you get to the next chord change sometimes I
just stay on that note. Then when you get to the
third chord change and it’s time to change the
note it means more when you play it after letting
a few bars go by. And that’s where I live as a
guitar player, always thinking about how long
I can stay on a note through a couple of bars
before I move. Maybe you get to that 2 minor,
can I still live on the root note and get by with it?
Does that help add some tension to the song?
Because if you just play every single chord of
the Christmas song with the piano, if everyone
is just playing every single chord, it can really
start to feel a little stale.
For me it’s always finding just a little melody or
guitar line that doesn’t take away from the song,
that doesn’t steer you away from Christmas,
but it can make it sound more interesting.
Some of it’s preferences, somebody else might
prefer to play every single chord (laughs) but I
guess that’s just where my head is at.
[WM] Do you tend to look at chords more from
the ‘cowboy chord’ CAGED based approach,
from a seven-note diatonic approach placing
chords up and down the neck, or a combination
Christmastime we would play the same four or and uplifting. I think that’s one thing about
five songs that we all as a band came to expect Christmas music, there are a few songs that are
Chris to want to play in church. At the time, we a little more haunting and mysterious sounding
didn’t have any arrangements, it was just kind where you could use some darker tones, but a
of like Chris on his acoustic and we were just lot of Christmas music is a celebration. So, you
going to try it as a band. So, I started playing want your parts to feel bright and exciting and
this highbred version of the melody to the verse hopefully full of color. I don’t really know how
for “Angels We Have Heard on High”, but I felt to describe that. But I think that’s what’s going
cheesy just playing the exact melody on guitar. on in my brain. I’m treating the songs with little
You know what that feels like, if you play the parts and stuff. Finding these little moments
exact melody of the song on the guitar (like in with the chord or with the melody where if
a solo fashion) it can sound a bit like elevator the traditional melody is this full F# minor 7 or
music. I didn’t want it to feel like that, I wanted it something, that may feel like too much in this
to sound like the song, and that’s the trick, you moment. I’ll find this little two note pattern up
want the guitar part to sound like the song so high with a little bit of reverb or something. And
when you hear it you know the song. that’ll just help glue the whole thing together, so
it doesn’t just feel like a total departure from the
So, it’s sort of this weird headspace you’ve got
kind of music we would normally make.
to get in where it’s like, I want this to sound
Christmassy, but I still want the guitar tone to So maybe just playing one note over a chord
be aggressive, or I want the part to feel exciting as opposed to playing a full chord. Then when
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December 2018
of the two?
[Daniel] I think a lot of players are finding
their way through the fret board, as they’re
learning how to see it and how to visualize it.
The CAGED thing was not a familiar term to me
when I was learning guitar, so I had never heard
of that. I don’t even know if it was around. I
don’t know if that’s a more modern term.
But the way I really learned that was from using
a capo. I think I kind of accidentally learned my
own version of the CAGED system, which was
more like the ‘capo’ system (laughing). I think
a lot of that came from always accompanying
another guitarist, I was always playing with
Chris or someone else. So, it was finding that
second chord shape, like if he’s playing a more
traditional chord down low, like a G chord or
something. For me, once I learned that you
could capo on three and play E, or capo on
five and play D, or capo seven and play C,
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