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Piedmont Blues
Q
I read an article about John Cephas sometime back in
Acoustic Guitar (March 2001). It talked about him playing Piedmont-style
blues. Is this a geographic style like Chicago or Delta blues, or
is it a fingerpicking style?
Rocky Thompson
Benton, Arizona
| A
“Piedmont blues” is a term coined by writers
in the early ’70s to describe the loosely related fingerpicking
styles of rural bluesmen of the Southeast like Blind Blake,
Reverend Gary Davis, and Blind Boy Fuller. Originally, it
wasn’t meant to include such later players as Cephas
and John Jackson, who learned as much from records as from
local and supposedly pure purveyors of the original style.
But it really doesn’t make sense to be purist about
it; close analysis will reveal little difference between Piedmont
blues and other fingerpicking styles like that of Mississippi
John Hurt or the country pickers from western Kentucky. Fin-gerpicking
styles based on alternating-bass lines were spread far and
wide across the South, and the blues players of the Piedmont
applied this general technique in their own individual ways.
The only regional styles that were really quite different
from the general approach were based in the Mississippi Delta
and to a lesser extent in Texas.
—Duck Baker
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Piedmont picker Blind Blake. |
Spanish-Style
Weissenborns
Q
I recently purchased a Weissenborn flattop. It has koa
back and sides and an ebony fretboard. It’s a 12-fret model
with a slotted headstock. Inside on the back upper bout is penciled
“131” with “12” under that. It has no binding
and small dot fret markers. On the middle brace on the back is stamped
“H. Weissenborn Los Angeles, Cal.” I’ve been able
to find only two pictures of Weissenborn flattops on the Web—one
has fancy binding and the other is a 14-fret. Other than that, I
can’t find any information about these instruments. What can
you tell me?
John L. White
Coupeville, Washington
A
While the name Weissenborn has become synonymous with hollow-neck
Hawaiian guitars, the company also manufactured round-neck instruments,
including ukuleles, tenor and plectrum four-string guitars, and
six-string Spanish models like this style A. Spanish styles A, B,
C, and D mirrored the Hawaiian models 1, 2, 3, and 4 in ascending
order of trim. Style A has no body binding, an unbound ebony fretboard,
and three light wood rings around the soundhole. This style A has
very small metallic fret markers, although mother-of-pearl dots
are more commonly seen.
Weissenborn Spanish and plectrum models are similar in size to
the Martin 12-fret 0 models and, like Martins, are
X-braced. Weissenborn necks have no truss rod and are usually chunky
and V-shaped. While the inner workmanship on Weissenborns (which
often includes saw marks, glue squeeze-out, and pencil lines) is
rough compared to that of Martins, they nonetheless have excellent
sound. The “131” mark is probably actually “B1”
for “back” and “style 1,” i.e., style A.
“12” is the number of the instrument within a manufacturing
batch. You might also find a “T1” and “12”
on the underside of the top; the markings helped match backs and
tops for the same instrument during production.
In the late 1920s, styles A through D ranged in price from $45
to $84—slightly higher than Hawaiians 1 through 4 and comparable
to Martin’s 0-18K and 0-28K models. If numbers of existing
examples are indicative, it appears that Spanish Weissenborns were
made in smaller numbers than Hawaiians, and well-preserved Weissenborn
roundnecks often command prices in the low-to-mid four-figure range.
—Ben Elder
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Snapping
G Strings
Q
Almost every time I tune my guitar back to standard tuning
from open E, my G string breaks. What can I do to prevent this?
Jerry Kilkenny
Morristown, New Jersey
A
Open E (E B E G# B E) is quite hard on strings, since it
involves tuning the third, fourth, and fifth strings up, rather
than down. The third string is particularly vulnerable, as it has
the thinnest core. This problem is exacerbated if the guitar has
a poorly cut nut. An alternative is to play in open D (D A D F#
A D); it uses the same intervals, and the same fingerings work,
but since it’s a whole-step lower, it’s a lot easier
on your strings. If the key poses a problem for singing, tune to
open D and put your capo at the second fret.
—Teja Gerken
Excerpted from
Acoustic Guitar magazine,
May
2004, No. 137.
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