I'd love to hear that entire Fred Carter Jr. track in isolation.Whatever pattern he was picking intermingles perfectly with Paul Simon playing in standard tuning - just gives it a really distinctive quality. Kudos to Roy Halee too, as the production on that track in particular is out of this world. Thanks for the demo tacarn, you nailed it.

wish it had not taken me so long to find this. I love it when somebody teaches something right when so many are teaching it wrong. Well played and illustrated!!

Just found this interview with Fred Carter Jr. where he explains a bit about the intro. “I was playing one of those Martin 000-18s, tuned up a third and cross-chorded (Re tuned) to an open G,” [DGDGBD] reveals Carter. “That baby guitar’s got such a short neck, it was easy to bring the strings up to the right tension. I came up with this thing and played it to Paul. And he said, ‘I love it . . .

Well done that man. I have known for many years that this was done with a different tuning but never figured it out. You have nailed it, and good for you. Brilliant.

This is the best explanation of what happened that I saw on the internet yet - thanx! ;) If you don't want to retune the guitar, you could do it the following way: the 4th finger on the 2nd string in the 8th fret (G), then the open 1st string (E) followed by the 3rd finger on the 3rd string in the 7th fret (D) --- again the open 1st string and the 3rd string on the 7th fret and then changing the the 4th finger to the 4th string in the 8th fret (Bb) --- and then again the open 1st string (E) followed again by the 3rd string on the 7th fret (D) and then the 1st finger on the 4th string in the 5th fret (G) (while leaving the the 3rd finger constantly on his position from before for the next two triads) and finally making a part barré on the 5th fret fret with string 3 and 4 (C + G) playing at first the 3rd string(C) followed by the 4th string on the 8th fret (Bb) and afterwards the open 3rd string (G) followed by a position change to the 1st on the 2nd string fret (C) to catch the C note on the 2nd string before the actual song starts. What do you think? Greetings from the silverfox, David from Germany ;)

@soofitnsexy

5 жыл бұрын

asshole

Much thanks for the research. It means a lot to be able to re-create how it was originally played.

Nice to see how it was really done on the recording. Good job, thanks!

Spot on. Well done. Nice bit of guitar forensics!

Fred Carter Jr was also the lead guitarist in The Hawks, replaced by a young Robbie Robertson. 😊

Great job and info!

I see on the interwebs where this topic was covered in much detail in Acoustic Guitar Magazine, Feb. 2000, #86. I'll assume the date is correct without digging through my piles of back issues of that mag, said pile being badly out of sequence. But indeed, I do remember reading the article at that time and going, "Oh...okay." As an aside, I recall Simon wanted the intro to be played by "the world's greatest concertina player" at that time (whoever that was), who dropped by, and thankfully, somebody interjected their better judgement. Didn't matter about the article/tutorial, though (which I nonetheless found very interesting) - I had already picked out the intro so I could just go right into the song in standard tuning. And I wasn't going to retune/slap nylon strings on a guitar (and up-tune it, which produces the brighter attack) just to play the intro. (I didn't have a nylon-string guitar at the time, but that wouldn't have killed the deal.) That's one advantage of playing it in standard. The other lesser thing is that it forces you to "think out of the box" and play a natural banjo roll in a somewhat awkward way and improve your chops and dexterity in the process. It's a _great_ exercise for doing that - for getting the thing to flow as a banjo roll. You'll go "ahhh!!" when you master it. And of course it's a great little ditty that never gets tiresome. Just finger an Amaj7 chord like you would in root position, only run it up to the 7th fret. There are two parts to this - one with that Amaj7 position, and the other down at the first fret. The number in parentheses is the string. (2)8 - (1)0 - (3)7 - (1)0 - (3)7 - (4)8 - (1)0 - (3)7 (3)0 - (1)0 - (2)3 - (3)0 - (2)1 - (3)3 - (3)0 - (2)1 - (5)3 All the above is guaranteed to be at least 50% correct on a good day. Thanks for this tutorial, and hopefully getting/keeping folks interested in this great tune!

@TheOldHacker

6 жыл бұрын

Nice. I'd worked out the first line, but was playing the second line up around fret V. Yours is simpler, easier to play, and sounds better.

@TheOldHacker

6 жыл бұрын

He plays an alternative intro live these days. kzread.info/dash/bejne/na1pmayoY5Cokbg.html

Brilliant!

Brilliant, bit of info and instruction. Explains why it's so awkward in standard tuning!

why do you fret 5th if you can play 4th?

Impressive but then how do you go to the rest of the song if you’re using a capo

Great video! Any risk for the guitar to raise E to G?

@killlalaland

8 жыл бұрын

nah, you're good. if it makes you feel any better, the highest i've gone tuning-wise with a regular gauge is open E tuned up to G, so up a minor third to a fourth on each string. set of 13s. thought i'd snap the bridge off. it was all good.

@renikort

8 жыл бұрын

+Jamie Mitchell thanks