Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

[Scott_F]

Every time I try to play slide it sounds like cats got caught in my engine as I start it up.

How much pressue do you apply? How high do you make your action? Tunings?

I know you're supposed to "fret" the notes right above the actual frets, but I just plain old SUCK at it.:yell:

Any tips?

 

[Pierre]

Re: Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

Try open tunings (G and A seem popular for slide?), don't put a whole lot of pressure. Just touching the strings should usually be enough. The action should be a bit higher than usual, with a flatter radius as well for better playing. Well at least that's what I can figure out from scratch, I never played slide :laugh2:

 

[tone4days]

Re: Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

yeah, flatten the string plane (no radius) ... try to put enough pressure to get solid tone, but not enough to make the string touch the fret ... dampen the strings behind the slide to cut out all the extra skreetchy noise ... open tuning for sure to get started (it's hard enough, no sense testing the depth of the water with both feet ) ... try it on your ring finger first if its too tricky on your pinky ... don't be afraid to google some lessons or buy a beginner slide book

good luck
have fun

remember to "play it pretty fo' 'tlanta"

cheers
t4d

 

[zionstrat]

Re: Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

Let the cat howl for about a week and he will magically calm down- The motor skills just take that long and I always howl for a day or two if haven't been playing recently-

Mixed picking or finger style in the right hand helps a bunch as you can mute what you aren't using and double stops are manditory- High action and shorter scale also help-

Here's a trick- I cut the blade off of a screwdriver, trimmed the ends so it is just widder than the fingerboard, I ground down one side of it and padded the flat side with a layer or two of surgical tape-

I dont want to perminatenly raise the action on my ancient 61lp/sg, so I just slide this bar under the first fret, tune up, and bingo, very high action! Of coruse everyting is a fret sharp, or you can detune 1/2 step-

Also, don't stay away from regular tunning for too long, some of the greats like Duane A, got their differnt sound by not usign fulkl chord tunings and of course it's much easier to swap bacn adn forth-

ON my lap steal I tune to open E because the top 2 strings are the same as regula, it's still pretty easy to 'see' the scales-Cheers!

 

[firebirdVII]

Re: Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

You mean electric slide, right?

 

[kmcguitars]

Re: Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

Forget about the frets. They are just landmarks now or a approximation of where the notes should be. You wanna slide into your notes. Your ears will tell you when your there. Try not to slide past the note (Sharp) The most important thing to develop is your string damping technique. That's the real tricky part is keeping the strings your NOT playing Quite. I rest my right hand palm across the bridge, And wear the slide on my ring finger. This way my index and middle fingers can dampen the strings behind the slide while my palm dampens the picking strings at the bridge.

 

[B2D]

Re: Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

Forget about the frets. They are just landmarks now or a approximation of where the notes should be. You wanna slide into your notes. Your ears will tell you when your there. Try not to slide past the note (Sharp) The most important thing to develop is your string damping technique. That's the real tricky part is keeping the strings your NOT playing Quite. I rest my right hand palm across the bridge, And wear the slide on my ring finger. This way my index and middle fingers can dampen the strings behind the slide while my palm dampens the picking strings at the bridge.

WERD.

I'm no slide player but I can get by pretty OK in a band setting for doing lead slide geetar. I found that keeping your action on the high side (i like mine medium, which people find seem to find unusual for the style of player I am) and using slightly heavier strings helps. I have an easier time playing slide on my strat with 10's.

And as always the frets shouldn't even be in the equation here. They're guide points. Let your ears judge where you wanna be.

 

[firebirdVII]

Re: Someone teach me to play SLIDE!

Medium action is nice because then you can also fret easily. Also the reason that I wear my slide on my pinky, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

Even with dampening, slide can end up really sharp, so I sometimes, roll back the tone just a little.

Final note, I am much better at slide on acoustic guitars than on electric, so you should weigh my advice how you like, but with that in mind.