From: owner-wanderer-digest@smoe.org (wanderer-digest) To: wanderer-digest@smoe.org Subject: wanderer-digest V2 #1 Reply-To: wanderer@smoe.org Sender: owner-wanderer-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-wanderer-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk wanderer-digest Saturday, January 5 2002 Volume 02 : Number 001 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Robert Johnson on Mars ["Paul Castle" ] Re: Robert Johnson on Mars [Susan McNamara ] Re: Robert Johnson on Mars ["Michael Paz" ] Re: Robert Johnson on Mars ["Marian" ] Re: Robert Johnson on Mars ["Paul Castle" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 18:17:40 -0000 From: "Paul Castle" Subject: Robert Johnson on Mars I recently had an e-mail from Warren Allen, whose 'alternate tunings' webpage link I posted on the list last week, asking if I knew whether Joni had ever learnt to play the guitar in standard tuning (on his site he quotes from Mark Hanson's book 'The Alternate Tunings Guide for Guitar' (Amsco Publications, 1991) that Joni Mitchell "has always played only in alternate tunings. She has never learned to play in standard tuning." Doing some research I found an article from 'Acoustic Guitar' magazine (August 1996) - http://www.jmdl.com/articles/docs/9608ag.cfm - which states that "only two of her songs 'Tin Angel' and 'Urge for Going' are in standard tuning." Does anyone on the list know if this is correct? I also found the following about her guitar style - in an interview with English guitarist Martin Simpson in Guitar Player (Feb 1995), http://www.jmdl.com/articles/docs/9502gp.cfm which I thought some might enjoy: JM: "When I'm writing, I put the guitar in the tuning first of all-- sometimes a familiar tuning. I have 50 of them now. Sometimes I get lost going between one and the other, and I find a new one. Then I have an adventure ahead of me because I have to figure out the shapes in it in order to retrieve the composition. Once I find six or seven chords, I begin to arrange them in an attractive manner. Because of the way I play now I can't really remember the whole chronology of it. I tend to think of the top three strings as muted trumpets, or the high end of an orchestra--horn stops. I think of the midrange as viola, I guess not violins--but the orchestra's mid-register, say French horn and viola. The thumb is a very sparse, eccentric bass line. Timewise the thumb can play vertically while the rest of the fingers are swinging, which gives a funny kind of Senegalese quality to my shuffle, as if my thumb is playing a monkey chant and the rest of me is swinging somewhere in the U.S.A.--like Robert Johnson on Mars." PaulC np 'Urge for Going' by Shawn Colvin ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 13:23:54 -0500 From: Susan McNamara Subject: Re: Robert Johnson on Mars At 6:17 PM +0000 1/4/02, Paul Castle wrote: >Doing some research I found an article from 'Acoustic Guitar' magazine >(August 1996) - http://www.jmdl.com/articles/docs/9608ag.cfm - which >states that "only two of her songs 'Tin Angel' and 'Urge for Going' are in >standard tuning." > >Does anyone on the list know if this is correct? Yes, although since 1996 she also wrote "Havana in Harlem" in standard tuning. As far as I know, those are the only 3 songs in standard. >"Because of the way I play now I can't really remember >the whole chronology of it. I tend to think of the top three strings >as muted trumpets, or the high end of an orchestra--horn stops. >I think of the midrange as viola, I guess not violins--but the >orchestra's mid-register, say French horn and viola. The thumb >is a very sparse, eccentric bass line. Timewise the thumb can >play vertically while the rest of the fingers are swinging, which >gives a funny kind of Senegalese quality to my shuffle, as if my >thumb is playing a monkey chant and the rest of me is swinging >somewhere in the U.S.A.--like Robert Johnson on Mars." > This is why I love Joni Mitchell...her creativity sends chills up my spine!!! great quote, Paul. thanks, sue PS when did Shawn Colvin cover Urge for Going? Where can I find that? - -- "Heart and humor and humility will lighten up your heavy load ... " - Joni Mitchell ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 12:55:25 -0600 From: "Michael Paz" Subject: Re: Robert Johnson on Mars I think she plays Harlem in Havana in standard tuning as well. I can't think of any other stuff maybe some of the unreleased early stuff. Michael - ----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul Castle" To: "jmdl" ; "The Wanderer" Sent: Friday, January 04, 2002 12:17 PM Subject: Robert Johnson on Mars > I recently had an e-mail from Warren Allen, whose 'alternate tunings' > webpage link I posted on the list last week, asking if I knew whether > Joni had ever learnt to play the guitar in standard tuning (on his site he > quotes from Mark Hanson's book 'The Alternate Tunings Guide for Guitar' > (Amsco Publications, 1991) that Joni Mitchell "has always played only > in alternate tunings. She has never learned to play in standard tuning." > > Doing some research I found an article from 'Acoustic Guitar' magazine > (August 1996) - http://www.jmdl.com/articles/docs/9608ag.cfm - which > states that "only two of her songs 'Tin Angel' and 'Urge for Going' are in > standard tuning." > > Does anyone on the list know if this is correct? > > I also found the following about her guitar style - in an interview > with English guitarist Martin Simpson in Guitar Player (Feb 1995), > http://www.jmdl.com/articles/docs/9502gp.cfm which I thought some > might enjoy: > > JM: "When I'm writing, I put the guitar in the tuning first of all-- > sometimes a familiar tuning. I have 50 of them now. Sometimes > I get lost going between one and the other, and I find a new one. > Then I have an adventure ahead of me because I have to figure > out the shapes in it in order to retrieve the composition. Once > I find six or seven chords, I begin to arrange them in an attractive > manner. Because of the way I play now I can't really remember > the whole chronology of it. I tend to think of the top three strings > as muted trumpets, or the high end of an orchestra--horn stops. > I think of the midrange as viola, I guess not violins--but the > orchestra's mid-register, say French horn and viola. The thumb > is a very sparse, eccentric bass line. Timewise the thumb can > play vertically while the rest of the fingers are swinging, which > gives a funny kind of Senegalese quality to my shuffle, as if my > thumb is playing a monkey chant and the rest of me is swinging > somewhere in the U.S.A.--like Robert Johnson on Mars." > > PaulC > > np 'Urge for Going' by Shawn Colvin ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 23:12:43 +0100 From: "Marian" Subject: Re: Robert Johnson on Mars I'm sure that Joni knows how to play in standard tuning. I think before she started composing her own songs, she performed a lot of folk tunes. Supposedly only three of her compositions are in standard - the two you mention and Harlem In Havanah. Marian Vienna - ---------- Original Message ---------------------------------- From: "Paul Castle" Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 18:17:40 -0000 >I recently had an e-mail from Warren Allen, whose 'alternate tunings' >webpage link I posted on the list last week, asking if I knew whether >Joni had ever learnt to play the guitar in standard tuning (on his site he >quotes from Mark Hanson's book 'The Alternate Tunings Guide for Guitar' >(Amsco Publications, 1991) that Joni Mitchell "has always played only >in alternate tunings. She has never learned to play in standard tuning." > >Doing some research I found an article from 'Acoustic Guitar' magazine >(August 1996) - http://www.jmdl.com/articles/docs/9608ag.cfm - which >states that "only two of her songs 'Tin Angel' and 'Urge for Going' are in >standard tuning." > >Does anyone on the list know if this is correct? ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 00:52:14 -0000 From: "Paul Castle" Subject: Re: Robert Johnson on Mars >> quotes from Mark Hanson's book 'The Alternate Tunings Guide for Guitar' >> (Amsco Publications, 1991) that Joni Mitchell "has always played only >> in alternate tunings. She has never learned to play in standard tuning."> Penny wrote: > The last sentence of this statement is not correct according to a first > hand aquaintance of mine. Thanks for the story, Penny - lucky guy!!! Thanks also - Sue, Michael and Marian - for confirmation of the standard tuning songs. I found this in an interview Joni did with DJ Tony Hale on London's Capital Radio for a show called 'Rock Master Class (London, England, December 29, 1985) see http://www.jmdl.com/articles/docs/851229rmc.cfm >>>>>> TH: You don't tune a guitar the same way -- the conventional tuning, E, A, D, G, B, E, I don't think, do you? JM: Well, when I started playing guitar -- I'm trying to think now when I got my first six-string guitar. I guess it was probably 1964. It was a nylon string, it had a classical neck, a wide neck on it, and at that time I played in standard tuning. It wasn't until I began to write my own songs that I began to crave chords that I didn't have the dexterity with my left hand to make. The voicings that I heard, the music that I wanted to make, I simply couldn't get out. And it was a frustration because, you know, I could learn your F chord and your G chord, and your minor, and a couple of things like that, but after a while there was no -- it seemed like every variation or combination of chords had already been a well-traveled course. It was Eric Anderson that showed me some of the first open tunings in the coffee houses in those days. Open G, D Modal, Open E, which I guess is the same as Open -- Open G, Open D -- pure major chords, anyway, were used among some of the people who played more blues oriented folk music. And so I learned those. And then I began to hybrid them. And the only person I knew that was also doing that at the same time was Buffy St. Marie who had developed some interesting-sounding chords with more modal than major or minor, and that modality drew my ear." >>>> PaulC PS. I know what Joni means by "it seemed like every variation or combination of chords had already been a well-traveled course." Only now, almost 40 years later, most of us find it hard to come up with an 'open tuning' that doesn't sound like "one of Joni Mitchell's"!!! ------------------------------ End of wanderer-digest V2 #1 ****************************