OUGD505 - Research

Fingerstyle:

Unobtrusive 
Whats it for? political? 
Disciplin 
representation

What is it?

• It is a technique of playing the guitar by plucking the strings directly with the fingertips, fingernails, or picks attached to fingers.
• Music for fingerstyle playing can include chords, arpeggios (the notes of a chord played one after the other, as opposed to simultaneously) and other elements such as artificial harmonics, hammering on and pulling off notes, using the body of the guitar percussively, etc.
• This enables singer-guitarists to accompany themselves, and it enables smaller groups which have only a single guitarist to use one guitarist to provide all of these musical elements.
• Fingerpicking is a standard technique on the classical or nylon string guitar, but is considered more of a specialised technique on steel string guitars. Fingerpicking is less common on electric guitars, except in the heavy metal music virtuoso style of lead guitar playing known as shred guitar.

A bit of history:

Fingerstyle guitar is more often than not thought of as a style rather than a technique of playing the guitar, however it can be argued that it is a technique rather than a style as it can be used across many different music genres.
The technique came from the lute and vihuela which are distant cousins of the guitar.

The vihuela:

• Guitar like instrument commonly found in Spain, Portugal and Italy.
• Dates back to the 15th century.
• Same tuning as the modern day guitar except the third string being tuned down a half step from G to F#.
• Scale technique is known as the Chet Atkins style. It consists of alternating between the thumb and index fingers and is the same technique used as the lute.  

The Lute:

• Played throughout Europe.
• Unknown when it dates back to but it is believed to be at least the 12th century.
• Scale technique is known as the Chet Atkins style. It consists of alternating between the thumb and index fingers and is the same technique used as the vihuela. 

There are many artists involved in the shaping of fingerstyle guitar playing.

Below is a list from the website; http://www.fingerstyleguitar.com/history.php, listing a few of the most important artists.

Traditional Thumb-Style:

• Chet Atkins
• Thom Bresh
• Ike Everley
• Tommy Flint
• Bobby Gibson
• Mose Rager
• Jerry Reed
• Bob Saxton
• Merle Travis
• Paul Yandell

Steel-String Greats:

• Peppino D'Agostino
• Pierre Bensusan
• Pat Danohue
• Alex de Grassi
• Tommy Emmanuel
• Laurence Juber
• Martin Simpson

Classical Greats:

• Julian Bream
• Christopher Parkening
• Pepe Ramero
• David Russell
• Andres Segovia
• The Los Angeles Guitar Quartet

Latin Guitarists:

• Laurinado Almedia
• Sergio and Odiar Assad
• Barrios
• Paulo Beelinati
• Manuel Barrueco
• Carlos Barbosa Lima
• Jorge Morel
• Marco Pereira
• Baden Powell

Flamenco:

• Paco de Lucia
• Carlos Montoya
• Paco Pena
• Sabicas

Jazz:

• Lenny Breau
• Ted Greene
• Earl Klugh
• Lorne Lofsky
• Jim Nichols
• Joe Pass
• Martin Taylor
• George Van Eps

Ragtime and Folk:

• Duck Baker
• Stephen Grossman
• Ernie Hawkins
• Leo Kottke
• Guy Van Duser

Blues:

• Rev. Gary Davis
• Blind Boy Fuller
• Lightin' Hopkins
• Son House
• Blind Lemon Jefferson
• Robert Johnson

Important Authors and Arrangers:

• Jim Ferguson
• Jody Fisher
• Sid Hudson
• John Knowles
• Howard Morgen
• Bill Piburn
• Stanley Yates

Example piece of fingerstyle music.