In a world where there seems to be a technical arms race amongst guitarists, you would be forgiven for thinking that if something is harder then it must be better. Musicians with more miles under their belt will realize, and it is something I have mentioned before, that harder does not equal better. It therefore stands to reason that easier does not mean worse.
In this blog post, we are going to be looking at spreading out triads in a way that is technically quite tricky, given the stretches involved, but has a unique sound - this will be the focus of today's blog post. I want to give you the option to use what we have discussed here today, but when and where you use it is entirely up to you!
Keep a look out for the YouTube short demonstrating this technique, and for the longer video given more explanation!
You can download PDF below
So What Is Going On?
As mentioned previously , the approach here has a unique sound in that the chords used have a lot of space, rather the feeling of space. We can do this by physically putting space in between each of the notes in the chord we play. We will be doing this with triads for the most part, but we can also take the important notes from a bigger chord and apply the same method.
We know that the regular, run of the mill open C major chord is a happy sounding thing, if a bit bland. Without introducing any new notes, we can still make the chord interesting by shifting the notes around. Why does this happen? My guess is that, as humans, our ears are used to hearing things in a certain order and when that order is changed we immediately notice, for better or worse is a personal opinion.
The Examples
Here is the chord progression we will be looking at for all of the examples. I should point out that the idea has simply been moved to other strings, just so you can see the shapes are how they translate to other places on the neck of the guitar.
C - Cm - Bb - Bbm - C7
Firstly, you will notice that usually this progression would not sound that good, and I would be inclined to agree, however, the way that the triads have been spread and how the leading tones work with each other, it results in a pleasing sound - at least to my ears! Secondly, you will notice that C7 is not a triad, owing to the fact that seventh chords have four notes in them. In this case, we are removing the fifth interval (G) as that is the least important note in this chord - I will mark this out in the examples.
Example 1
I have labeled the shapes above with the fingers that I choose to use personally. I feel the stretch would be nearly impossible otherwise, so definitely try my suggestions first. However, if you have another method that works better for you, then go for it! Use the same fingering for the Bb and Bbm chords.
You will notice that there is a string placed in between each of the notes of the chord, this is what gives us the feeling of space and a certain ‘airy-ness’ to the sound. Notice that, for the C chord the notes are ordered E, C and then G - this is still a C Major chord but with the third as the lowest note. It is like a first inversion. But in this case the root note would be on the top, which it is not. Also, playing the shape in this way means that we can simply use our ring finger one fret below where our pinky finger was, and we instantly have a minor chord.
For the C7 chord, as mentioned before the intervals used are the root (green), third (blue) and flat seventh (red). In these examples, they are ordered with the root note as the lowest which is a deviation from the pattern the rest of the chords follow. There is also a pleasing chromatic line with the lowest notes as the exercise changes between each chord.
Example 2
This example is a little different; you can immediately see that there is only one string that has been skipped, which is the G string. I moved my fingers around a lot for this one, but that is only how I naturally approached the chord and not necessarily the best way to play it. These voicings are on the thinner strings, and the tone reflects that.
Example 3
The shapes and the fingering for this last example are almost exactly the same. The only difference is that the C7 chord has the open string included - naturally, you do not need any fingers to play that!
Occasionally, depending on the guitar tone I am using, the lower strings can produce a sound that is overwhelming in the lower frequencies. The problem here is that the tone tone might sound great for all other applications apart from that one, hence why I included the A string shapes. As the B string is skipped in these examples, you avoid those awkward changes given the third interval between the G and B strings.
Where Would I Use These?
As I mentioned previously, it is entirely up to you when and where to use these ideas. However, you should always be able to call upon them if need to - you never know! As for myself, I like to use these shapes for an atmospheric, space-like sound. I think this comes across in the big reverb and delay sounds I used in the example and explanation video.
I think these really work well when used for playing some cool, atmospheric swells on the guitar (keep an eye out for something on that soon!). Put simply, having your volume turned down and playing a chord and then slowly turning up the volume gives you a great swell effect, which all of the shapes discussed today work nicely with.
Another good use for shapes like these would be to have a simple chord progression in the forefront of your song, but to fill out the sound in the background you can use these ideas to create a keyboard or pad type sound. The key is to keep experimenting and come up with something cool!
Final Thoughts
The main thing you should understand about these spread triad ideas is that they are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what you could do with the simplest of musical concepts. If you are looking for a new texture in your song, then something like this might be perfect, but there are countless other approaches to take.
Your focus should always be on what would serve the song the best; technique should never be at the forefront of your decision making.
“Always the sound comes first, the technique is just there to serve you”
Guthrie Govan
To develop your skills further, you should make sure you improve your knowledge of where the notes are on the fretboard. If you know where the root notes are in the shapes, and you know the shapes, it should be relatively straightforward to move the shapes around as required. Maybe pick a common chord progression to practice with. You also do not need to work from one string, try moving horizontally if that avoids some really big jumps up or down the fretboard.
If this topic really interests you, you could always try applying what I did with the C7 chord to other seventh shapes, like major seventh or minor seventh. I would recommend you omit the fifth interval, but that is not a strict rule. Try it out!
If you want some more help in understanding this concept, make sure you watch the example video and the explanation video also. In addition, any of the amazing teachers at the American Guitar Academy will be able to help you out, as I am sure your normal guitar teacher will be able to also!
Alex
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