Talk:Slide guitar

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article really should mention names of some of the classic bluesmen who invented this technique (or at least were the first recorded examples). -- Jmabel 16:18, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)

Since no one seems to be following through, I've just ventured to blindly assert this in the article. I'm not expert here & don't have names of who may have originated the technique, but it certainly was used by both Robert Johnson and Mississippi Fred McDowell. -- Jmabel 18:28, Aug 5, 2004 (UTC)

I added a date and instrumental origin, but I don't have one for the first recording. That would be interesting to have. Hyacinth 03:55, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The reference to diddley-bows belongs here somewhere, but not within the discussion of the history of open tunings. It's nonsensical to claim that open tunings derive from a one-stringed instrument... --RobHutten 13:20, 27 May 2005 (UTC)

Contents 1 Slides 2 Needs rewrite/repair 3 Image 4 Lightnin' Hopkins 5 Open D 6 Hendrix 7 Structure 8 Race bias 9 Question 10 Slide Type info 11 improving the History bit

[edit] Slides

• "Other items used for slides and noted in album notes or instructional books include other types of glass or metal tubing, a long 9/16 inch (14 mm) socket wrench socket, an old glass Coricidin pill bottle, and, in the case of Mississippi Fred McDowell 'a beef bone, filed with a file'."

This is from the old "Bottleneck guitar" article. It is uncited and I'm not sure if a list of specific DIY slides is that notable or informative or whatever. Hyacinth 03:55, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

speaking from experience and my own personal knowledge of slide guitar, potentially anything tubular can be used as a slide, considering that slide guitar started from using old bottle necks I think it's worth noting other kinds of slides. However, i think it's worth mentioning for any future slide guitarist the most suitable kind of slide and portray these other kinds of slides as unorthodox, the limitations behind using pill bottles and sockets is that you need to lay your fingers behind the slide in order to prevent overtones (these sound high pitched and not too good) and also certain alternatives will give a very poor dampened sound for example if you were to play with a highlighter pen. I think the article should say "a glass slide can give a full soud, a metal slide'll give a tinny sound (etc.) alternatively sockets and pill bottles can be used but they can be very dubious. Do you agree?--Mikeoman 11:43, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Needs rewrite/repair

Overly condensed from previous slide guitar and bottleneck guitar articles; has lost all differentiation between slide/bottleneck playing in regular guitar position, and playing slide on lap or flat position. Gzuckier 20:14, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

A slide guitar is not a bottleneck guitar. The article should make reference to fretted and fretless guitars and positions they are held. Also the use of vibrato bars in guitarists such as Don Felder.--Fuwah 12:09, 7 May 2005 (UTC)

The article seems to be about a playing style - not about the actual instruments used. The actual instruments can be a regular steel-string guitar (electric or acoustic); a steel-string with the nut and bridge raised (in this case it can oly be played with a slide); a dobro guitar; a steel-guitar or lap steel (the ones typically used in country music) and the Weissenborn. Whatever your instrument of choice, its about draging something across the strings. Well, that's a big list! Do we need it here? I don't think fretless guitar playing qualifies as slide - its cool, but maybe it deserves its own article? It has more to do with experimental and micortonal stuff than with bluesy roots. Vibrato or tremolo bars are not "slide" as such, and if understood this way we would qualify half of '80s heavy players as "slide" - absurd, no? --Modi 09:43, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

i have added the name of a veery famous person playing slide :: David Gilmore of THE Pink Floyd (anon 21 July 2005)

[edit] Image

What is the theory under which the Rough Guide photo here is fair use? -- Jmabel | Talk 03:50, July 27, 2005 (UTC)

Gzuckier 04:18, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

I've removed the picture. The fair-use criteria would certainly work for an article about the album, but we can't use it as an illustration for another article. — KayEss | talk 04:22, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Lightnin' Hopkins

I removed Lightnin Hopkins as a prominent slide player, since he was not. He might have played some slide though I don't know of any recordings. He was a magnificent guitar player and perfect example of no compromise real acoustic blues (fingerstyle) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 213.118.56.179 (talk • contribs) 29 Aug 2005.

[edit] Open D

I added a link to the Open D article I wrote. DanG 12:01, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hendrix

To my knowledge, Jimi Hendrix did not ever play slide guitar while playing the Star Spangled Banner, and I'm 100% sure he didn't at Woodstock, which is his most famous rendering of the Star Spangled Banner. He got his "wailing and screaming" sounds primarily with the Whammy Bar. Because of this I've removed the reference from the article. Jhayes94 02:32, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd just like to say that Jhayes is correct, I think it's worth noting though as recently I saw a video of Hendrix playing at wood stock, that he was wearing something on his hand that could he confused with a slide, but it's not(i'm not sure what it is but it's not a slide). i've read the tab and there are a few of trills(hammering on or off is very difficult with a slide due to the weight), as Jhayes said, he used the whamy bar and he did slide towards the begginning, but it's important to note that he only did so with his fingers and he didn't use a slide.

[edit] Structure

This edit removed much of my work to reorganise the article to give it a more consistent structure. It moved a lot of text into a vague "introduction" section which just resurrected the problems of the old version before my reorganisation, which is that there is a huge chunk of unstructured text which is hard to navigate.

I have restored the structure I gave the article, plus my own edits to the text itself (PLEASE don't do reverts like that again!), but also preserved the intervening edits where these made sense, and carefully added the material I deleted (which I felt was either redundant or unencyclopaedic) which U Go Boy saw fit to reinstate. I've also put the history section at the bottom. I thought it was better further up, but apparently others disagree. Hairy Dude 16:28, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Race bias

This article sure does talk disproportionately about white people in describing a playing technique of African American origin. - Jmabel | Talk 19:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

While I tend to agree with you, I suspect it's reflective more of the racial demographic of contemporary slide players than it is of any actual collective racial bias of the contributors. It's almost definitely the case that there are currently more white than black active interpreters of African American traditional music, slide guitar or otherwise. --RobHutten 02:39, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. But it's definitely currentism. Most of the great innovators of the technique were Black. - Jmabel | Talk 19:36, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Question

• Is there a difference between slide guitar and lead guitar, or is slide just a style of playing lead? I ask because it confuses me when I read that Duane Allman played both slide and lead guitar with the Allman Bros. Cubs Fan 04:08, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Orthogonal terms. Slide guitar is a technique, using a slide rather than the fingers of one's left hand on the fretboard. Lead guitar means guitar as a lead instrument, usually involving a good deal of single-note playing, distinct from the more chord-oriented rhythm guitar. Rhythm guitar typically combines with the bass and drums to form the rhythm section of a rock band. - Jmabel | Talk 01:34, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Slide Type info

Added the info that is always interesting to me about the hawaiians bringing the sound over in the 1900s, and added name of the person who invented the ceramic/porcelain guitar slide. Very encouraging. Really like the info about Sonny Landreth. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Brassys (talk • contribs) 26 November 2006.

Do you have citation for Hawaiian origin? I've always presumed Black Southern origin. (It could, of course, be independent discovery.) - Jmabel | Talk 07:19, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] improving the History bit

The history bit I think is mostly good, however I think the focus is entirely on western music, I was reading somewhere that in India there are guitarists who have their own interpretation of slide guitar, where they sit down with a classical guitar on their lap facing upwards and the play slide, i've never heard this music however and I was wondering if anyone did and if they could contribute? --Mikeoman 12:15, 5 December 2006 (UTC) Somebody please do something about the discrepencies. In the intro, someone mentions that indeed slide guitar usage was most likely invented by the Hawaiians. However, in the History section, someone mentions that africans were using a similar tool to create similar sounds most likely first. some one please get to the bottom of this. I thought this website was somewhat reliable until I started reading a realized it was run by...us!(gasp!)

I may've misworded my question, so i'll rephrase it. Are there examples of how slide guitar has been used in a national/regional music? for example as the last guy said about Hawaiian music styles, in African music, or in aisian music?--Mikeoman 18:41, 8 December 2006 (UTC)