The Chris Smither Complete Package – Keb’ Mo’
Chris Smither has made a terrific lesson for everyone interested in taking traditional blues guitar style and incorporating it into a contemporary setting. He has perfected the art of combining the fingerpicking he first learned from the music of Lightnin’ Hopkins, Skip James, Brownie McGhee and other country blues masters with groove-driven original songs that are as current as today’s news.
Chris takes apart some of his most requested songs, slowing them down and analysing his arrangements for the learning guitarist. Chock full of musical advice, clarity and good humor, this lesson will add powerful licks and interesting ideas to your song accompaniments and blues technique.
You’ll learn the bass-line shuffle groove of Link of Chain, the sliding harmony figures of Happier Blue and a load of great riffs to pull them together (including Chris’s trademark use of his feet for rhythm accompanyment). Moving into open D tuning, he gets deeply into Hold On, with its bluesy vibrato, bends and hammer-ons, while Roly Salley’s heart-wrenching Killin’ the Blues (one of Chris’ most requested covers) highlights his ballad accompaniment. Back to standard tuning, Chris takes apart the Skip James-type lick that’s at the heart of Can’t Shake These Blues, and then closes with a Delta-style The Devil’s Real.
DVD Two: Chris Smither Teaches Six Outstanding Fingerpicking Arrangements
Chris Smither’s foot-tapping, high-groove guitar style and blues-inflected songs have kept him in the top ranks of singer/songwriters for four decades. On this DVD lesson he shows you how he uses his alternating thumb and syncopated two-finger picking, along with a variety of left hand techniques, to create the rhythmic drive and distinctive harmonies that distinguish his unique arrangements.
No Love Today (“The Fruit and Vegetable Song”), a rich evocation of old New Orleans street life, is one of Chris’ most requested songs; Drive You Home Again, a moody minor-key blues, is the title song of one of his best-selling CDs; Bob Dylan’s titanic Visions of Johanna gets a new treatment; the humorous Get a Better One features infectious single note riffs against a steady bass groove; Leave the Light On is joyous, straight-ahead fingerpicking in open D; Lightnin’ Hopkins’ “spooky” Blues in the Bottle is played and taught on both 12-string and 6-string guitars.
Chris’ wry humor and deep understanding of traditional styles help to make this an outstanding guitar lesson for all fingerpicking enthusiasts.
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