A little help needed....guitar-violin thingie I initially thought of putting this in the Beginners Lounge but it's not really a beginner type question. Of late, I've been getting into more physical aspects of the guitar and two things have been bugging me....well, not so much bugging me but have me wanting to try them out. First of all, the violin on guitar type thing. I tried it and have no idea if this is the way it's meant to be done. So this is where you come in. Listen to this short theme from Titanic that I randomly played in this....I haven't practiced to perfect it or anything, just off the top of my head hence I made mistakes in the tune at places. What I'm doing is cutting off the initial "twang" using my volume knob and hammering on the notes with my left hand....is this how it's supposed to be done? I haven't used any effects whatsoever....this is just a plain old crappy electric guitar plugged into the computer. You might have to turn up the volume a bit. https://www.geocities.com/robotpajamas/titanic.mp3 What you have to tell me is a) Whether I'm having success in making it sound like it's played on a voilin and not a guitar. b) If no, what should I do to make it sound like one. If yes, is there a better way to do it...should I be muting the other strings? c) Don't worry about the volume...I get about 3 times this volume with an amp. Also don't judge me terribly harshly since this was recorded within my first hour of practicing this technique. But feel free to tell me in no uncertain terms if it sucks. Another thing I'm having problems with is half-muting. I'm not sure I understand the concept completely. More accurately...the type of sound you get in songs like "Every Breath You Take" by Sting and the Police. What I don't understand is the right-hand technique....are you just palm muting in a lighter sort of way or are you muting the strings with your right hand lightly just after you hit the note? Any help on this would be appreciated. I would've asked my teacher but it's 6 days to class and I don't want to wait that long.
That violin like sound is a common guitar trick played using the guitar. The volume knob is kept to zero and you pluck the string, so that the attact is not heard and then you slowly increase the volume. For best results you should make sure that the volume POT in the guitar is logrithmic or audio taper. With linear POTs it doesn't come out very well. Try it with nice overdrive and it will sound even better. Another option is to use a Volume Pedal which has logrithmic POT or the audio taper ones and use this before the overdrive. Using it after the overdrive doesn't give a great effect. I usually do this thing with the volume pedal. Check out some Live solos of Steve Morse. He has perfected this. Palm Muting means muffling the strings with your palm at the bridge or near the bridge of your guitar. You could mute it soft or hard and it depends on what sound you want. With very high gain, and heavy muting and palm at slightly before the bridge will give you a good chug for the Rhythm. Slightly muffling at the bridge will give you a good palm mute for soloing. The police song you talked about has a very soft palm mute. Andy Summers is playing that with very mild overdrive, so a heavy palm mute will make the string sound dead. So for that kind of thing muffle slightly over the bridge and play with a mild overdrive.
hey for that every breath u take song ... i mute using my left fretting fingers ,,, dont ask me how i do that ... coz even i dont know :shock:
Hey Ssslayer if you were muting with the fretting hand, then the notes wont be clear. In every breath you take, the notes sounds slightly mutes not dead. Or maybe you have a technique to do it.
ha ... mebbe i mute with my palm also ... dunno exactly what i do ... guess i llahavta check today night (exactly what i do)
@slayer if you mute with your left hand wont harmonics sound when u r fretting 5th 7th or 12th fret and spoil the effect??
oops i did not check exactly how i play ... yest i spent playing (actually just trying to play Alone in the Dark) - awesome song ... even more awesome are the leads ...
If Muted properly, there wont be any harmonics. I do left hand muting for that percussive attack something like the intro of Voodoo Chile. A bad muting can cause harmonics.
A bad muting and high distortion settings does lead to harmonics as I discovered recently ..but with improvement in muting technique they should not sound.. left hand muting sounds real nice with wah thrown in..a la voodo chile
