Stop 2 of 5
Vibrato and double stops
Every guitarist's signature and the flavour of two notes at once.
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Stop 2 of 5
Every guitarist's signature and the flavour of two notes at once.
If the bend is the ramp, is the note's breath. Two guitarists can play exactly the same phrase and you will tell them apart by the way they make long notes shimmer: it is, quite literally, a signature. In the second half of this stop you add another classic colour of blues, rock and country: , two notes at once that give a melody weight without stopping it from being a melody.
Listen to a long "naked" note and think about how a singer would sing it: they would hardly ever keep it still. Now listen to the same gesture in slow motion and exaggerated: the note rises a half step and comes back, faster and faster, until it turns into a shimmer:
That is the skeleton of vibrato. Real vibrato is narrower (usually less than a half step) and continuous, with no steps; in tab it is marked with a wavy line, here ~. When you play it, the note shouldn't "jump" between two pitches, it should undulate between them.
Every vibrato is described by two numbers:
The combinations give character. Narrow and slow sounds intimate; wide and fast, desperate; wide and slow, like a ballad. What never sounds good is uneven vibrato: width and speed changing without intent, like a voice trembling with nerves.
Wrist vibrato (bend-style)
The finger pushes the string sideways and lets it back, again and again. The force comes from rotating the wrist, with the thumb hooked over the neck or the base of the index finger resting on the edge of the fingerboard. The note only rises and returns. It's the vibrato of blues and rock: wide, expressive and with great control of width.
Finger vibrato (along the string)
The finger rocks along the length of the string, towards the nut and the bridge, without pushing it sideways. The pitch change is small and goes both above and below the note. It's the vibrato of classical guitar and jazz, subtle and elegant; on electric guitar it is barely noticeable.
There is a famous variant of wrist vibrato in which the index finger holds the note and the whole hand shakes, the other fingers loose in the air like a fluttering butterfly. It is associated above all with B. B. King, who made that very fast, narrow vibrato his trademark.
String 2, Fret 8: G4 · 1 · Scale tone
Here's the secret that separates amateur vibrato from professional vibrato: vibrato is in time. The waves fit the song's subdivision: two per beat (eighths) or three (triplets) at a medium tempo, four in slow ballads. Listen and play this exercise with the metronome:
Then halve the width without losing the rhythm: you no longer rise a full half step, you just peek up. That's the vibrato you'll use in your solos.
A picked guitar note starts loud and dies away. The ear quickly gets used to an unchanging sound and stops paying attention. Vibrato keeps renewing the pitch (and, slightly, the tone), so the ear stays "awake" and hears the note as alive for longer, even while its volume keeps falling. That's why long notes without vibrato sound like an exercise and with vibrato sound like music.
A is a "thickened" melody: instead of one note you play two at once on neighbouring strings (or skipping one). The between them decides the colour.
On strings 2 and 1, the same fret gives a perfect fourth. In box 1 of A minor you have two pairs right there:
On strings 3 and 2 the tuning changes (from the 3rd string to the 2nd is a major third, not a fourth), so for the same fourth the note on string 2 goes one fret higher.
On strings 3 and 2, the same fret gives a major third; with the 3rd string one fret higher, a minor third. Over an A7 chord, the C♯–E double stop (frets 6 and 5) is pure honey: they are the chord's 3rd and 5th.
Skipping a string (3rd and 1st) gives you sixths. With the 3rd string one fret higher than the 1st you get the 3rd and root of a major chord; slide the same shape up five frets and you have those of the IV chord:
Play the sixths with the pick on the 3rd string and the middle finger on the 1st, or with two picking-hand fingers; the fretting finger on the 3rd string mutes the 2nd.
Invert a third (move the lower note up an octave) and you get a sixth: C♯ below A is a minor sixth; A below C♯ is a major third. Both are imperfect consonances: stable but warm, which is why they sound "sweet". Fourths and fifths are perfect consonances: hollower and stronger. That difference explains why thirds and sixths are the language of country and soul, and fourths that of rock.
Blues mixes double stops with everything you already know: hammer-ons, bends and vibrato. This original lick starts on C–E, turns the C into C♯ with a (minor to major in an instant), and ends by bending the D up to E while the 2nd string holds the G:
With the A drone sounding, play these long notes, each with four beats of vibrato at two waves per beat. First with finger 3, then with finger 1:
If the vibrato drifts away from the beat, stop, count out loud and start slower.
Goal: Hold each note for four beats with an even vibrato of two waves per beat that stays in tune.
One double stop per chord: C♯–E over A7, D–F♯ over D7 and E–G♯ over E7. This is the rhythm for each bar; repeat the one that matches the chord being played:
Goal: Change double stop right on beat one of each new chord, for a whole chorus.
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