Confusing terminology

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Stevo on March 2, 2012 at 2:09am

Black diamond strings?

Like diamonds and rust"

Like diamonds on the soles of her shoes?

Chicken picking = tirando? There is a similarity, but it's different. Hence the different name.

Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on March 2, 2012 at 11:03am

Tirando with a little more up? I oversimplified that one. And I don't think I've seen anyone recently except for a classical guitarist use apoyando for a rapid run of notes, though I can't play passages any faster any other way.

Permalink Reply by Toni on March 2, 2012 at 9:49am

Tirando? Is that something you do with your pulgar?

Maybe a guitar diamond is what you get when you burn the guitar down to charcoal, then squeeze it really, really hard at high temperature until all the carbon atoms link as tetrahedrons.

Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on March 2, 2012 at 12:25pm

It's a conspiracy. The guitars will all have to be made of carbon fiber as international treaties to prevent guitar manufacturers from using exotic hardwoods become more enforcable. And we'll all start having to play our carbon fiber guitars through modeling pods as some well meaning but clueless bureaucrats will eventually interpret incandescent bulb legislation to prohibit vacuum tubes from being manufactured or sold. :D

Permalink Reply by Stevo on March 2, 2012 at 1:20pm

No! No!

CA guitars are pretty decent sounding. Still not wood though.

I recently talked to a local guy who's fairly high up in the musical food chain - he does a lot of recording for folks and gigs around the country - and he plays through an Axe-Fx and loves it. However, he readily admitted that it's not a true replacement for a good tube amp and that you can tell the difference. He's actually starting to like the Fractal better because it's got a much wider spectrum and sounds more "hi-fi" to him. 

Guitar Diamond - the little inlays on some fretboards? A special guitar that was built for Elvis - diamond studded? A new kind of pick? A diamond pendant that's shaped like a guitar?

Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on March 2, 2012 at 2:27pm

My problem with using the Fractal unit is that eventually the sound must run through a cone, and mine our better than the PA we're currently using. So even with the Fractal, in order to get a convincing presentation, I'll still have to use stage volume. We're in no position to upgrade our sound system right now. In ref to the OP, still haven't found any references for "diamond" as some sort of guitar technique. There's no natural or artificial guitar harmonics audible on the reference track, so it's not that. There aren't any melodic fills from the guitar to speak of, so it's not that.

 

Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on March 2, 2012 at 6:06pm

"are" not "our". Carbon-based spell-checker fault.

Permalink Reply by Stevo on March 2, 2012 at 1:21pm

I like Bulgar...

Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on March 2, 2012 at 2:41pm

Maybe I've found my own answer to the question I've posed. I found some reference to strumming notation, in which half notes or greater are indicated by a diamond shape, with whole notes having no stem: . So instead of saying don't strum, just hold the chords through the changes, we say "play guitar diamonds" now, I suppose. Having never used strumming notation, never would have made the connection. I guess I learn something new every day. I guess that's the drawback of learning to read music first, rather than learning strumming and chord charts.

Permalink Reply by Stevo on March 2, 2012 at 3:40pm

I don't think you missed either way. I started with folk style and then learned to read music. I've still never seen that. But I have confirmed your find. I've never felt the need to do what notation tells me anyhow. The point of not reading notation is that you don't have to copy the original recording. But whatever, at least I know what this is about. Whew, that was quite a journey. 

http://totalguitarist.com/lessons/technique/chords/strumming/intro/

Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on July 1, 2012 at 1:44am

Thank you, but after realizing what the cue meant, I knew that I already familiar with basic rhythmic notation. The confusing part was that they wrote out the cue, "play guitar diamonds". Is that the most common way of saying "play sustained chords", or were they just trying to use buzzwords?

Permalink Reply by David Loeffler on June 30, 2012 at 11:16pm

Glad to see you found what it means and that will help me because I only strum, no lead yet.

As I was reading before I saw the answer my answer was going to be play a guitar with Diamond inlays on the fretboard, I have two like that!!!!!!