Fiddle tunes/Bluegrass
Sat, 02/09/2013 - 11:35
Winslow...I have an opportunity to play some accompaniment harmonica with a Bluegrass group and was wanting to explore some comping techniques that fit in this genre of music; Can you direct me to some studies or enlighten me as what is my best approach at learning the basics in this? Thanks in advance...Tommy Hutch
Tommy -
The first thing to learn is the mandolin chop. This is a brief percussive chord that the mandolin typically plays on the weak beats:
1 2* 3 4* (chop on the 2 and 4)
1 -and*- 2 -and*- (chop on the ands)
This helps keep the background rhythm while staying out of the way of whoever is playing melody or soloing.
The main thing in accompanying is to stick with simple chord rhythms. There's no such thing as playing fills between melody phrases like in blues and jazz. Listen to the rhythms being played around you on mandolin and guitar, and try to match or fit in with these.
Melody is paramount. If you don't know the melodies, learn them before trying to play them in the presence of others. Knowing or not knowing the melodies and being able to play them accurately makes all the difference between being accepted or shunned. Noodling along trying to find the tune won't win you goodwill.
Soloing in bluegrass can involve improvisation - but only in short solos that might last 4 or 8 bars (one or two phrases of the verse) before passing the baton to the next player. Take any more and you'll be hogging the spotlight.
Listen attentively, be discreet and polite, remember that less is almost always more, and you'll do fine.