Slide guitar

A style in which a hard object, usually a glass or metal tube, is moved along the strings to change pitch instead of the fingers stopping them.

The slide has no frets to land in, so intonation becomes a continuous skill and much of the character comes from the gliding between notes and from the microtonal shading around them. Notes are usually played with the strings open or in an open tuning, since a full barre across the strings is straightforward with a slide but fretting underneath it is not. Damping behind the slide is essential, because every unused string will ring otherwise.

Example: an open-tuned instrument played with a bottleneck gives the vocal, moaning sound that defines a great deal of early blues.

Slide guitar

See also