Topic: Frank Stokes' Guitar Style--Queries and Tips

[banjochris]

I tend not to worry about it too much. I use playlists for all my albums on iTunes, and I have a Frank Stokes Complete playlist that includes everything. If the artist says Beale Street Sheiks it doesn't bother me.

And yes, Beale Street Sheiks were all Paramount, stuff on Victor came out as by Frank Stokes, even though Sane is on a lot of them. I believe some of the Sheiks records say (Stokes and Sane) on them. Certainly some of the advertisements do.
Chris

[Forgetful Jones]

Thanks for the help, BanjoChris. For whatever reason, I never really listened to Stokes much until recently. He's fantastic!

[banjochris]

He absolutely is!

[Mark Miller]

Thanks for this thread, everybody.  I've never played anything in D other than MJH's Stagolee until recently.  Now my teacher and I are starting a tour of D.  Finishing up MJH's Nearer My God to Thee, and starting Frank Stokes's Memphis Rounders Blues.  Having lots of fun going through all my John Miller DVD's for the tunes in D--John, you seem to make a point of including something in D on each one, and it always brings out something really cool about what's available in that position.  I think Tom Dickson's Happy Blues will be next.

One cool thing we've figured out that both John Hurt and Frank Stokes do sometimes when switching from the A chord back to the D, is to lift the left hand off the fingerboard for a quick strum of the open middle strings--in effect, playing a G chord on the open D, G, and B strings.  It gives a great rhythmic drive to that chord transition.  You can hear it in Nearer My God to Thee after the passage when Hurt dances between the long A and A7 (the open-string strum happens on the 4th beat of the 8th measure).  It's clear it's deliberate--he repeats it on other passes through the form.

Maybe this belongs in the Frank Stokes thread, but if anyone has any insights into how he gets the great rhythmic texture of Memphis Rounders, please let me know.  Tom Feldmann's lesson on his Stokes DVD is great, but he plays and teaches the song with a very different texture--much tighter in the bass as opposed to the very rhythmic, loose, almost strummy way Stokes handles the thumb; plus Feldmann grabs when he plays multiple notes on the high strings, but I'm pretty sure Stokes is doing brush strokes there.  The passage in G in bars 5-6 has an especially great feel.

[GhostRider]

Mark:

I've wrestled with the Stoke's stroke for years and here's what I've come up with. One beats 2 and 4 of a typical Stoke's C tune for example, he does a brush with his thumb AND index finger at the same time, using an almost claw-like hand position on the downstroke, striking two bass notes (+/-) and two treble notes at the same time. And on the "And" of these beats, as his hand it going back up to get the next bass note, he does a light brush with the index finger, again getting 2-3 notes. A soft brush-you can here when he deliberately plucks a treble note and when he's using the sort of rhythm brush.

See what you think,
Alex

PS: I recorded years back a Stoke's tune in the Back Porch where I tried to use this technique. Search for it as an example

[waxwing]

I agree with you, Alex. This is another example of the non-opposing style of right hand that I have spoken about often on this board. You and I spoke about it in regard to Stokes years ago at Port Townsend. I think that those strong treble notes you describe that "he deliberately plucks" can be played with a down stoke by flicking the index finger while dragging the middle finger simultaneously for the brush, an interesting variation I hadn't discovered before.

The freedom of moving the forearm and hand down on the beat and up on the "and" allows a very fluid and relaxed approach to syncopation compared to trying to create the same rhythm with constant upstrokes using only the finger muscles in opposition to the thumb, an extremely tiring technique. And quick tempos are easily achievable. Another good example of this technique by a fellow Memphis player is Jim Jackson's "Kansas City Blues" (and the same with William Harris's version). I have long touted this as the primary technique used by Charley Patton, the down up movement of the arm and hand allowing for his top tapping on the beat quite easily. Another good example is the opening lick of Big Joe's "Little Leg Woman" where the thumb is clearly audible and the down up brushes are pretty clear. Williams intersperses the technique into his very complex right hand style. I think there were many other players who used this technique.

I wish more of the many strong players on this board would experiment with the technique and discuss their discoveries. It does take quite a time commitment to greatly alter your right hand technique, I'd say it was close to two years before I felt comfortable, but the rewards are really exciting rhythmic music.

Wax

[Mark Miller]

Thanks guys.  This is harder than I thought it would be!

Last night at my lesson we slowed Memphis Rounders opening bars way down.  Turns out you can do this right on youtube, drop it to half or even quarter speed without changing the pitch.  What a great tool!  Another thing we discovered is that in the 2nd-4th bars, while in D position, Stokes is hitting a muted note on the 3rd string 2nd fret in between the hammer on the 1st string 2nd fret and the subsequent bass strum.  So the pattern is

1: pinch of open 1st and 5th strings
1a: hammer onto the 1st string second fret (this is a quick hammer, i.e. not waiting all the way until the "and" of 1)
1b: pluck the third string second fret while muting the string (I'm finding it easiest to open up my D chord entirely on the 1, hammer down hard on the 1st string with my middle finger, and bring my index finger gently to rest on the third string without fretting it as I re-establish the D chord)
2: full-throated thumb on the 2nd-4th strings

You don't really hear that extra note at full speed, partly because he's muting it so fully that the note itself doesn't sound, but it's definitely there when you slow it down, and it adds a lot to the rhythmic feel.

Is there a way to move this last stretch of 4 posts to the Frank Stokes playing tips thread?

[Rivers]

Is there a way to move this last stretch of 4 posts to the Frank Stokes playing tips thread?

Yep there is. There are a couple of steps to it and the forum software does not provide an easy, open option to do it. Training is long and rigorous! So I moved the last four posts from the D position thread to the Frank Stokes guitar thread as you requested, good call.

[Johnm]

Thanks for stepping in and doing the topic split, Rivers!
All best,
Johnm

[Mark Miller]

Thanks, Rivers!

[Mark Miller]

Here's a really nice look at what Stokes and Dan Sane might have been like playing together.  Great version of Sweet to Mama:

[Stuart]

They also have a new CD:

https://www.amazon.com/Pennys-Farm-Kweskin-Geoff-Muldaur/dp/B01KIJ16C8

[Mark Miller]

Been working on Sweet to Mama.  At least in that song, I think I can get somewhat close to Stokes's rhythmic feel with brush strokes alternating between the index finger brushing strings 2 and 3 on the "and" of beats 1, 2, and 3, and the middle finger brushing strings 1 and 2 on the beat of 2, 3, and 4.  At least that works on the C and D chords; on G (the "1" chord--I'm referring to fingerings, since the song is played in B flat with Stokes in G position and capoed at 3), the picking uses fewer brush strokes, apart from when he brushes the wonderful dissonant piano-sounding notes of the open 2nd string and the 3rd string 3rd fret.  I've posted the best I can currently do with this in the Back Porch forum if anyone's interested.  It takes a while to get strong brush strokes like that if you're used to trying for more of the precision of Mississippi John Hurt or Elizabeth Cotten!

[CookinSherry]

First post here!
Can anyone offer advise for what Frank Stoke's right hand is doing on "I Got Mine"?...I got the thumb figured out, but the fingers got some magic going on that drives the rhythm of that beaut!...Down strokes w/ the fingernail maybe?

[GhostRider]

CS:

Yes, I think that's what he's doing. I think that the is holding a sort of claw-like position with the thumb and index finger and sort of "strumming" with the index up and down when he is not actually plucking a treble note. That and the brush on the 2 and 4 beats with the thumb drive the tune.

Alex