How do you play guitar like django?

Answer 1

Hi there, first off - I don't have the answer to this but I have been giving it some thought since last October. I have been playing for 30 years - folk, blues, ragtime, rock etc. but took a notion to try and play more Django style guitar. The following thoughts stem from my efforts of the last 6 months.

Here are my thoughts

1: Log on to YouTube, look for clips from gypsy players - Lollo Meier, Angelo Debarre, Tchavolo Schmidt and the rest. Watch these guys playing - they provide inspiration and free lessons in how to hold the plectrum, getting a good rythm going etc.

2. Refer back to Django - because as good as the aforementioned players are - he is the source and sometimes what he plays is much simpler in terms of number of notes but in terms of harmonic and melodic invention it's just so rich

3. Download some lessons from the web, learn some runs and patterns, practice these and then expriment with them. Listen to recorded tracks by Django et al and you'll start to hear how the runs/patterns are used, re-used and adapted in various ways 4. Learn the relevant chords, find a book or on the web. These are different chords from what we'd normally use. Often they're only three notes and may not even include the root note. Also work out the inversions. Eg play the notes b/f/a/d and you have a g7 with an added 6th but no root. 5. Learn basic chord structures and understand the relationships in interval terms between the notes in each chord - eg 1,3,5 rathe rather than C,E,G for the chord of C 6. Learn about chord substitutions- eg a G6 chord is so similar to an Em that the two can be interchanged or subsituted. Or Am6 and D7 etc. 6. Play along with records, improvise, have fun 7 Abandon your previous method of holding a plectrum. You gotta buy a thick heavy plectrum which you grip like a vice. I dont mean a thick Dunlop or Gibson plecturm I mean a THICK ( 3 or 4 mm) plectrum. This will hurt like hell for a while - again check out the youtube and otehr vids and you'll get the picture 8. Buy a Gypsy guitar but dont get caught up in the must have the best possible guitar spiral, buy the best you can afford but dont be fooled into thinking that a better guitar will make you a better player. Be more concerned about developing your sound through your own technique. Obviously a better guitar will sound better but this whole thing is about what you play as well. I get a stunning sound from $60 1996 Yairi classical guitar. 9. Don't be put off by the blistering speed merchants you'll see all over the place. That will come later - at least that's what I tell myself. 10. Practice practice practice - and do it with enthusiam and love. 11. Take the advice offered in books and on the web. but remember this: much of what is offered is analytical. By that I mean people have dissected what Django and others played and they do it using musical theory etc. to explain it. Django just felt this stuff in his bones. In the Dregni biog of Django it's clear that Django was uncluttered by the strictures of theory etc. and just played from the heart and for sheer joy. Do the same.