Ol' Joe Clark- Intermediate Arrangement

Ol’ Joe Clark On Guitar

Intermediate Arrangement

Howdy Bluegrass and guitar lovers. This months lesson series will be all about the tune Ol’ Joe Clark. I’ve created an intermediate arrangement for the tune. Although I do feel if you’ve been flat-picking a short while this may be a good tune to push your playing to a new level. I hope you’ve enjoyed the lessons so far. I really excited about showing you guys this tune because it’s one of the first fiddle tunes I learned and it has a lot of room for some popular Tony Rice licks. The melody for Ol’ Joe Clark is rather easy and often can be played with little alternate picking, so this is a good lesson for learning how to fill in the measures with consecutive eighth notes. This arrangement will give you an idea of how to fill up each measure with notes while still giving you time to breath and not become over-whelmed. I am very excited so say I’ve integrated tabs on to the screen! This is such a powerful way to learn. You will have a close up for the left and right hand while I move along two or four measures at a time. If somethings trips you up just pause the video and look at the tabs. Great, isn’t it?! I plan to have tabs or chords on the screen for every lesson/post that we do. I trying my best to make learning easy for my students out there and I know this will help. Good ahead and dig in!

Things to Watch For:

1. The A section is very straight ahead. I feel like the trick measure will be the 1st and 2nd ending. There is not many notes involved but make sure you are getting that “droan” sound. You are playing G notes on two different strings. So, make sure you know which string your hitting and that your counting is correct.

2. Make sure in the first measure of the B part you are playing the correct notes. I know that sounds obviously but again you’re playing a G note on two different strings multiple times and it’s very easy to get lost.

3. In the 4th measure of the B section you will be doing of pull-offs so watch your pick direction closely. In this measure you will be using a double-down stroke.

4. In the second to last measure and the 2nd ending of the B section I’ve placed a nice little bluesy lick. Feel free to use this lick in other fiddle tunes at the end of the phrase or other songs when working out of “G position.”

5. Lastly, I don’t talk about it much but master the “droning” effect you getting when you play two G notes together. This happens in the first and second ending of the A section, the first measure of the B section, the fifth measure of the B section, and the first ending of the B section. This “move” happens a lot and it will really begin to give you that Bluegrass guitar sound when done correctly.

6. Practice s-l-o-w-l-y!.

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