Prepared Guitar

Please check out my first actual song using prepared guitar! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wq1btO9vp6E

Inspired by Sonic Youth and Keith Rowe I decided to prepare my old electric guitar just to experiment a little. This is my first attempt.

Source: Wikipedia
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A prepared guitar is a guitar which has had its timbre altered by placing various objects on or between the instrument's strings, including other extended techniques. This practice is sometimes called tabletop guitar, because many prepared guitarists do not hold the instrument in the usual manner, but instead place the guitar on a table in order to manipulate it.

Not classified as a "preparation", but more as an extended technique is the slide guitar technique. However, with prepared guitars one of the key goals in preparing the instrument is changing its timbre the fundamental tone composition of the sound. This is typically achieved by placing objects on or under the strings. The objects can have a tone of their own, like for instance a pencil spring, but can also cause strange string resonance effects or behave like a seesaw and create echoing or buzzing effects after being struck and swinging like a balance. Many of the sounds sound more or less like clocks, bells or Non Western musical instruments of even non string percussion instruments.

The method of actually preparing the guitar was developed in the late 1960s by Keith Rowe, in imitation of Jackson Pollock's painting method and John Cage's prepared piano. Rowe developed various prepared guitar techniques: placing the guitar flat on a table and manipulating the strings, body and pickups in unorthodox ways to produce sounds described as dark, brooding, compelling, expansive and alien. He has been known to employ objects such as a library card, rubber eraser, springs, hand-held electric fans, alligator clips, and common office supplies in playing the guitar.

Another pioneer was Fred Frith. In 1974 he released a solo album called Guitar Solos. The album comprises eight tracks of unaccompanied and improvised music played on prepared guitars by Frith. The album was recorded using a modified 1936 Gibson K-11. Frith added an extra pickup over the strings at the nut, enabling him to amplify sound from both sides of the fretted note. He then split the fretboard in two with a capo, effectively giving him two guitars, each amplified separately, that he could play independently with each hand. To split the sounds further he attached alligator clips at various positions on the strings. The net result was a guitar with multiple sound sources that could be channeled to a mixer and distributed across the stereo soundscape.

Beginning in the 1970s, guitarist and luthier Hans Reichel made some unusual guitars with third bridge-like qualities.

Bradford Reed (pencilina), Glenn Branca, Fred Frith and the band Neptune also made other individually different types of experimental third bridge guitars. Yuri Landman derived a just intoned musical scale from an initially considered atonal prepared guitar playing technique based on adding a third bridge under the strings. He constructed an instrument called the Moodswinger with this scale. When this bridge is positioned in the noded positions of the harmonic series the volume of the instrument increases and the overtone becomes clear and has a consonant relation to the complementary opposed string part creating a harmonic multiphonic tone.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Experimental
• Experiment
• Keith
• Rowe
• Sonic
• Youth
• Noise
• Prepared
• Guitar

[flemmy]

only pretentious dorks listen to this garbage. i guess it's a little more fun to play it, but considering you're just making unintelligible noises...i doubt that too.

[MaxieMaxi]

@flemmy Not only pretentious dorks listen to this. There's nothing pretentious in honestly liking a genre of music. Also, speak for yourself. Why would I play this if I didn't think it was fun?

[bilos1993]

Try retuning it first.

D A D F# A D

[MaxieMaxi]

@bilos1993 The point of a prepared guitar is experimenting, making new sounds. Why would I need to tune my guitar? Besides, I like the dischord.

[dylantheworm808]

@MaxieMaxi you'll get different results, different sounds with new tunings. it's just another way to experiment. sonic youth used tons of different alternate tunings.

[MaxieMaxi]

@dylantheworm808 I don't think I used a tuning at all in this video, but I've experimented with tunings alot. My favourite is GBDGBD

[raqugo123]

no mames que buen sonido sacas carnal, q ampli usaste? me podrias pasar las tablaturas?

[Dillinify]

Hey guys, quit complaining. It's not supposed to be music- it's just a demonstration. And even it it was, you have no right to judge someone for their personal musical preference.

[Strublenator]

You would be the worst child to parent, lol.

[Hentaifreak50]

@MaxieMaxi EXACTLY. No one in their right mind really gets why I sit in my basement with a broken guitar sticking various objects in between the strings and hitting it with a hammer.

[Hentaifreak50]

Thats basically what I do!

[JukeboxHeartbreak91]

soooo good.

[MrWtfnonames123]

Great job! thank you very much for sharing, keep up the awesome work. Check out Pico Dorado on youtube, there are a couple young prepared guitarists that participate in the project!

[Molagbal38]

That's pretty fucking cool.

[jacbenj]

that is actually awesome, how did you prepare the guitar?

[sk8ajoe89]

For some reason... I can imagine Frank Zappa doing something like this if he were alive.