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Originally posted by Lounge Primate

Sure. .. here goes … I think open D or capo’d 2 to have open E lends itself for me to play blues a little more , for lack of a better word, intuitively. And yes sometimes that equates to sloppy too.
Which can work for blues.

Those Elmore James ‘Dust my broom’ type licks just kind of rattle off easily in open D. To play that song in G there is more potential for me to hit a couple clams. No doubt a solid G player could crush that song ……but it’s really easy in Vestapol.


G is much more a ‘complete’ tuning and it is rich and has it all, and I admire those that can navigate any style in (bluegrass) G.

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sounds like a great ad for the hipshot!

In G tuned bluegrass/Americana you might well be required to play melodic runs against minor changes "at tempo" (110bpm+) so, melodic/scale based solos are often more appropriate than 2/3 note chordal based passages.

Rolls, hammer-on/pull-offs and other techniques are just as important in these situations as they are against major keys or changes.

You just apply these techniques to your knowledge of theory and how it applies to the G tuned neck.

h

Regarding minor scales (and blues scales to some extent)…

I almost feel like I have TOO many options when presented with an Em tune, or an E blues.

E natural minor and G major share identical notes. E minor pentatonic (for playing E blues) is a subset of that pool, and the fuller E blues scale adds just one note (Bb).

All this is “gettable” from G tuning using G major scale patterns (if one adds in the Bb when desired/needed).

Sometimes (especially for E blues) I’ll flip the Hipshot to D tuning and capo 2. Very intuitive and lends itself to 12-bar and delta blues in E.

Sometimes I’ll flip to D tuning (no capo) so I get the pulled off notes from 2nd fret (E) to open position. Flatted 7 sounds great like that.

Often I’ll stay in G tuning and use familiar G major scale patterns while resolving to E as the tonal center. Common scenario for Em bluegrass, Americana, folk…

In all of these scenarios the “landing notes” (played against chords) are important.

Depends on the song. But good to have choices :)

Agreed Jamie,

Excellent observation.

h

I’m a novice to resonators, and am starting by learning melody lines, but is there a reso equivalent to the boom chuck that guitarists play as filler while others solo?

Yes..

Thumb on string 6
Middle on string 4
Index on string 3

Thumb is the "boom"
Middle/Index together are the "chuck".

Lift bar as the "chuck" is played while muting with the trailing fingers.

If the "boom" is covered by guitar or bass just "chuck".

The above is a basic approach. There are other right hand techniques that allow for more complex rhythm, in combination with the left hand.

h

Assuming you mean dobro GBDGBD tuning, my scales are getting better, but they're still hard.

Standard guitar has the CAGED system, roundneck open G (DGDGBD) has easy access to essentials and leaves lots of room for error, and the core of mandolin is just logical patterns that repeat up and down and across the fretboard. So they're all easier for me than GBDGBD.

I have found some handy shapes, though, so don't give up on me yet!

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Originally posted by Charlie Bernstein

mandolin is just logical patterns that repeat up and down and across the fretboard. So they're all easier for me than GBDGBD.
 

Same on dobro. The patterns repeat. 

Same on every "fretted" instrument (as far as I know).

h

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Originally posted by hlpdobro

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Originally posted by Charlie Bernstein

mandolin is just logical patterns that repeat up and down and across the fretboard. So they're all easier for me than GBDGBD.
 

Same on dobro. The patterns repeat. 

Same on every "fretted" instrument (as far as I know).

h

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Natch! But not as simply as they do on mandolin. For instance, here's a C-major octave:

G - A - BC

C - D - EF

See how the whole- and half-step intervals match up? And thanks to the tuning in fifths, it repeats those two-two-one fret spacings over and over. So you have a great starting place for learning your way around the neck. 

And one blues scale has a repeating zig-zag pattern, another springboard to greatness.

I've drawn lots of dobro diagrams, and that's been a big help, of course. The patterns are apparent when you draw them. But with a mandolin, I don't need to draw anything.

So..

What are the roadblocks and challenges you are facing in GBDGBD dobro tuning?

Have specific issues or questions?

Sorry I'm a bit late to this thread, as I've been away . The thing that I've found limiting is trying to approximate the C6 sound that I love, that's  heard on classic Hank Williams tunes and the like. I can play the melodies and some of the intervals but it's not the same.That sound is very distinctive.  It's driven me to buying another lap steel to attempt learning C6, but it's a long and slow process. I'd love to get closer in GBDGBD tuning which is what generally play in. I'm curious if anyone else has been through this.

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Originally posted by sovio

Sorry I'm a bit late to this thread, as I've been away . The thing that I've found limiting is trying to approximate the C6 sound that I love, that's  heard on classic Hank Williams tunes and the like. I can play the melodies and some of the intervals but it's not the same.That sound is very distinctive.  It's driven me to buying another lap steel to attempt learning C6, but it's a long and slow process. I'd love to get closer in GBDGBD tuning which is what generally play in. I'm curious if anyone else has been through this.

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Put a lighter 4th string on guitar and tune it up to E from D so now you're in G6th. I would go down to a .032w from the typical 35 or 36 you have on there now. I've tried a 34 in the past but going back and forth between D to E I've broken a couple of those. 

It's sort of amazing how only one string re-tuned gives your dobro a completely different "flavor."

Nothing to do with original topic. You can tune anything to anything.

Now, what about roadblocks in G-B-D-G-B-D

Harry (sovio), check out this lesson from Rob Ickes using GBDGBD and getting those “Hank & Helms” sounds.

youtu.be/JpXEo8F6FM0?si=c70qL5YXk8Ga8ImO

Apologies for the short hijack Howard, but I thought it best to address Harry regarding G6th for dobro (in a short post - for me ) if he isn't familiar with it to get some of that Hank Williams vibe from the late '40s to early '50s. I thought it better than telling him he should go start his own thread about it. 

It actually leads to a good segue - you mentioned in the original post Billy Cardine's album Six String Swing. Some amazing playing by Billy - I recall after he first sent me the CD 14 years ago thinking he might be the heir apparent to Jerry's moniker, The Flaming Hand. It's remarkable what he did, and in going back and listening to a few of the tunes today, I thought I was detecting some arpeggiated full minor chords at high speed and I recall Billy saying that he did some serious woodshedding prior to recording the album. As we know, there are few straight bar minors available in Open G, so most of us just play the 1 and the 5 to approximate a minor chord and avoid the 3 note since it's one fret back on the 2nd string from your starting point on the 3rd string. To be able to play those minor chords as an arpeggio really fast and in tune is high skill level material.

Jazz in general on the dobro brings to mind the young Jerry Douglas in his J.D. Crowe & The New South days and a little later talking about hanging with Tony Rice and having Tony turn him on to a lot of jazz, like Miles Davis and John Coltrane. Then Jerry discovering the likes of Chick Corea & Return to Forever, and Weather Report. And what he got out of all that is that horn players were a good inspiration for a dobro tuned to GBDGBD, because you can only play one note at a time on a trumpet or sax. 

So single note lines and some double stops are great for taking leads and playing a melody on the dobro, but beyond the straight bar major chords and a few minors, maybe it's not so much of a roadblock, but  more of an acceptance of what is possible in a G tuning. The individual notes are all there on the dobro, but there are many combinations or chords that are impossible to play that can be done on a keyboard or a standard guitar. 

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Originally posted by MarkinSonoma

Apologies for the short hijack Howard, but I thought it best to address Harry regarding G6th for dobro (in a short post - for me ) if he isn't familiar with it to get some of that Hank Williams vibe from the late '40s to early '50s. I thought it better than telling him he should go start his own thread about it. 

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I just didn't want things to get too far afield 

Mike also was inspired by horn parts....

At any rate, in the cases cited above, the challenges faced in GBDGBD tuning were eventually overcome with knowledge and technique in that very same GBDGBD tuning.

These are certainly lessons to be learned.

h
 

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Originally posted by Lounge Primate

Harry (sovio), check out this lesson from Rob Ickes using GBDGBD and getting those “Hank & Helms” sounds.

youtu.be/JpXEo8F6FM0?si=c70qL5YXk8Ga8ImO

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Right on Howard, Mike was definitely influenced by listening to horn players as was Rob Ickes. And Rob, Jerry and Mike were no doubt all influenced by jazz guitar players. A bunch of years ago after a duo show Rob did with the very eclectic NorCal musician Joe Craven, I asked Rob who he was listening to at the time as far as jazz guitarists. One was John Scofield, and I was already a moderate level fan of Sco, and another was French Gypsy Jazz guitarist Biréli Lagrène, with whom I was unfamiliar. I'm sure glad he turned me on to Lagrène!

Speaking of lessons to be learned, I definitely qualify as an old dog trying to learn new tricks. I've been a member of Rob's Reso Room for four years and will be signing up for year five next week. If I were a smarter old dog I'd spend more time on the site. Out of the greatest dobro players, I don't know that anyone worked any harder to be successful in his career as Rob. I remember how flattered Rob was when he Jerry, and Mike were working on Three Bells and Mike made a comment that he felt Rob knew the fretboard in GBDGBD better than he did. Talk about high praise!

Brooks, great link to to Rob's lesson on Hey Good Lookin'.  There is so much to explore on the ResoRoom site I had yet to view that one. He had a relatively simple solution to beginning the song an octave lower than trying to emulate Don Helms on steel guitar in the same range - kicking off the song up on the C chord at the 17th fret on a dobro wasn't going to cut it. 

Being a standard guitar player for 50 years, yeah I'm old, I just started playing around on a lap steel in open G. If I can get my head around GBDGBD tuning, I'll buy a reso. I've had a few round necks though the years but never a square for lap and bar playing.

I have picking technique other than getting used to thumb and finger picks. I'm fine with a bar. I just need practice with visualizing and getting used to the tuning. In a way it's simple, yet difficult since I'm primarily used to standard tuning for 50 years.

Anyway, if I suss some basic theory and get a few standard licks down, I'll buy something under $1000.

Care to relate specific issues? "Getting used to the tuning" does not give us a lot to go on. The more detail the easier it is for someone to assist.

Self taught? If so, how? What are you relying on for education resources?