Topic: an open G blues; lapstyle guitar

[neal cassady]

hello all -

new here & have been just reading and wanting to get a video out for feedback for a while now 

i began attempting at playing blues for the frailing banjo about 2 years ago
then was given a small Martin backpacker guitar 1 year later that i put in open g, and translated all i learned up on the banjo,
at first i got my right thumb alternating the bass while attempting to frail - but then relized i really just wanted to learn
some sort of 'normal' fingerstyle movement. finally got to set that backpacker down and was given an unknown older
guitar (that i'm still having trouble holding the strings down! the neck is so bowed it made for some really high action perfect for what i wanted,
but it's definatly a rough time getting going at first --) to play on.

any info on the guitar would be appreciated as well - the 'grandma' that gave it to me said her husband (not a player himself)
brought it home on one of his many auction purchasing escapades in the '50s.
(but she's not even for-certain that it was this decade, possibly just a bit later?)

anyway here's the video, it's just a G blues with various inserted things i 'made up' before-hand, on the spot, and have heard else-where
it's tuned with a drone G on the lowest string -- GGDGBD

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkXY4ujWahA

[Richard]

I don't know the guitar at all, I'd guess probably some catalogue type thing or other.

I see you use only the thumb and first finger, nothing wrong but I thought coming from banjo you would be using the second finger as well     I would suggest holding the bar in more conventional way which might help you progress, if want to know more about lap let me know. Now, I don't want to put you off lap as it's all I play, but why not also try that style of playing with the guitar in the conventional position and wave a slide about rather in the manner of Blind Willie Whatnot 

[neal cassady]

yea, i have a feeling it's a 'sears & roebuck' type of thing -

i can only seem to get my thumb/index going and still haven't been able to get my middle to flow in with the rest,
but this is directly because i began frailing on the banjo with just these two fingers. check out dobro33h's videos (patrick costello)
-- guy's is amazing at what he does - has great song choice for the blues he translates to the frailing banjo - Get Right Church was my first --

i pretty much only play lap as well - whenever it's slide it's on my lap - and whenever i wanna finger pick (sans slide) i hold it upright.
but my lefthand fingering is real limited since i never have learned how to form chords, i only know how to do a some hammer on's and pull off's -

i've tried to slide around holding the guitar upright and it's just not the same   -
it was harder for me to gauge distance between frets; holding it up doesn't let me get my slide down in there to
play individual stings while keeping my right hand going and having the rest of the strings just ring freely open;
i also noticed a big difference in the quality of the slide sound itself when held upright - im not sure
if just has all to do with the way the sound is projected in the different positions? laying in my thighs
the guitar seems to 'bulk' up in sound and when it's pressed against my chest the sound just seems
to fall flat - that about the best i can explain, haha;

it was an easy solution for being annoyed at attempting to learn how to finger chords and throw in slide at the same time -
so i just said to hell with my left hand's fingers and 'glued' a slide to my palm instead, practiced straight lap for about 6 months following

wanted to put this in the first post:
most of that is misinterpretations of bukka's "poor boy long ways from home", fahey's "how green was my valley", weaver's "guitar rag",
and some individual string "phrases" that i made up to connect the sections of bar chords

[harry klook]

cool, not too common to play lapstyle guitar. You know kelly joe phelps?, his record "lead me on" is lapstyle guitar at it's finest.