I keep the action very low. For that guitar, I use a very thin glass slide, or a very thin chrome one, depending on what kind of sound I'm looking for. Both allow me to do some decent slide work without fretting out. the thin, light slides are a good compromise if you want the action low.

On my acoustics, and my tele, both of which are a bit higher with action, I'll use, heavier ones such as brass or ceramic. I'm with bludave on the Mudslide. Really nice and responsive, excellent to control. One of my faves.

As said above, whatever finger seems best for you is the right answer. I go with the ring finger, and I use my pinky to help make some chords that I would normally use my ring finger for. Practice and mess around and you'll find a style that works. its a lot easier than most make it out to be.

 

[More-Gear-Than-Skill]

Re: I wanna learn Slide...what open tuning?

Wow! So slide is an avenue that opens up into a whole city of options, choices and styles... Much like any other avenue of guitar playing. I wonder if piano players have as much options etc.

Anywhoo....
So, due to a lack of other axes to use, i was forced to use my Ibanez with F Rose. This had some drawbacks. First one was that it just seemed "wrong" Second was the bridge saddle radius is "locked". But, bieng a fairly flat radius, this isn't too problematic. The advantage of the F rose system (for me) was the ease of (non-permanently) raising the nut height. I un-bolted the locking nut system and shimmed it under the base with two little coins. Done! Then raised the pivot screws on the trem a few turns. Done! I will point out that i have had the trem blocked for some time now with some wood blocks. So there sas no floating horror to deal with.

The axe had some heavy 13's on already, from it's downtuned riffer days.
Now that action is seriously 80's pawnshop!

I got down to the guitar store and checked out the slides. Wow, choices! I settled for a dunlop medium brass one. And i already have my glass one (which is'nt so nice compared)

Tuned to open D and listened to Ry Cooders "Paris Texas". Now i'm having fun.
I'm going to stick with the pinky for now and see how things progress.

Many thanks for the generous help from all who responded. (Hey Lew's back! or was he never gone??)