Hi, The song of the week is the old Flatt and Scruggs Bluegrass jam classic 'Blue Ridge Cabin Home' in the key of A. For those who find these useful, attached here are melody sheets in standard notation, mandolin tab, guitar tab, and banjo tab, to help guide you in coming up with a melody-based break for the song. The chord progression is the one labelled as W8 on the Basic Chord Progressions handout, namely: 1144 5511 1144 5511 Notice that both halves of the progression are identical with each other. Two other old Bluegrass classics on the beginner jam song lists that use the same progression are Flatt & Scruggs' '(Someday) We'll Meet Again Sweetheart', and Bill Monroe's 'Sweetheart You Done Me Wrong'. The same progression is also used for 'We Can't Be Darlings Anymore', 'Is It Too Late Now?' (both of which are highly jam-friendly classic Flatt & Scruggs songs) 'A Few More Seasons', 'Nobody's Business', the verses of 'I Wonder Where You Are Tonight', 'Are You Tired Of Me My Darling', 'Sunny Tennessee', 'I'm Using My Bible For A Roadmap', 'I'd Rather Be Alone', and 'Thinking About You', and the A-Parts of 'Daybreak In Dixie', 'Randy Lynn Rag', 'Orange Blossom Special', and 'Durham's Reel'. For those of you who are still far less familiar with Bluegrass than with certain other genres of music, then, depending on your musical background, good points of reference for Prog. V8 may include one or more of the following songs: 'The Prisoner's Song' (an old country song that sometimes comes up at Bluegrass jams), 'I'm Thinking Tonight Of My Blue Eyes', 'The Great Speckled Bird', 'The Wild Side Of Life', 'It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels', 'Fraulein', the verses of 'Your Cheating Heart', 'They'll Never Never Take Her Love From Me', and 'Mocking Bird Hill', the chorus of 'Reuben James', the A-Part of 'Life In The Finland Woods', and the first half of the B-Part - or, in some versions, the entire B-Part - of '(O Dem) Golden Slippers'. Here are a couple of youtube links to listen to: Flatt and Scruggs - key of Bb. This is the original recording of 'Blue Ridge Cabin Home'. It is in the key of Bb instead of A only because all the instruments were tuned a half-step higher than normal. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCKBD17GKV4 Here is a link of the same recording, but which the person who posted it on youtube has taken it upon himself to slow it down a bit so that it is in the key of A. You may wish to try playing along with this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fdo34w5-DtQ For a more recent recording of Blue Ridge Cabin Home, here is one of my favorites: The Bluegrass Album Band - key of Bb https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htxGouge9-g Happy Pickin', Jason
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Here is the classic Flatt & Scruggs recording of 'Down The Road' that I mentioned at last night's jam that every Bluegrasser, especially every Bluegrass banjo player, should be familiar with:
Down the road - Earl Scruggs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmBOl82qXqs I first heard 'Down The Road' on a cassette tape that I purchased back in the early 90's at a Bluegrass Cardinals concert: the band on the tape consisted of a couple of members of the Bluegrass Cardinals, and a few members of the Del McCoury Band: their version of Down The Road was clearly influenced by the old Flatt & Scruggs arrangement (as evidenced especially by the choice of banjo licks for the banjo breaks and backup parts, and by the unusual way of ending a vocal number), and I have found that to be the case with nearly all arrangements of Down The Road from top-notch Bluegrassers. Here's an example of this from the Bluegrass Album Band - Down the Road:: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqJVrqQO1Dk ...and another good example from The Bluegrass Cardinals (live performance) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvrknpbs06k Listening over and over again to the set of records recorded by Tony Rice, J.D. Crowe, Doyle Lawson, etc., under the name 'The Bluegrass Album Band' was a big help to me when I was first learning to play bluegrass about 25 years ago. These still rank very high on my list of favorite bluegrass recordings.
Here is a link to 20 songs from the Bluegrass Album Band records. I hope you enjoy these. This is high-quality bluegrass well worth taking the time to listen to. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htxGouge9-g&list=PLN709e3s41mfgcjGSR_MXsVTX0j9wYM6X Finally, here is a list of other Bluegrass artists and bands besides Flatt & Scruggs and the Bluegrass Album Band to check out on youtube (or on any recordings that you can find for sale online or in local record stores) that I especially recommend for those who are new to Bluegrass: Bill Monroe The Stanley Brothers Ralph Stanley Tony Rice J.D. Crowe & The New South Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder Boone Creek The Del McCoury Band The Osborne Brothers Jim & Jesse Alison Krauss & Union Station The Lynn Morris Band Reno & Smiley Jimmy Martin Doc Watson Larry Sparks Hot Rize Kenny Baker Peter Rowan Almost all the songs on the beginner jam song lists have been recorded by one or more of these artists or bands, and there are many more songs recorded by these artists that are bluegrass standards and very jam friendly that are easy to find on online and in stores that have a decent bluegrass music section. The chord progression for 'Take This Hammer' is V9 on the Basic Progressions chart. As I pointed out last night, this progression consists of the progression used to play Little Birdie: 1155 5511, followed immediately by the last 8 measures of the progression used to play Bury Me Beneath The Willow - V7: 1144 1511. Other songs that have been played at the various incarnations of the beginner and intermediate jams that use Prog. V9 include: Banks Of The Ohio, Love Me Darling Just Tonight (on the current additional 30 list for the beginner jam), 99 Years And One Dark Day, and the chorus of In The Sweet By And By. Goodnight Irene (on the current additional list for the beginner jam) and the chorus of Blue Ridge Mountain Blues use the closely related W9 Progression that consists of the Little Birdie progression: 11555511 followed by the Blue Ridge Cabin Home progression: 11445511. Here is a good version of Take This Hammer from the Osborne Brothers to listen to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRG0Yor_GRA Sheet music: abcnotation.com/tunePage?a=trillian.mit.edu/~jc/music/abc/mirror/musicaviva.com/tunes/usa/take-this-hammer/0000 Handsome Molly:
The chord progression used for Handsome Molly last night was: 1115 5551 repeated twice, with some versions of the song consistently adding an extra 1 at the end of the progression, or doing so both at the end of the progression and in the middle of the progression (and not just between a break and the next verse, where one expects in many Bluegrass songs than an extra measure or more of the 1 might be added to the end of the progression before it starts over again). Here's a version that comes close to how we played Handsome Molly last night - though, unlike on this recording, the breaks we played were twice as long (16 measures + however many extra measures of the 1 might elapse between a break and the next verse, rather than just only 8 +...). What tends to throw people off about the following type of arrangement is how quickly the breaks come after the vocal ends (only one measure of the 1 chord at the end of the progression, rather than the much more typical two measures of the 1 chord for a 16 measure (4x4-type) progression that allows for a 1 measure length fillin lick to be played before the pickup measure that leads into the break. (Almost always, and Handsome Molly is no exception to this, the last syllable sung in a verse or a chorus coincides with the final change back to the 1 chord in the progression.) Notice that every progression in rows V, W, and X of the basic chord progressions handout (i.e., every single one of the 16- measure progressions on the chart) ends with two measures of the 1 chord. Playing the final line of the progression as 55511, as in some alternate versions, therefore, could make playing through the progression feel a bit more like playing through the progressions in the three top rows of the basic progressions chart, even though it would involve playing a 5-measure, rather than a 4-measure, line. Flatt & Scruggs - Handsome Molly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ughi19PTkeY Hi, Excellent jam last night! It was good to see so many new people there for their first or second time. The song of the week is Buffalo Gals, one of the many old-time string band tunes that have made their way into bluegrass. Although there are lyrics for this tune, Buffalo Gals more often than not is played as an instrumental in bluegrass circles. When played as a bluegrass banjo or fiddle tune, the keys of G and A tend to be the keys of choice for this tune. For its song of the week cycle, we will play Buffalo Gals in the key of A, but it is a good idea to also be prepared to play it in G. There are many other titles for this tune, including: 'Alabama Gals' and 'Round Town Gals'. Buffalo Gals is a 2-part fiddle tune that I have seen played two different ways at jams: some play each part only once through before going to the other part (AB form). Others play each part through twice before going to the other part (AABB form), which is how we'll play it when I call the tune, and how we'll play it whenever it is called at the jam during the first half of the evening, until we get away from just sticking to the top 20 list for the first half of the evening. The chord progression is about as simple and repetitive as it gets. For each part, the progression is: 1151 1151 This is Prog. Z5 on the Basic Chord Progressions handout. (Note: in some versions the B-Part is played using Prog. Z10 instead - 4151.) The melody is also quite repetitive. If you take a glance at the melody sheets attached here, one of the first things you might notice is that measures 2,4, and 6 of each part are identical with each other. Other points worthwhile observing to aid in learning and memorizing the tune include:
Before we go any further in explaining the tune, here are two good Bluegrass versions to take a listen to: Flatt and Scruggs (key of G) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3VEYKt9L8M Mike Scott (key of G) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIZs3Rs8B2U&feature=youtu.be For the sake of comparison and contrast, here is an old-time version of Buffalo Gals: 2nd South Carolina String Band - key of D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvykZZjPRZE&feature=youtu.be Finally, here is a good version that I would describe as Old-Time with Bluegrass leanings or tendencies: Idyl Time - key of E Idyl Time is a local Boise band that plays a mix of Bluegrass and old-time music); the members of this band are regulars at the old-time jam held at Pengilly's on Monday nights. Their most recent CD, 'Rimrock Country', that Buffalo Gals is on, is available for purchase at the Record Exchange. Buffalo Gals is one of the relatively few AABB-type fiddle tunes that I prefer not to start with an 8 potato intro at a jam, because the first melody note of the first measure is identical with the main note I would be droning in an 8 Potato intro (in the key of A, an A note that is in the same octave as the A note that the melody begins with), thus making it sound unclear where the intro ends and the tune begins. So, I start with three quarter note pickups instead that ascend into the A note (E, F#, G#: the 5th, 6th, and 7th notes of the A Major Scale: these notes are written on the fifth attachment provided here, but not on the melody sheets.) Buffalo Gals has a fast enough moving melody that one can play a satisfactory beginning-level bluegrass break for it without adding much, or anything at all, around the melody. But, because the tune is so repetitive, I can't help but want to vary it up as I go through the phrases that constantly recur in the tune. While many of you may not be ready to add much more to the melody other than, on guitar, fiddle, and mandolin, some double stops, slides into some of the notes, and the shuffle rhythm, or on banjo, alternating thumb roll, pinches, and slides, I have included in the attachments an example of a pattern I make use of on the instruments I play for adding notes around the melody. I call this the checkmark pattern, because if one were to represent the pattern on a graph, the dots would connect to form checkmarks. (See also the additional attachment labeled as 'Buffalo Gals - graph for the first one-and-a-half measures'.) This pattern is made use of sparingly in various spots in some of the breaks played on the two Bluegrass versions of the tune given in the links above. I use this pattern very often on guitar and mandolin, and to a somewhat lesser extent when playing clawhammer (old-time) style banjo, but to an even lesser extent when playing 3 finger style banjo. Scruggs-style banjo lends itself well to other types of note choices that are determined by a repertoire of various right hand picking patterns (rolls), and clawhammer banjo has its own set of patterns that are characteristic of the clawhammer style, but for banjo players who are curious about how the notes given for the other instruments might fall on the banjo when played in 3 finger style and in clawhammer style, I have included banjo examples of the checkmark pattern applied to the first four measures of Buffalo Gals on the attachment. On banjo, this involves some pretty advanced-level playing relative to the much lower level of difficulty in getting the same combinations of notes on fiddle, mandolin and guitar. To grasp the system whereby notes are added around the melody using the checkmark pattern, compare the first four measures of the A Part melody for Buffalo Gals with the 'Buffalo Gals - checkmark patterns example' attachment, breaking both of them down into half-measure chunks. (Note: there are more examples of the pattern on this sheet than what would tend to occur in my playing within any four consecutive measures: I use all these moves in my playing, but I don't usually string them all together back to back.) Within each half-measure unit, observe whether the melody is ascending from a lower to a higher note, descending from a higher to a lower note, or remaining on the same note, and observe whether or not the same thing is happening between the note that ends one of the half-measure units and the note that begins the next half-measure unit. In the first half of measure 1, the melody remains on the same note, but then ascends to a higher note at the beginning of the second half of that measure. In this case, I start with the first melody note, then dip down to a slightly lower note, then return to the note I started with, and then ascend to a note that connects smoothly into the even higher melody note that the second half of the measure starts with. The same idea applies to the second half of measure 1, though, in that case the melody ascends within that unit, rather than just when moving into the next unit: so the fourth/final note of the checkmark pattern that connects into the first note of measure 2 ends up being the same note as the second/final melody note in the second half of measure 1; the melody note in question is displaced in the process, coming an 8th of a measure later in the checkmark pattern example than where it occurs within the unembellished melody. In the first half of measure 2, going into the second half of that measure, the melody moves in the opposite direction: descending instead of ascending. In that case, after the starting melody note, I first ascend to a higher note, then return to the starting note, then descend to a note that connects to the even lower next melody note that starts the second half of measure 2: thus, we end up with an upside down checkmark in this case. This pattern is much easier for me to explain in person with instruments in hand than in a song of the week email. I hope that the above explanation does not sound too awkward as I have written it. (It is also an incomplete explanation that does not account for very many of the specific choices of notes when descending or ascending from one melody note to another.) If you are interested in learning more about how this and other useful patterns can be effectively applied to one's playing, please feel free to contact me for a private lesson (I teach banjo, guitar, and mandolin. I do not teach fiddle, but for teaching theoretical stuff along the lines of the checkmark pattern, I can teach this for fiddle and for certain other instruments that, when it comes to other types of aspects of playing on these instruments, I would not count myself as being qualified to teach.) Happy Pickin', Jason
The progression we used last night for 'Cluck Old Hen' was much simpler than the progression we used to play it at last week's beginner jam. For both parts of the tune last night, we used the Cripple Creek B-Part/Shortnin' Bread progression:
1 1 1 5/1 ...which just goes to show how many spots there can be in tunes that are often played with a lot of frequently occurring chord changes where one can get away with just simply staying on the '1' chord. Here's a version of Cluck Old Hen that has almost no chord changes at all, but stays on '1' chord for nearly the entire tune, except in a few seemingly random spots where a 5/1 split measure occurs as per the Cripple Creek B-Part/Shortnin' Bread progression. Earl Brothers - key of G https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpQC5TKHNtc Sheet music - but different chords progression) http://www.traditionalmusic.co.uk/american-mandolin-tab/cluck_old_hen_1.htm Hi, The song of the week is 'Gathering Flowers From The Hillside' in the key of G. 'Gathering Flowers' is just one of thousands of simple and straightforward bluegrass songs that, for that very reason, tend to work well at almost any bluegrass jam, irrespective of how many people at the jam have ever played or even heard the song before. Keep your ears open for these types of songs if you are looking for ways to more rapidly increase your repertoire of songs to introduce into the jams you play at. The chord progression for 'Gathering Flowers' is: 1111 1155 1111 1511 (Prog. V1 on the Basic Chord Progressions handout) In the key of G: 1 = G; 5 = D. The G chord consists of the notes G, B, and D. The D chord consists of the notes D, F#, and A. Notice the relation between the progression for 'Gathering Flowers' (V1) and the progressions used to play 'Mama Don't Allow' (V2), 'Foggy Mountain Top (V6), and 'Bury Me Beneath The Willow' (V7). V1 simply stays on the '1' chord in all the spots where these other progressions have a '4' chord. In all four of these progressions, the locations of the '5' chords are the same (measures 3 and 4 of line 2, and measure 2 of line 4), and in all these progressions, measures 1 and 2 of lines 1, 2, and 3, and measures 1, 3, and 4 of line 4 have the '1' chord. Here are a few versions of 'Gathering Flowers From The Hillside' to take a listen to. The first one is just good old straightforward traditional bluegrass. The second one is from an old-school country artist I have always enjoyed listening to whose music could be described (albeit somewhat anachronistically) as somewhere between country and bluegrass. And the third one is the version that I learned the song from. Earl Taylor & Jim McCall - key of G https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zErVDmaffwc Wilma Lee Cooper - key of C https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wliYjs8WdlM Hylo Brown - key of F https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YK1Sv9oft4 Remember, the melody sheets provided here in the attachments are just that and nothing more. They do not show you how to play bluegrass-style breaks on your instrument. So, why do I include the melody sheets in the song of the week emails? Because, to a significant extent, creating a break that sounds like it belongs in the song (and this is especially true of intro breaks, i.e., the break that is played before the singing starts and which identifies what song is being played even before the singing starts, or in the case of an instrumental, just simply the first break) involves surrounding the melody notes in the song with appropriate choices of other notes: and, in order to do this, one needs to have a fairly clear idea of what the melody of the song is. There are countless ways to play a break for any given song, and how one plays a break for a song depends upon several factors, including stylistic preference, level of technical ability on one's instrument, and even things of the nature of what tempo the song is being played at. But, once one is past the very beginner stages of learning to play 'lead' parts, attempts should be made - with the help of a teacher if need be - to play in a way that involves more than just copying on one's instrument the melody of the song as sung. Concerning Pickup Notes into a break for Gathering Flowers. Instead of playing only the 2 pickup notes (B and C) that are sung in the vocal melody (see the attached melody sheets) to lead into the first complete measure of your break, it is often more effective at jams to add a 3rd quarter note, a C#, after these two notes, especially if you the one kicking off the song with an intro break. The chromatically ascending sequence of pickup notes: B, C, C# to lead to a D note on a G chord is commonplace on good Bluegrass records (good examples of this are at the beginning of the banjo intro break and at the beginning of the fiddle break on the first youtube link given here for Gathering Flowers). Three-quarters of a measure, rather than just half a measure, worth of pickup notes gives everyone at the jam a better sense of what the tempo of the song will be, so that they can all start playing backup confidently behind the person playing the intro break at the beginning of the first complete measure of the break. This is a good case in point illustrating how it is sometimes better to make modifications to the melody as sung, rather than to follow the melody slavishly, when creating melody-based breaks. Note: Many melodies do not have any built-in pickup notes leading into their first complete measure; in these cases one needs to create a pick-up measure to have an effective intro break for the song. This can be done by borrowing pickup phrases from other songs in which the first full measure of the song starts with the same note and same chord as the song in question, or one can learn common generic pickup phrases used on Bluegrass records for each specific situation: e.g., a generic pickup phrase leading to a B note on a G chord, a generic pickup phrase leading to a C note on a C chord, etc. Happy Pickin', Jason For your listening pleasure, here is the Flatt and Scruggs live version of 'Long Journey Home', called on the album 'Lost All My Money', that was the very first song I heard Flatt and Scruggs play. You can find all the rest of the songs on the same album by searching for 'Flatt and Scruggs" "Live At Vanderblit" on youtube Lost All My Money · Flatt & Scruggs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j36uEgzfer4 Here is the really fast Monroe Brothers version of the same song (recorded in 1936) that I also mentioned at last night's jam: My Long Journey Home · The Monroe Brothers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4ZLjumc8x0
Excellent jam last night! The song of the week is 'I'll Fly Away' in the key of G. The chord progression is: 1111 4411 1111 1511 This is Progression V3 on the 'Basic Chord Progressions' handout, and is the same progression that is used for 'Will The Circle Be Unbroken', 'Mountain Dew', 'Cryin' Holy', 'Ridin' The Midnight Train', the chorus of 'It's Mighty Dark To Travel', some versions of 'Sitting On Top Of The World', and many other bluegrass jam standards. In the key of G: 1=G; 4=C; 5=D. The G chord consists of the notes: G,B, and D The C chord consists of the notes: C,E, and G The D chord consists of the notes: D,F#, and A Observe that with these three chords, all 7 of the notes that make up the G major scale are accounted for: G, A, B, C, D, E, and F#. The same necessarily holds true for the 1,4,and 5 chords of any key relative to the major scale of that key. This is a big part of the reason why most songs require no more than 3 chords; this holds true even for many songs which are commonly played with more than 3 chords. While the chord progression is the same for both the verse and the chorus of I'll Fly Away, the melody of the chorus differs from the melody of the verse. The spots that differ are the whole first line and (in most versions: the Gillian Welch/Alison Krauss version on the youtube link below is an exception) the first two measures of the 3rd line. In the attachments, I have provided the melody for the verse as a guide for creating melody-based breaks for each of the instruments; but since the progression is the same for both the verse and the chorus, if you know the chorus melody and would like to play a break that is based upon the chorus melody instead of the verse melody, feel free to do so, just not at the beginning of the song for the intro break. This can make the song a bit more interesting, especially when two breaks are played back to back, or after several breaks have been already been played in the song that have been based upon the verse melody, and it will work in the context of the collective breaks that we play at the beginner jam, since the chorus melody does not conflict with the verse melody. I welcome harmony singers to sing not only on the choruses, but also on the second and fourth lines of the verses (the 'I'll Fly Aways'). Please remember though that when singing harmony, it is important to be focused on the lead singer as much as possible for the sake of timing, tuning, and phrasing. In the attachments, I have included a simple three part harmony arrangement for the choruses (the notes for the 'I'll Fly Aways' in the verses are identical with the notes for the 'I'll Fly Aways' in the choruses, so I have not included a harmony arrangement for those parts of the verses in the attachments.) There are much more interesting note choices that one could use for the harmony parts than what I have written here, but I thought that, for the sake of those who are just beginning to learn to sing harmony, I should keep the parts as simple and straightforward as possible. But, some ideas for what you might do for more interesting harmony parts than just singing all the syllables in time with me can be found on the youtube links below, especially the first one. On the harmony sheet attached here, the notes for the tenor harmony are the highest of the groups of three notes on the staff, the notes for the baritone harmony are the lowest, and the melody is the middle set of notes. If it suits your vocal range better, you may drop the tenor harmony part an octave to create the harmony part that is known in bluegrass as the 'low tenor' (this is what I would need to do to sing this part, if the song were to be sung in a key a third or more higher than G), or you may raise the baritone harmony an octave higher to create the harmony part that is known in bluegrass as the 'high baritone'. (Most women will need to do this in order to sing this part, unless the melody is being sung in an unusually high range for bluegrass.) The Stanley Brothers - key of A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SU-NZTrAWio Doc Watson - key of G - instrumental (verse and chorus breaks) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvyXBPaC89c Alison Krauss and Gillian Welch - key of D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uz-0C2dhKlg Happy Pickin', Jason
The chord progression we used for Swing Low Sweet Chariot last night is V6 on the Basic Chord Progressions chart, which is the same progression used to play Foggy Mountain Top. The chord progression is one of the most common progressions in bluegrass: 1141 1155 1141 1511 Here are a couple of good bluegrass versions of Swing Low Sweet Chariot to take a listen to: Del McCoury - key of B https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSpitlVb018 Listening to Del McCoury is always an opportunity for me to get ideas for improving my rhythm guitar playing. Del never plays guitar breaks, but he is one of the greats when it comes to good solid bluegrass-style rhythm guitar playing. Although it is not the first thing that jumps out to the listener on most bluegrass records, the vital role of rhythm guitar in bluegrass should never be underestimated: it is the 'glue' that holds a bluegrass band together. The way that the guitar is played in a bluegrass band when it is playing backup can make or break a bluegrass band. There are many nuances to master - some of them very subtle - in becoming a solid bluegrass rhythm guitar player, and good backup skills are a much more important thing for a bluegrass guitar player to have than the ability to play breaks. Bill Monroe (the 'Father of Bluegrass') - key of B (Gospel Medley: Swing Low Sweet Chariot, I'll Fly Away, I Saw The Light.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0ZQVYXC76k Notice that, in these versions, line 2 of the progression is 1111 instead of 1155, and that this affects the choice of harmony notes on the syllable 'home' in line 2 of the verses and choruses. In last night's teaching segment, we went over using a capo to play in keys other than G, using the common sets of chord shapes that are used to play in the keys of G, C, and D without a capo; and, by way of reference to the chromatic scale, how to readily identify the name of the real chord being played when one sees a common chord shape being played on guitar when the capo is on the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th frets. For the benefit of those who were not able to make it to the jam last night, and as a way of summarizing the information for those who were there, I have included in the attachments a simple capo chart (written with the guitar in mind, but applicable to any instrument that a capo may be used on), and I have circled the scenarios in it that are the most typical for bluegrass guitar playing. Happy Pickin', Jason
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Jason's Beginner Jam Blog 2017 - 2018
Songs regularly called at the Beginner Bluegrass Jam and links from Jason's "Song of the Week" emails. (from Renee)
Songs
All
in alphabetical order
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