How to Play the 3-String Cigar Box Guitar
By Rick McKeon
()
About this ebook
Less Is More
Having only three strings to work with, the 3-String CBG might seem limited, but its limitations are also its greatness!
We need to make the most of what we have. This means that we need to play each note with expression, and feeling. That's what makes the music come alive!
In this book (together with 26 online video lessons) you will learn the basics of right and left hand technique, chord construction, fingerpicking and slide playing. You will also learn how to jam with other players and improvise on the blues!
Read more from Rick Mc Keon
The Natural Banjo Player Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Fingerpicking Guitar Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Journal of Plant Based Health & Wellness Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAmazing Fractal Images: Postcards from the Complex Plane Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Natural Guitar Player Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPlant Based Health & Wellness Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Nature's Hidden Patterns Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsKailee's Adventures in the Pine Forest Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNature's Small World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Journal of Plant Based Health & Wellness, 2019 Annual Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUnderlying Patterns Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSierra Impressions Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsYou Make Us Feel Young Again! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to How to Play the 3-String Cigar Box Guitar
Related ebooks
Learn To Play C6 Lap Steel Guitar: For Absolute Beginners To Intermediate Level Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Guitar and Harmonica Method Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlues Chord Buster Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5How To Play Guitar Modes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSecrets of the Guitar: How to read tabs and tablature Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Blues Soloing for Guitar, Volume 2: Levelling Up: Blues Soloing for Guitar, #2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Freestyleguitar Method Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Rick Payne's Blues And Rags Collection Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Set Up a Stratocaster Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Irish Washerwoman Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBanjo For Dummies: Book + Online Video and Audio Instruction Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFingerpicking vs. Flatpicking Guitar: How to Choose the Right Picking Style for You Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Blues Play-A-Long and Solos Collection for Guitar Beginner Series: The Blues Play-A-Long and Solos Collection Beginner Series Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGuitar Setup Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Intermediate Guitar Fingerpicking: Add Scales and Melodies to Your Guitar Fingerpicking Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Complete Guitar Care & Maintenance Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlues Soloing for Guitar, Volume 1: Blues Basics: Blues Soloing for Guitar, #1 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Six-String Sleuth: A Guitar Player's Guide to Figuring Out Song Chords Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Obsessed With Cigar Box Guitars, 2nd Edition: Over 120 Hand-Built Guitars from the Masters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Making Poor Man's Guitars: Cigar Box Guitars, the Frying Pan Banjo, and Other DIY Instruments Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cigar Box Banjo: Notes on Music and Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Handmade Music Factory: The Ultimate Guide to Making Foot-Stompin Good Instruments Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beyond The Delta Slide Guitar Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bottleneck Blues Volume 1 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Just This Banjo Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Slide Guitar: Know the Players, Play the Music Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Playing Harmonica Like a Real Musician Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bottleneck Blues Volume 2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe 5-String Banjo Scrapbook: A Collection of Tips Techniques and Tricks Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Music For You
A Strange Loop Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Music Theory For Dummies Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Weird Scenes Inside The Canyon: Laurel Canyon, Covert Ops & The Dark Heart Of The Hippie Dream Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Circle of Fifths: Visual Tools for Musicians, #1 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/588 Piano Classics for Beginners Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Me: Elton John Official Autobiography Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bowie: An Illustrated Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dirt: Confessions of the World's Most Notorious Rock Band Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Learn Jazz Piano: book 1 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Learn Guitar A Beginner's Course Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Easyway to Play Piano: A Beginner's Best Piano Primer Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Songwriting For Dummies Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Open Book Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Making Rumours: The Inside Story of the Classic Fleetwood Mac Album Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Big Keyboard and Piano Chord Book: 500+ Keyboard and Piano Chords in a Unique Visual Format Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hal Leonard Pocket Music Theory (Music Instruction): A Comprehensive and Convenient Source for All Musicians Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Songwriting: Essential Guide to Lyric Form and Structure: Tools and Techniques for Writing Better Lyrics Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Learn Your Fretboard: The Essential Memorization Guide for Guitar (Book + Online Bonus) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Guitar For Dummies Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Singing For Dummies Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Singing Coach Secrets Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Music Theory For Beginners Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Rememberings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dear Evan Hansen (TCG Edition) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Becoming a Great Sight-Reader–or Not! Learn From My Quest for Piano Sight-Reading Nirvana Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for How to Play the 3-String Cigar Box Guitar
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
How to Play the 3-String Cigar Box Guitar - Rick McKeon
Welcome!
Chapter 1: The Basics
1.1 Strings and Tuning
1.1.1 Strings and Pitch
1.1.2 Electric vs. Acoustic Strings
1.1.3 Strings for Tuning G, D, G
1.1.4 Changing Strings
1.1.5 Tuning
1.2 For the Audiophile
1.2.1 Bridge Placement
1.2.2 Action
1.2.3 Bending Notes Off Pitch
1.3 How to Read the Tab
1.3.1 Reading Tablature
1.4 Timing
1.4.1 Time Signatures
1.4.2 Note Values and Counting
1.5 Fretting for a Clean Sound
1.5.1 You Can Do This!
1.5.2 Here's How It's Done
1.6 How to Use a Capo
1.6.1 Playing Familiar Arrangements in a Different Key
1.6.2 Using a Capo to Improve Intonation
Chapter 2: Basic Techniques
2.1 How to Use a Slide
2.1.1 Material, Mass, and Smoothness
2.1.2 Bottleneck Slide vs. Lap Steel
2.1.3 Which Finger to Wear the Slide On?
2.1.4 Clean Slide Playing: Pressure
2.1.5 Clean Slide Playing: String Damping
2.2 Embellishments
2.2.1 Hammer-Ons
2.2.2 Pull-Offs
2.2.3 Bends
2.3 Bright and Mellow Sounds
2.3.1 Harmonic Content and Timbre
2.3.2 Influencing the Harmonic Content
2.4 Natural and Artificial Harmonics
2.4.1 Creating Harmonics
2.4.2 Artificial Harmonics are Natural
2.5 Using Vibrato for an Organic Sound
2.5.1 Sterile vs. Organic Sounds
2.5.2 Vibrato on a Fretted string
2.5.3 Vibrato with a slide
2.5.4 Vibrato on an Open String
2.6 Incorporating Dynamics for Variety
2.6.1 Don't Put Me to Sleep!
2.7 Use Punctuation
2.7.1 Think About Telling a Story
Chapter 3: Fingerpicking with a Steady Bass
3.1 The Steady Bass
3.1.1 Blues Styles
3.1.2 My Bass Damping Trick
3.1.3 Steady Bass Licks
3.2 The Ten Mile Stomp
3.2.1 Where Do Songs Come From?
3.2.2 The Ten Mile Stomp
3.3 Incorporate Natural Sounds
3.3.1 Nature's Drummer
Chapter 4: A Little Music Theory
4.1 The Major Scale
4.1.1 Interval Pattern for the Major Scale
4.1.2 The Major Scale on the 3-String CBG
4.2 Chord Construction
4.2.1 Basic Chord Construction
4.2.2 Chords on the 3-String CBG
Chapter 5: The Blues
5.1 The 12-Bar Blues
5.1.1 The 12-Bar Form
5.1.2 Playing Through the 12-Bar Form
5.1.3 Adding a Pattern Pick and Simple Licks
5.2 The Blues Scale
5.2.1 The Blues Scale
5.2.1 Call/Response Filler Licks
5.3 12-Bar Solo
5.3.1 Combining Licks to Make a Solo
5.4 12-Bar Jam Session
5.4.1 Play What You Hear
Appendix A: List of Figures
Appendix B: List of Tables
Appendix C: Note Names by the Octave
Appendix D: Note Names and Pitches
Appendix E: Displaying G3 on the Oscilloscope
Appendix F: Capturing Oscilloscope Traces
Meet The Author
Other Books by Rick McKeon
Welcome!
Hi, I'm Rick McKeon, and I would like to welcome you to this exciting program about how to play the 3-string cigar box guitar!
In recent years the cigar box guitar has become very popular. The early blues musicians couldn't afford expensive instruments, so they built their own. Start with a cigar box, add a stick and some wire, and voila! You have a guitar to express your music.
Today cost may not be the most important factor, but there is a resurgence of these instruments. We are fascinated by how the early blues players got such expressive music from their simple instruments. But there's more to it than that. Here's the key:
––––––––
Less is more
––––––––
Having only three strings to work with might seem limiting, but its limitation is also its greatness! We need to make the most of what we have. This means that we need to play each note with expression and feeling. That's what makes the music come alive! The music has to come from the player, not just the instrument. This approach is an excellent way to realize that less can actually be more if you make it so!
In this book (together with the online video lessons) you will learn the basics of right and left hand technique, chord construction, fingerpicking and slide playing, together with jamming and improvising on the blues.
If you are interested in the technical stuff, or want to find a Figure or Table quickly you can jump right to the appendices.
We have an exciting musical adventure waiting for us. So, let's get started!
Chapter 1: The Basics
1.1 Strings and Tuning
1.1.1 Strings and Pitch
There are three