Re: Slide guitar tips
As far as getting a slide that fits..... sometimes that can be hard. My "pocket" slide is a cheap Dunlop Pyrex that I have lined with velcro so it fits well. Slides in general sound best when the wall is thick. You will probably wind up with a lot of slides made from a lot of materials to experiment and see which works best for you. I have Porcelain, Ceramic, Glass, brass, copper and metal. My favorite store bought slide is a Dunlop Mudslide.
If you elect to dedicate a guitar to slide you should raise the action up as high as you can to comfortably be able to run the slide up & down without it bouncing off the frets, yet still be able to fret without killing your hand. I have my action on almost all my guitars pretty high. This is more from playing a lot of acoustic guitar then slide (I play more slide on acoustic). I also prefer to use heavier strings on my electrics that are setup for slide. I use 11's normally & 12's on my slide guitars. My acoustics have 13's on them. The heavier strings will give you better tone.
OPEN D (or E) & Open G (or A) are pretty much the go to tunings for slide...... of course you can play slide in standard but most people don't.
Now for me what really works from a picking point of view as well as a muting point of view is to pick with your fingers. My teacher called it the Spider crawl technique. Essentially you use 3 fingers of your picking hand. The thumb, index & middle finger. Most picking is done with the index finger & the thumb & middle are placed on the strings of either side of the string you are picking so you can mute them. this allows you to pick one note, then slide & only sound one note. In essence this claw approach moves in groups of 3 strings. Now of course you can pick with your middle & thumb also, but in most cases when you are picking the D or G strings the index finger is doing the picking. When you move this over to the bass side one string the thumb is resting on the E string & when you move it over to the treble side it is resting on the D string, so depending what string needs to be picked determines which finger to use.
Now muting behind the slide is also essential. you kind of have to feel where you need to place your finger behind the slide. Its a combination of the left hand fingers behind the slide as well as the right hand finger muting the strings as you pick them. Its a great technique that has worked wonders with my overall playing not just slide.
Don't forget to listen to great players & practice a lot....
A good thing to do is to seek out a teacher that will be able to point you in the right direction. It really will help you on your way. Also look at buying some videos. Warren Haynes or Arlen Roth videos are great training aids.
