On The Beat - Episode 730 - Weekly Guitar Video News Wrap Up November 3, 2023

[TGNeil]

November 3, 2023

This week I finished a couple instrumental fingerpicking lessons, one of which I started over 6 years ago, and another that I have messed around with for about 40 years before it was suggested to make a lesson of it. Gaslight Rag by Dave Van Ronk was the first and Mrs. Brown, You've Got A Lovely Daughter by Herman's Hermits was the second. Gaslight would qualify as and advanced piece and Mrs. Brown is a bit easier, as long as you are comfortable with a lot of barre chords.

I also fired up our old Fly On The Wall series with a couple new additions: Fred working on The Christmas Song and Rob starting to learn Sugar Mountain. Both of these lessons are free to everybody to enjoy. You just have to login to your account to see them.

Today's musical tangents included a bit of Mrs. Brown, I Know You Rider, Dallas Rag, and a Name That Tune of a lesson I am considering, which I will heavily consider if anyone watching identifies it by its very unusual opening chord.

Neil

[carolm242]

Gotta love a good chord naming challenge (Time stamp 8:40)

The "Mystery Chord" looks like you are playing strings XO987O, which would translate to A-B-D#-F#-e.
From the clues you gave in the video, it looks to be a B-major chord with the A in the Bass. However that high e adds to the challenge of naming this chord...
Since the e natural note is the 4th degree of a Bmajor scale I'm going to say it's a B4/A, or really since that e is in the next octave, it could also be a Badd11/A?
It's a real pretty chord with the fingerstyle picking pattern. I don't know what song it's from, but it kinda reminds me of the intro to Kathy's Song, where they play a C-shape in 3rd position (really a D major chord) but they also pick the open strings (Would that be a D11?)
Anyway I can't wait to hear the entire obscure song this chord is from. And also can't wait to find out what the name of the chord is

[TGNeil]

Carol,

Thanks for getting involved. You are really close, 90% I would say. The number 4 is usually only used in suspended chords. So if the third is there, the 4th usually is considered an 11th.

The 'C' shape in Kathy's song (also in Sugar Mountain) is also close to D11 but not quite. Keep working on them.

Here is another chord from the same song -

133200

Neil

[brennanmichaelj71258]

Hello Neil,

As usual, I really enjoyed this week's update and was floored by your mystery chord! Is it from "You Set the Scene" by Love? When I was a college d.j. in the early eighties, I found "Forever Changes" way back in the stacks. It quickly became part of my rotation. I look forward to your answer; if I'm right, cool. If I'm wrong I'm very interested to know which song it is.

Cheers
Mike

[TGNeil]

Hi Mike,

I knew somebody out there would be up on Love and Arthur Lee. I was in the middle of this lesson a couple days ago and then got sidetracked by something else I hope to finish today or tomorrow. It won't be long for this one though.

Neil

[brennanmichaelj71258]

Looking forward to it!

Thanks Neil.