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john martyn tunings

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Mad Hippy

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Nov 11, 2001, 10:23:33 AM11/11/01
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I have been trying to track down some of the open guitar tunings and chords used by John Martyn on his early albums without success.

I know that he often used DADGAD but beyond that I have struggled to find more details.

Does anyone know of a site where tunings/chords/tabs etc are posted?? or are there any guitarists who've figured soem songs out and would be willing to share their efforts??
 

please mail me at :

 doc...@mail.com

cheers

simon.

kevinj.fitzgerald

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Nov 17, 2001, 1:44:53 PM11/17/01
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May You Never was in dropped D, DADGBE if this helps (played in D of course, but first chord A with the pinky on the 5th fret).
 
Hope this helps.
 
Kev

Hobgoblin Crawley

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Nov 23, 2001, 12:17:57 PM11/23/01
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Dear Simon,
          If you call our London branch on 02073239040 and ask for Dave Benton
he may be able to help as I know he can play some John Martyn.
           cheers Neil 

mark_bluemel

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Nov 23, 2001, 3:08:47 PM11/23/01
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(Follow-ups snipped...)

I've largely lost interest in John Martyn, post "Solid Air"!. But if you're
asking about the early stuff, my impression is that he uses a lot of
straight tuning (sometimes with dropped-D bass) and as you suggested DADGAD.
DADGAD underlies a lot of the early echo-plex work, I seem to remember.

"Over the Hill" is in Open Gminor (DGDGBbD) I think - that fits when I've
tried it and fits the fingering I saw him use 20-something years ago... You
can hold the main chords (G and Am) with one finger and then use the others
for all those hammer-on and pull-off bits.

I also half-remember him responding to a query from the audience - "what's
the tuning?" - with "take all the normal strings off a 12-string", so I
think he sometimes uses "Nashville"/"Angel"/"Hi-string" tuning.

I think "7 Black Roses" is in what a friend calls "D modal" - DADDAD. It's
actually fairly simple - you need one of those old-fashioned capos with the
stretchy strap so you can do all the key changes (slide the capo up and down
the neck!), and one of Adrian Legg's banjo tuning pegs would probably be
good for the detuning bit, though it looked like he played it on a clapped
out Yamaha (!) acoustic with (presumably) stock tuners when I saw him
perform it.

The only tab I can find on OLGA (www.olga.net) is "Back Down The River" in
CACGCE which is a new tuning to me...

Hope that helps...

Mark
--
"Bother!" said Pooh "Eyeore, ready two photon torpedoes and lock phasers on
the Heffalump, Piglet, meet me in transporter room three, Christopher
Robin, you have the bridge" (Found on the net, Author Unknown)
Mark Bluemel - Unix and Oracle Consultant; Musician and Caller
http://www.bluemel.org.uk Telephone 023 8077 1967


David Benton

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Nov 26, 2001, 1:51:52 PM11/26/01
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Hi,
I know John Martyn used DADGAD (but then who hasn't?) on some numbers. There was an article on him in a guitar mag somewhere, sometime. I recall it gave a tuning that was really odd  there were two adjacent strings tuned the same and there were lots of E's and A's but that's as close as I can get. I'll try and see if I can find the article.
 
Dave Benton
"Hobgoblin Crawley" <hobgo...@btconnect.com> wrote in message news:SrvL7.13152$JZ3.132528@NewsReader...

Mad Hippy

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Nov 29, 2001, 3:31:03 PM11/29/01
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Dear Simon,          If you call our London branch on 02073239040 and ask for Dave Bentonhe may be able to help as I know he can play some John Martyn.           cheers Neil

cheers for the tip neil!!!

simon
 
 

Mad Hippy

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Nov 29, 2001, 3:32:50 PM11/29/01
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hi dave,

i found an article about john (re: tunings amongst other things) would you like me to mail you the URL or a copy???
 

 docto...@mail.com
 

cheers

simon.
 

David Benton wrote:

Hi,I know John Martyn used DADGAD (but then who hasn't?) on some numbers. There was an article on him in a guitar mag somewhere, sometime. I recall it gave a tuning that was really odd  there were two adjacent strings tuned the same and there were lots of E's and A's but that's as close as I can get. I'll try and see if I can find the article. Dave Benton 

Mad Hippy

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Nov 29, 2001, 6:18:28 PM11/29/01
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oh BUGGER!!!!

i entered the wrong e-mail address in my last reply!!!

 docto...@mad.scientist.com

cheers

s.

Graham Gurrin

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Dec 7, 2001, 9:46:10 PM12/7/01
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Hi Simon

I think the site you are after is the John Martyn Guitar Freaks' Forum
at http://go.to/johnmartyn.gff This is the message on the home page:
The aim of this site is to provide tablature and playing notes to help
guitarists interested in learning some of John Martyn's unique
guitar-playing technique. Bit of a giveaway really...

There is also quite a lot of stuff in the Guitar Scores section of
John Hillarby's semi-official John Martyn web site at
http://www.hillarby.freeserve.co.uk/guitar.htm

Keep picking!

On Sun, 11 Nov 2001 15:23:33 +0000, Mad Hippy (who signs himself
Simon) <NoS...@address.inside.message> wrote:

>I have been trying to track down some of the open guitar tunings and
>chords used by John Martyn on his early albums without success.
>

(snip)

Take care,
Graham Gurrin

Ram Pages: web.ukonline.co.uk/graham.gurrin/ram
Folk on Line: web.ukonline.co.uk/graham.gurrin/fot

Mobile: 07971 881417

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