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Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 19 Aug 2017 10:26 am

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Joe Elk · Post by **Joe Elk** » 19 Aug 2017 11:03 am

Nice Doug!!!
Joe Elk

Steve Cunningham · Post by **Steve Cunningham** » 19 Aug 2017 11:23 am

Sounds great!
Did you kick in some tremolo throughout, ie: 1:55?

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 19 Aug 2017 11:28 am

Thanks, yes, I used tremolo in a couple of spots.

C. E. Jackson · Post by **C. E. Jackson** » 19 Aug 2017 1:35 pm

Very nice, Doug.

C. E.

Guy Cundell · Post by **Guy Cundell** » 19 Aug 2017 1:44 pm

The touch and tone benchmark. Sweet as a nut, Doug.

Bill Creller · Post by **Bill Creller** » 19 Aug 2017 4:47 pm

That was really nice Doug !!

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 19 Aug 2017 6:34 pm

Nice! There's a lot there in C Diatonic but good blocking is a must.

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 19 Aug 2017 7:00 pm

Thanks all! Yes, pick blocking is important here. Without it, the notes just run together and sound like a cluster....! The main riff is mostly finger & thumb alternating on adjacent strings, from string 2 down to string 6. The magic is in the tuning.

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 20 Aug 2017 3:34 am

You can get some really cool melody cascades easily right out of the tuning layout as you demonstrated so beautifully, Doug. Fantastic touch and tone.

For folks looking for a jumping off place with the tuning, here are some chord forms from my C Diatonic book (ignore metronome marking) ...

Andrew Roblin · Post by **Andrew Roblin** » 20 Aug 2017 4:42 am

THAT was inspiring, Doug. Many thanks!

And thank you, Andy, for posting those chords.

I'm going to get out my 6-string and try out the tuning.

Einar Baldursson · Post by **Einar Baldursson** » 20 Aug 2017 4:52 am

Sounds great! It seems stepwise melodies are a lot easier in this tuning compared to C6. Doug, what would you say are the main strengths and weaknesses compared to C6? Also you mentioned the importance of pick blocking. So far I have mainly practiced palm blocking and left hand blocking, usually by tilting the bar. Is this a disadvantage in your opinion?

Andy, I recently bought your C Diatonic book but haven't yet had time to dig into it. It's interesting that this tuning shares a lot of chord positions with straight C6. The slanted 9th chords for instance are very similar.

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 20 Aug 2017 5:10 am

Einar, yes - lots of similarities - in the 6-string C-diatonic, you have 4 of the strings out of the C6th tuning; in the 7-string version that adds a low E, 5 of the C6th strings. Every tuning has advantages and disadvantages depending on what sounds you're looking for. The diatonic tuning facilitates chromatic melodies well but is not as user-friendly as C6th and other "strum-friendly" tunings.

You get access to some cool pedal-steel type sounds and slick things like the I, 6, iV, V at a single fret. The blocking aspect can't be ignored or everything runs together in a wash, but you also have opportunities to exploit that ringing wash of strings at times that are unavailable in other tunings. Like this example - almost no blocking required:

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 20 Aug 2017 7:08 am

"cascades"... I like that description, Andy. The 1/2 step interval (B, C) makes for some nice scale runs, or cascades. The downside is... that B interferes with chord strumming in most cases.

Einar, regarding pick blocking, it's hard to explain in text, but check out the following video I made several years ago showing closeups of pick blocking. Go to 1 min. 53 sec.

----> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WG7qSLYOtU&t=1m53s

Thanks for the positive replies here. BTW, when I posted the video I set it as "unlisted", but I just changed it to "public".

Einar Baldursson · Post by **Einar Baldursson** » 20 Aug 2017 7:24 am

Thank you both Doug and Andy for your answers. Both of these techniques - open strings that ring together and pick blocking are very common on spanish/standard guitar but I haven't explored them too much on steel yet. Still struggling with the basics! Looking at Doug's pick blocking video I see great resemblance to what classical guitarists call "planting" and I can certainly see how it can complement palm blocking and left hand blocking in certain situations.

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 20 Aug 2017 11:40 am

Speaking of diatonic tunings... here's a song I recorded on (A?) diatonic tuning several years ago. I've posted this song here a few times in the past.

"It Was A Very Good Year" ---> https://soundcloud.com/doug-beaumier/a- ... eel-guitar

Bosse Engzell · Post by **Bosse Engzell** » 21 Aug 2017 2:36 am

VERY insperation, YES love this sound so nice and goood. Have mostley use C6 latley, but this,,,,,,

Bosse in Sweden [/i]

Bill Leff · Post by **Bill Leff** » 21 Aug 2017 6:50 am

Doug Beaumier wrote:Speaking of diatonic tunings... here's a song I recorded on (A?) diatonic tuning several years ago. I've posted this song here a few times in the past.

"It Was A Very Good Year" ---> https://soundcloud.com/doug-beaumier/a- ... eel-guitar

That is really cool Doug!

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 21 Aug 2017 12:24 pm

Thanks Bill and Bosse!