I'm guessing I'm not the only one whose shorthand for this or that technique or playing style is based on which musician I swiped it from. When it comes to slide, I think of open-position playing as the Ry Cooder sound, and closed-position playing as the Duane Allman sound.

In the case of Ry Cooder, that's a little inaccurate, because Ry Cooder definitely plays up the neck as well as in open position. And I imagine when Duane Allman was just hanging out, playing for himself, he had his share of open position slide chops, too.

But one of the big things that makes Ry Cooder sound like Ry Cooder is definitely his open-position stuff - the hammer-ons, the pulloffs, the funky single-note major and minor pentatonic moves. And what makes Duane Allman sound like Duane Allman is the way he completely retooled Elmore James' closed-position vocabulary with his own profoundly distinctive harmonica-inspired phrasing and impassioned lyrical sensibility.

Both of these are really valuable approaches. So if you want to improvise your own slide solos while playing fingerstyle guitar, the question is, how can you incorporate both of these sounds into your playing – while maintaining a consistent alternating-thumb bass at the same time?

For my money, the best way to do it goes like this: first, for either the open or the closed position, learn a handful of licks, just as single-note licks, without the thumb. Then look at how to make them work over an alternating thumb bass. And finally, when you can play a few licks in both open and in closed position, while keeping the bass going, that's when you can start working on connecting up licks in open position with licks closed position, and vice versa.

That's how we'll be doing it in my upcoming Slide Improvisation workshop this Saturday, May 18th. Over the course of this two-hour class, we'll look at how to build a vocabulary of licks in open position and up the neck, how to coordinate those licks with an alternating thumb bass, how to put those licks together into complete twelve-bar blues solos, and how to round those solos out with arranging tools like vamps and stop time.

You can still register for the workshop, at the link below. And an on-demand replay of the complete workshop will also be available for anyone who would like to take the class but can't be there for the actual live stream:

Register for the Slide Improvisation workshop

Meanwhile, today's Youtube lesson provides an overview of this whole idea, including examples of some of the licks and techniques that distinguish Ry Cooder from Duane Allman (and vice versa). You can find that video here:

Ry Cooder vs. Duane Allman

More soon,

David