(Going to) Kansas City

week #3

I absolutely love this song.  Great to pin it to the top.

I'm going to unpin Before you accuse me.

Let's rock!

Some of the riffs in the middle of this lesson have little "rainbow" marks over pairs of 8th notes... When I played flute in high school band this mark signaled a slur or meant don't interrupt the air with your tongue when making the note transition.  

What does it mean to a guitar player?  How do I do it?

Thanks!

Those marks are usually indicative of hammer-ons (if you're going from an open string to a fret or from a low fret to a higher fret on the same string) or pull-offs (going from a higher fret to a lower one (or open string) on the same string.  You can find out about them here:

https://www.guitarnoise.com/lessons/tricks-of-the-trade/

Hope this helps.

Peace

Thanks for the quick reply & link!  

I should'a paid more attention to the notation when I studied that hammer-on lesson. <sigh>

Thanks again!

Thanks for the great song and arrangement!

I have a question about the theory - I don't understand the numbering totally on the fret illustration on page 4 (if you print the lesson out) mainly the b3's, the other numbers are falling into place- the rest of the theory I could understand pretty well, except for the word: "plagal" (page 8 ie "plagal cadence), I looked it up in the dictionary and it wasn't there :-[ Thanks in advance.

It's interesting to learn about the structure of the blues and I've been enjoying listening for this on other blues music I've got on CD.

The flow of this song is gradually coming together with practise, jammin the blues pretty well soon, thanks!

PS off the topic a bit sorry - Sue, guitar purchasing on the backburner for now cos I fell off a landing on Sat. now hobbling around on crutches, but still practising my guitar every day, that's dedication for you!

You're looking at the page with the B7 chord right?  The open B7 is fretted so:

2
0
2
1
2
x

What David's doing here is making the song more interesting by playing around and arpeggiating the chord (letting it sound note by note rather than all at once and by using a hammer-on.  )  Just play around with it until it sounds bluesy and fits the rhythm of the shuffle you've been playing.  

Okay, plagal cadence is beyond me.  But here's what I think David is doing in his arrangement.  

He's trying to make that E chord more interesting.  So you can play an E in the D shape up the fretboard a bit at the fourth fret

4
5
4
6
x
x

Then an Eb at
3
4
3
5

As you can see, it's the D shape moving up the fretboard.  So David's focusing on the top three strings
these may not line up right but they should be in columns.
4     3              2
5                    4             3
4           3              2
E             Eb            D

Only he's dropping the B string out, right?  Basically he's walking down from the fourth fret E  (E to Eb to D) back to the open E chord which he plays as an arpeggio:

0
0
1
2
2
0

But then he walks the open E shape back over into the B7.

Hope that makes sense.  That's my completely naive interpretation of this arrangement, for what it's worth (and it may be entirely worthless).
Tim

PS  just read the end of your message.  Here's wishing you a speedy recovery!

Hi Astokes

The "b3" to which you refer is in this fretboard chart, right?

This refers to the "flatted third," which is part of the minor pentatonic scale. As I wrote:

The Blues Minor Pentatonic Scale consists of the root, the minor third, the fourth, the fifth and the minor seventh.

So, if the major scale is:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

The minor pentatonic is:

1, b3, 4, 5, b7

I hope this helps. For a (much) better explanation, check out the article "Scaling the Heights," which can be found here:

https://www.guitarnoise.com/lessons/scaling-the-heights/

Peace

Usually Blues songs end by going the the five chord, to the one chord or in other words the dominant to the tonic.

I think the plagal cadence means you end the song by going from the four chord (sub dominant ) to the one chord.  I think David said this is also known as the "amen cadence" Because it sounds like the amen ending at the end of hymns

So in a standard 12 bar blues progression in E instead of resolving from B(the V chord ) to E(the I chord) we would resolve from A(the IV chord) to E

David please correct me if I am wrong

You're correct about the plagal cadence. I'm not certain where the name comes from, but it refers to a chord resolution going from the IV chord (or the minor IV) to the root (I). I had to laugh about the "amen cadence" because I didn't think anyone ever reads my old theory columns anymore! That's from "You Say You Want A Resolution," right?

So the last four bars of 12 bar blues are:

V - - - / IV - - - / I - - - / - IV V - /

           Â plagal cadence   turnaround

By the bye, a "perfect cadence" is V to I, in case it should ever come up in conversation...   ;)

Peace

oops.  Talk about heading down the wrong path!!!!  

maybe the wrong path but (a) we're gong to end up there anyway and (b) the view is terrific...    ;)

Peace

Thanks very much for all the above replies! and the good wishes for recovery  :)

David H., Hi, I'm just managing to work through the article you mentioned above (link: Scaling the Heights) and thought I'd let you know that the diagram on the Roman Numeral keyboard is a third missing (ie on page 5 if you print it) - hope this is being helpful, thanks again for the explanation.

Tim, Hi, I just managed to work out what you meant about the Eb chord etc, funny, that bar 12 (with the E to the B) has been the hardest to strum as a blues shuffle, just getting the hang of it today, thanks again.

Allison

Hi Allison

Since bar 12 (at least the one Tim diagrammed here) is straight triplets, you should abandon the shuffle for that measure.

Generally, use the shuffle for rhythm and then drop it if you're dong single-note fills.

Hope this helps.

Thanks, too, for the heads-up on the typo in "Scaling the Heights." I'm beginning to wonder if I've ever written anything without mistakes!   ;)

Peace