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A DIY capo hack to turn 6 strings into 12: tune to DADGAD, capo at 11fr, and pluck on ‘both sides of the bar’ for some hyper-resonant harmonic magic. Transform your guitar into a microtonal harp!

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• What is ‘double-side’ capoing? Accidental harp creations
• Two-faced fretboard theory: Concepts of the double guitar
• Why is ‘DADGAD cp.11’ special? Mellifluosity & microtonality
• Further ‘capo + tuning’ combos: Improving our quest methods
• List of melodious ‘double-sides’: A non-exhaustive rundown
• Third-bridging guitar explorers: Frith, Johansen, & Kaki King
• Side note: (un-)musical politicians: Boris, Nixon, Blair, Sankara
• More multi-bridge instruments: Guzheng, koto, & dulcimer
• Further questions & resources: Taking this zone forward!

• What is ‘double-siding’? •

The ‘dark sides of the strings’…

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Recently, I gave an ‘introduction to capos’ lesson to a young Zoom student. After we’d transposed a few of their favourite Gen-Z joys, they asked me how high the capo could go. I showed how it depends on mechanism, neck shape, and so forth – managing to get mine up to 11fr for a fairly silly end-of-session demo.

 

After logging off, I returned to my tuning research, writing about DADGAD. Or, rather, I intended to…but quickly became distracted by the urge to mess around in the tuning rather than just read about it, picking up my steel-string and leaving the high capo on for some exploratory variety. After tuning, I briefly strummed across the ‘other sides of the strings’ (i.e. behind the capo), wanting to check if any had been unduly misaligned or overtensed by the downward pressure of such a high bar. To my surprise, the accidental combination sounded like this:

 

The fact that you can play on ‘both sides of the bar’ is itself nothing to shout about (if you’ve capoed high or played slide, you’ve probably stumbled on the same effect). But the magic of ‘double DADGAD cp.11’ is unique and immediately captivating – as if you can’t help but summon up a hazy, ethereal dose of vibratory mist with every touch of either side (whoever thought that playing a 12-string microtonal harp could be so straightforward…and so cheap!).

 

Naturally, I lay zero claim to having inventing this technique – e.g. avant-garde axeman Fred Frith has been doubling for decades, and Sonic Youth have been known to wedge pencils, screwdrivers, and other objects between their strings (more below). But I felt I should share this particular combo – and also conceptualise the area a bit, to help uncover how we might find other promising ‘double-sides’…

 

• Two-faced fretboard theory •

What is unique about ‘double-siding’? How can we usefully think about it?

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The ‘double-siding’ idea is a form of ‘third bridge‘ technique (as in, ‘bridge + nut + something inbetween’). By splitting each string into two separate vibrating lengths, you get the notes produced by ‘either side’ of the capoed fret: i.e. 11fr gives you ‘0 to 10′ as well as ’11 upwards’ (the one capoed fretspace itself is the only ‘dead zone’). This effectively turns 6 strings into 12 – opening up fresh zones of harmonic fascination.

 

Intriguingly, this method also adds a microtonal tinge. Our fret distances are only measured out for ‘normal’ playing – so plucking on the ‘other sides’ will produce curious frequencies, unavailable anywhere on the usual fretboard (for one thing, the frets get wider as you move higher in pitch…). In the context of our ‘DADGAD 11fr’ example: there’s no ‘right-way-round’ fretting position which gives the exact same vibrating length as ‘dark side 0-10fr’ (i.e. behind the capo) – so it rings with a higher microtone, roughly a quarter-tone sharp of the nearest ‘normal’ note due to the differing fret spacings on the dark side.

 

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• Microtonal deviations (RH open > RH 3fr > LH open):

—Capo squeeze-sharpening—

Hear how ‘messy’ the sound is? There are a range of reasons for this – e.g. each separation interval is slightly ‘widened’ by the downward pressure of the capo. In fact, this is inescapable – it’s impossible for a capo to work properly if it exerts zero ‘bending’ pressure (e.g. see how James Taylor compensates for this). Thus, all the cent values calculated below are actually a little flat of their ‘real-world’ frequencies: with the effect being more pronounced at thinner frets (which provide less space for the same vertical ‘squeeze’), and with thicker/slacker strings (larger shapes get ‘squashed’ more, and looser strings experience greater pitch-warp for the same absolute tension change).

 

This adds a further harmonic scattering to our scenario – as the capo will have a unique effect on each string (typically, the thick 6str is ‘squeeze-sharpened’ more than the 1st). Even without a capo, each string will be further sharpened by the ‘inharmonicity’ of its own oscillation – essentially, a vibration is itself a form of ‘bend’, and all bends raise pitch (again, more pronounced with thicker, heavier, denser gauges: which behave like inflexible ‘cylinders’ rather than idealised ‘zero-mass’ lengths). While we could also try to formalise this zone of guitar physics, the exercise would be too messy to bring much true value: e.g. different scale lengths, fretboard curves, and capo designs will bring all manner of unique combinational quirks (e.g. I wedged some hard paper strips underneath the nut, so as to stop the darksides buzzing against their frets: and also, the guitar I used is old, worn, and slightly neck-warped…).

 

• Why is ‘DADGAD cp.11’ so effective? •

Maybe I could answer better if I hadn’t found it by accident – however, several clear factors underlie its magic:

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—Mellifluoisity—

It forms a coherent melodic sequence right away. If you take the most intuitive ascending path (‘normal→dark’, from 6→1str), you get a curiously fragmented minor scale, scattered unevenly across two-plus octaves. Its six tones (1–b3–4–5–b6–b7) are like a ‘secondless Aeolian‘ – or alternatively a ‘Minor Pentatonic (add b6)‘ – but, despite lying just one note away from two über-familiar melodic forms, it stands alone, presenting its own geometries and moods.

 

While very close to well-known ground (‘add a 2nd = Aeolian, remove the b6 = Min. Pent’), our sequence is rarely used in its own right – bringing a tantalising blend of novelty and almost-familiarity. Ian Ring’s superb All the Scales database (for which I am an occasional ‘raga spelling consultant’), lists it as the ‘Epathimic‘, citing Zeitler. I’ve never heard the term before, but it seems to fit the general mystique…so let’s go with it.

 

Below is the full 12-note sequence, along with a tab of our nearest ‘no-capo EADGBE‘ approximation. If playing in Standard, try to feel the ‘ghost of the capo’ (i.e. each note pair is 3fr apart), and the ‘ghost of DADGAD‘ (i.e. how you have to position-shift). Also try mode-switching: feeling other notes as the root (in fact, if it wasn’t for our present guitaristic particularities, the sequence ‘1-b3-4-5-b6-b7’ naturally tempts an inversion on its perf. 4th, forming the much more common Minor Hexatonic: 1-2-b3-4-5-b7 – a key reason for the rarity of our unrotated version!)

 

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• ‘Epathimic’ sequence (with then without ‘zigzag’):

• The ‘plucking path’ (bass>treble: from bottom-right):

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• And a rough Standard-tuned equivalent:

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Also expand your feel for the tuning itself via my DADGAD page: originally popularised by Davy Graham, who used it to jam with Moroccan oud players in the early 60s, and then brought his ideas back to British folk…)

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—Microtonality—

As outlined, doublesiding will almost always introduce microtones to the mix – and having our capo at 11fr opens up a particularly useful set of new notes. Theoretically, each ‘darkside’ rings out at ~3.25 semitones above its accompanying ‘normal’ note on the same string (’11fr upwards’), giving a ‘quarter-tone‘ interval, right between a minor and a major 3rd. I’m not going to try and describe its ‘mood’ too much – a core joy of encountering genuinely fresh sounds is the chance to form your own perceptions. This is a zone where avoiding preconception is easier…

 

—Physicality—

While not all necks will fit an 11fr capo, most steel-string acoustics seem to be able to handle it well enough. Also note how the squeeze of the bar can itself introduce its own organic details: after all, a capo’s tension profile is somewhat uneven at the best of times (the thicker strings get ‘squeezed’ more: as covered in my article James Taylor’s ‘stretched’ tuning puzzle).

 

And here, the unusually tight grip required at 11fr exacerbates this sharpening effect even further, meaning that each ‘darkside’ note actually rings slightly higher than the quarter-tones listed above (which are the ‘non-messy’ values derived from string length calculations alone). This usually affects the bass strings more – you’ll probably have to ‘nudge’ some of the strings to counteract the effect…as ever, trust your ears!).

 

• Further capo/tuning combos •

How can we optimise our search for melodious combinations?

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Given that I’d stumbled upon ‘DADGAD cp.11’ by mistake, I assumed that other effective combinations wouldn’t be too hard to find either. This, however, proved more challenging than anticipated. While it’s fairly straightforward to find ‘interesting’ capo+tuning combos, most of them are so alien as to be hard to use in any truly melodic fashion. This is no reason not to try – but if we want to open up improvisatory freedom, we should take a moment to clarify our search. What are we looking for? And which formal constraints are we bound by?

 

—Capo placement—

Primarily, we want our double-sided note set to ring with ‘pleasing’ melodic/harmonic combinations. And our main constraint is that (assuming only one capo) we’re limited to a defined set of ‘left/right’ intervals – i.e. those produced by each of the possible capo positions. On my acoustic, 11fr is the highest I can go (as mentioned, this is how I first found the technique) – but we may as well calculate right the way up to 12fr. Here’s a menu of all the ‘low>high separation intervals’ between the two string-sides, covering all capo positions from 2fr upwards (…a 1fr capo has no ‘left side’ to pluck):

 

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• Table 1: ‘Double-side’ intervals for 2-12fr capo:

(calculation table)

—Maths in brief (skip at will)—

Basically, I reverse-engineered the workings of this page from Sengpie Audio, checking all relevant results against it (and another site) afterwards – as well as incorporating a cent-level strobe tuner (more below). The process essentially runs as follows (also see the full spreadsheet):

• String-division distances: My acoustic has a scale length of 642.62 mm (25.3 inches). While you can use this value alone to derive the ‘idealised’ 12-tet fret spacings (see Megatable), I’ve just taken the actual measurements direct from manufacturing data – as, in 3D reality, each fret is slightly ‘offset’ to compensate for the ‘downward bend’ brought by pressing the strings to the neck (after all, no guitar can have a ‘zero-height’ action). From here, you can just write out the distances on each side of the capo – remembering to discount the fret occupied by the capo itself (i.e. ‘scale length = LH string + capo space + RH string’). 
• Left-right intervals: These will be the same on each string regardless of tuning (well, in theory: e.g. the ‘capo pressure’ issues explained above) – meaning we don’t need to worry about actual Hz values. However, Hz are generally useful to have – so I’ve taken a more roundabout route so as to include them in the table (see calculations for more).

—Separation intervals—

Summarising the step above gives us our list of potential separations:

• 12fr: minor 2nd (+6 cents)
• 11fr: major 3rd (+26)
• 10fr: tritone (-37)
• 9fr: minor 6th (+21)
• 8fr: major 7th (+6)
• 7fr: 1 octave + major 2nd (+26)
• 6fr: 1 octave + tritone (-6)
• 5fr: 1 octave + minor 7th (+33)
• 4fr: 2 octaves + major 3rd (-18)
• 3fr: 2 octaves + major 7th (+35)
• 2fr: 4 octaves (-14)

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• Separation possibilities: 12>2fr (on 6str):

—Next selections—

From here, we can select the most pleasing separations – by ‘freezing’ one side of our ‘capo/tuning’ equation, we can better focus our search for the latter. Go ahead and pick any position you want (try them all!) – but below, I’ll run through a few of my initial favourites. Some are straightforwardly melodic, while some present complex polytonality.

 

To prune down the choices, I chose to ignore the lowest fret positions (3fr and below): their ultra-wide intervals proved awkward to weave into a coherent scale, and also too quiet to summon any real ‘left-right’ balance (even with heavy compression). After switching between the rest (11>5fr), I was particularly drawn to the resonance of 9fr, 7fr, and 6fr – as well as our original 11fr example from above.

 

Once you’ve chosen your central intervallic ‘axis’, the next task is to find the right tunings to bring it to life. You can judiciously sample any of the other 99 options on the Menu – but, in the end, I favour a ‘free-for-all’ approach here – just twirl at the pegs and follow your instincts!

 

• Melodious ‘double-sides’ •

A non-exhaustive rundown of pleasing combos. This time I’ll leave it up to you to turn these suggestions into sounds…send them in and I’ll feature here!

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—Other DADGAD options—

• DADGAD cp.11: our original discovery from above
• DADGAD cp.9: just a shade sharp of minor 6ths
• DADGAD cp.7: a robust set of double-5th jumps
• DADGAD cp.6: stacking tritones can be surprising

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—Further discoveries—

• ‘7>3>5>4>5’ cp.10: an ear-melting minor shuffle
• ‘7>5>2>2>8’ cp.8: a waterfall of leading tones
• ‘7>5>2>2>8’ cp.5: a variety of almost-octaves

[…more to follow…]

• Third-bridging guitarists •

Which guitarists have tried out this kind of thing in the past?

—Kaki King: Passerelle bridges—

American explorer Kaki King is probably the most prominent third-bridger in today’s guitarosphere. In recent years, she has showcased the ‘Passerelle bridge’: a collaborative invention with luthier Rachel Rosenkrantz. Placed above 16fr, the Passerelle (meaning ‘flyover’ or ‘walkway’) offers an effective double-siding method – splitting each string into two portions, with the shorter sides ringing a 5th (3:2 ratio) higher than the longer ones (i.e. the ‘short tones’ equal those of ‘normal’ 17fr: but here, the bridge’s raised tension sharpens the shorter side more, meaning we have to ‘compensate’ to 16fr. Also note that, unlike ‘DADGAD cp.11’, King has the lower notes on the left: perhaps more logical, given that ‘moving left = going lower’ when navigating the fretboard’s ‘ordinary’ geometry).

 

As explained on Rosenkrantz’ website: “The Passerelle is a bridge that turns any regular 6-string guitar into a 12-note instrument, that can produce sounds reminiscent of the Japanese koto or the Chinese guzheng. It can be used just for sound effects, or as an entirely new instrument for composition…Listen to Kaki’s songs Nails and Bowen Island to hear it in action. It is made and finished by hand in Rhode Island. Passerelle comes in limited editions, as we cast bronze in small batches. Made from the traditional ‘lost-wax’ technique, each of them comes out with their unique markings due to their handmade nature. One-of-a-kind, as usual.” You can order them here…but there’s a waiting list!

 

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• Passerelle Demo (‘Teek’) – Kaki King (2020):

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“I had to be reminded that the guitar is infinite. It never stops teaching you, it never stops being difficult; there’s an unlimited amount of things to learn, and you’ll never master it.” (Kaki King)

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—Bryan Johanson: nylon inventions—

Classical guitarists have also explored their own ‘double-sided’ zones. Composer Bryan Johanson, best known for applying his instrument’s nylon strings to novel chamber-music settings (and arranging Finnish folk melodies), has also released capo-flipping solo works. In particular, his 2006 piece The Magic Serenade showcases some superb string-splitting (see Bill Kanengiser perform it below and discuss it here).

 

As noted in two Classical Guitar features, Johanson’s work is “a brilliant example of [using] the capo as a compositional device…a capo is placed between [6fr and 7fr]…The portion of string between [7fr] and the bridge is played conventionally, whereas the length from nut to [6fr] is plucked occasionally by the left hand alone to produce mysterious-sounding bi-tones”…”The music is printed on two staves; the top one being the actual sound and the lower one being the notes played…[including] a startling array of quaver runs…set against a backdrop of constantly changing time signatures…Very musical, and aptly sounds magical – but so difficult that it sounds like a firefly on speed.”

 

[n.b. Also see Leo Brouwer’s Cuban Landscape, which “fuses Afro-Cuban rhythmic invention with repeating structures influenced by US minimalism. For the first half of the piece, all four guitars employ different kinds of mutes, including strips of paper, cardboard violin mutes, and pairs of matchsticks…“]

 

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• The Magic Serenade – Bryan Johanson (2006):

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“Bryan has been keeping bees in his back yard since the summer of 2017. He has two top-bar hives and is enjoying transforming a life-long fascination into an urban beekeeping reality…”

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—Fred Frith: multi-object mods—

Fred Frith’s off-the-wall playing philosophy is the stuff of avant-garde legend. Since the early 1970s, the Englishman has been ‘preparing’ his electric axes with an eye-opening array of implements – including, in his own recollection, “sticks, bits of glass, metal, springs, chains”, as well as paintbrushes, egg-beaters, metal chains, dried beans, and alligator clips (which “sound like a gong”) – plus, “dropping things on the guitars”, and “[laying] two guitars flat on the ground [in] opposite directions…basically like keyboards”. He also builds his own DIY instruments (“I can use an electric drill to bore holes [and] achieve certain sounds”) – see more in the documentary Step Across the Border.

 

Though renowned for his work in free improv groups such as Henry Cow, Art Bears, and Skeleton Crew, Frith remains best known for his solo sonic experiments (notably, 1974’s Guitar Solos – although I first found him via his inspired soundtrack for Act of God: a 2009 documentary about “the metaphysical effects of being struck by lightning”). Watch him jump a drumstick around as a ‘moveable third bridge’ in the clip below, from a 2006 concert at Mózg, Poland, also featuring a loop pedal, an extra pickup at the nut end (to better capture the ‘left-side’ string tones), and a red rope-like material of some sort. (I always tell my primary school classes to see the guitar ‘more like a toy than schoolwork’ – and, more than once, Frith has come to mind in these moments. In both cases, the chaos is well worth it!).

 

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• MÓZG (Live in Bydgoszcz) – Fred Frith (2006):

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“You could say that everything the musicians have learned and known over the years – all of their technical resources – are in a dialogue with the things they are discovering every time, as if it was the first time…” (Fred Frith)

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—Side note: two-faced politics—

Boris Johnson’s PR bullshit: ‘Double-siding’ has turned up in some rather unlikely places. In fact, even former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has given it a go – visibly taking a rather novel approach to the fretboard during a 2013 PR stunt. Johnson – the latest in a depressingly long line of prolific British bullshitters who fool few with their bluster yet somehow fall into high office anyway – stands alongside X-Factor finalist Misha B at London Bridge station, as part of a photo op related to TfL’s new busking licences. After finally prevailing in an extended struggle with the strap, he tries strumming at the guitar that somebody unwisely chose to give him – placing his fretting hand behind the 5fr capo as part of his premium-grade brand of all-around stage-cringe.

 

Really, there are no surprises here: just more attention-seeking buffoonery from the UK’s most prominent political embarrassment. In a list of his most pungent bullshit, this wouldn’t even make the top 40. I don’t want Boris moving around on my site – so click here for the full vid, if you can stand it (to my international readers: yeah, he is a real person not a TV character – in fact, many of my countrymen apparently see this guy’s clownish idiocy as evidence of ‘patriotism’. I don’t need to tell you how his 2013 version of Three Little Birds sounds either: other than to say that Bob Marley would immediately roll (something) in his grave in horror…).

 

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• Boris Johnson – guitar as a mirror of self (2013):

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—More musical politicians—

It’s not as if politics inherently repels musical talent (or vice versa). For example we have Thomas Sankara: who found fame as guitarist for the band Tout-à-Coup Jazz, then co-led a successful 1983 revolution in Burkina Faso with lead singer Blaise Compaoré, overthrowing the country’s oppressive military dictatorship and turning it towards progressive social policies – before being murdered four years later in another coup…orchestrated by none other than Compaoré himself (damn, I’ve worked with some spotlight-hungry singers, but never feared they would assassinate me: although I guess none of our bands had the word ‘coup’ in their names). Touchingly, Compaoré did at least retain the new national anthem, penned by Sankara himself…listen below!

 

Also Damian Drăghici: an all-time master of the nai (Romanian pan-flute), who I first came across as a teenager via his incredible rendition of Charlie Parker’s Donna Lee. A decade or so later, I noticed a headline reading The Piper of Parliament, and thought ‘lol, I hope it’s the Donna Lee guy’…which, bizarrely, turned out to be the case. In 2014, Drăghici retired from performing to take up a new role as the chief EU Parliamentary representative of the Roma people (“I want to change stereotypes: gypsy music…is a conglomeration of lots of history, joy, and pain. It’s similar to the experiences African Americans distilled in their music. There are many similarities…”).

 

But before anyone starts over-idealising the political effects of playing music, we should also note that up-tight paranoiac Richard Nixon was a skilled piano student, while the warmongering former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice nearly pursued a career as a concert pianist (President Bush “always encouraged [me] to find time to play…it was a very centering experience” – I wonder which pieces are best to distract you from orchestrating illegal invasions and the indiscriminate bombing of Afghan civilians?). Fellow war criminal Tony Blair prefers the guitar, even spending his gap year as a self-styled rock promoter before attempting to imitate Mick Jagger in a short-lived Oxford University group named Ugly Rumours (I guess, like the ones about normalised torture of Iraqi prisoners by UK forces: although actually, they aren’t rumours). As recounted by Ozzy Osbourne, “I met Tony Blair [once] and he said…’I could never get the riff to Iron Man right.’ I thought, ‘Why are you telling me about Iron Man when there’s a war going on?'”.

 

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• Ditanyé/Une Seule Nuit – Thomas Sankara (1983):

Boris is, at least, far from alone when it comes to capo confusion. I recently came across this Amazon listing fail (below left: an Asus4 shape is nullified by the 4fr capo – and also, the zoomed-in view of the guitar’s fretboard turns it into a ukulele…the stuff of nightmares). And, as highlighted by the esteemed toan-chasers of r/guitarcirclejerk, this ad from a Turkish website (below right: actually, it does place the capo precisely on 11fr…maybe the stock model deserves a co-writing credit for my setup above?)

 

(Two instances of double-siding in the wild)

 

It’s also worth noting that some guitarists – such as Willy Porter – do actually play on both sides of a (partial) capo, in ‘non-third bridge’ fashion – i.e. sometimes fretting behind because some strings aren’t covered by it (also check out Ben Howard’s partial capo setups).

 

• More multi-bridge instruments •

Some instruments are designed to play on ‘both sides of the bridge’…

—Guzheng (China)—

The guzheng (or zheng) is a ‘heterochordal half-tube zither’ used in Chinese classical and folk music. The first known example, found in a tomb in Jiangsu Province, has been dated to around 2,600 years ago (gǔ means ‘old’, and zhēng means ‘bridge-stretched strings’). However, it underwent a major standardisation and update during the 1960s, quickly proliferating in Mao Zedong’s era: modern designs have 21 to 26 strings, set across a pinewood body of around 160cm, arranged to form a characteristic ‘S’ shape at one end (although variants abound: e.g. ‘butterfly’, ‘centipede’, & ‘multi-tonic’ models). The instrument’s constituent parts take poetic names – for example lóngtóu (‘dragon head’ = right side), fèng wěi (‘phoenix tail’ = left side), yuèshān (‘high mountains’ = fixed bridges), tiānchí (‘celestial pond’ = central soundhole), yàn zhù (‘wild goose pillars’ = moveable bridges), miànbǎn (‘face-board’ = soundboard), and yǐn jiān (‘hidden chamber’ = inner space).

 

The guzheng is played with four finger-plectra, and tuned by twisting small pegs hidden inside a compartment on the right-hand side (tiáo xián hé = ‘string tuning box’). Today, most performers set the strings to multi-octave pentatonic scales – as per the excellent Guzheng Alive, the two most common keys are D (as ‘A-B-D-E-F#’: the same note set as Lute, Baritone, & José González tunings), and G (as ‘A-B-D-E-G’: the same tones as Standard, Drop D, & Ali Farka Touré). To access the b7 of each scale, “C and F notes are achieved by pressing a B or G string [behind the bridge] when it is struck”. Unlike our ‘double-sided’ guitar setups above (but like the koto below), guzheng players rarely ‘pluck on both sides’: traditionally, the right hand is used to sound the strings, and the left to press down on the ‘extra’ segments (like a ‘behind the nut’ bend) – although modern players may sometimes deviate from this.

 

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• Spring River Flower Moon Night – Carol Chang (2009):

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“Over the next few centuries, the banquet music that included zheng faded in popularity. By the beginning of the Ming dynasty [c.1368], banquet music and the zheng were abandoned by the upper classes completely…kicked out of the hallowed [and] restricted halls of the rich – and became an instrument of the people…Freed from the restrictive protocol of the courts, the zheng’s player base, repertoire, and [playing] styles expanded.” (Guzheng Alive)

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—Koto (Japan)—

The koto – Japan’s national instrument – is ‘half-zither’ of epic proportions, with 13 or so strings set across a hardwood soundboard of around 190cm (3x the scale length of a standard guitar). The huge size allows the strings to retain power while being ‘split’ by wooden bridges, placed at varying points along their lengths. Like the Chinese guzheng above (from which it descends), players do not pluck on both sides: here, the left-hand string divisions are used near-exclusively for bending, with performers pressing down on them to summon an array of intricate shapes. While the koto’s tone, register, and bendability are all somewhat guitar-like, it differs in that the bass strings are further away from the player – a feature designed to make high-toned bends easier to reach – while also being tuned microtonally, often to Pythagorean-inclined ‘pure’ intervals.

 

Now Japan’s national instrument, it was adapted from the Chinese guzheng (see above) some time around the Nara Period in the 8th century. It quickly came to occupy a central role in gagaku (the classical music of the imperial court) – in fact, it was almost impossible to hear one anywhere else for several hundred years. Almost a millennium after this original adoption, it enjoyed a somewhat broader resurgence, thanks to the efforts of musicians such as Yatsuhashi Kengyo (1614-1685), the blind master of the Kyoto court, who retuned his koto to match the microtones of local folk scales, and took his music to the general public as well as to royal audiences. Today’s koto artists continue to (literally) push the instrument’s capacities forward in both danmono (solo performance) and sankyoku (chamber music) – as well as an ever-expanding list of fusion forms, e.g. covering Chick Corea & Guns ‘N’ Roses. (Also check out Davidlap‘s DIY koto-guitar hack: he summons an impressively similar flavour by ‘double-siding’ with a plastic wedge at 15fr.)

 

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• Rokudan no Shirabe – Fuyuki Enokido (2012):

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“The koto, originally a court music instrument, [was brought] to the profane music scene [by] blind monks…also instrumental in introducing shamisen [3-string lutes] from Okinawa [in] the 16th century. The term ‘gaikyoku’ [denotes] the ‘outer’ repertoire: ‘profane’ music.” (from Gunnar Jinmei Linder’s 2012 thesis Shakuhachi, Historical Authenticity, & Transmission of Tradition, p.21)

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—Hammered dulcimer (USA)—

‘Dulcimer’ is a somewhat ambiguous term, variously used in reference to several distinct instrument designs – including the Appalachian (‘mountain’) dulcimer, a narrow 3-to-5-string zither placed flat on the player’s lap, which has found fame via the work of artists such as Jean Ritchie and Joni Mitchell. However, the word ‘dulcimer’ more generally (and more precisely) refers to any instrument where horizontal-set strings are plucked, strummed, or hammered to sound at their full bridge-to-bridge length, rather than being fretted (thus, it is dubious whether the Appalachian dulcimer is, strictly speaking, a dulcimer at all: as its strings are regularly fretted, albeit in ‘overhand’ fashion rather than the guitar’s ‘underhand’ setup…well, unless you’re Erik Mongrain!).

 

Globally, this encompasses a plethora of dulcimeric variants. Many share a remarkably similar design – a legacy of their intertwined history, stretching back to 15th-century Persia (and, possibly, the Ancient Greek psaltery harp). The Alpine hackbrett, Hungarian cimbalom, Romanian țambal, Greek santouri, Iranian santur, Kashmiri santoor, Chinese yangqin, Korean yanggeum, and Thai khim all set metal string courses across a trapezoid-shaped wooden sound box – as does the piano. You can even classify the piano as an elaborate kind of ‘hammered dulcimer’ – however, the main incarnation of this form is a North American design, which sets 50 or so strings in ascending sequences based on perfect 5ths. Two rows of bridges split the strings into multiple sounding lengths – in particular, the trebles are struck to the left of the bridges as well as in between them. Also see the santoor section of my Global Instrument Tunings article – and for more on the ‘mountain’ dulcimer, see my Joni Mitchell lesson, and Zen Drone (‘Dulcimeric’) tuning.

 

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• Echoes in Time – Joshua Messick (2021):

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“My ideas come from being aware of my surroundings: the melody of the birds singing, the instrumentation of leaves rustling in the air, and the percussion of the crackling fire…I’ve used alternate tunings, non-typical time signatures, and unique keys…much diversity!” (Joshua Messick)

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• Questions & resources •

How else can we take this zone forward? And which ideas can’t I shoe-horn into any of the other sections?

—Further questions—

• How can we strengthen the sound? e.g. By using an additional close-mic for the left-side strings, to compensate for their lack of body amplification – or, like Fred Frith, installing extra pickups near the nut (also see India’s ‘double-tumba’ sitars and rudra veenas: essentially, an all-acoustic version of the same idea). We can also balance the sound with the use of left-hand fingerpicks, which boost clarity and volume – and by adjusting how we hold the instrument itself (e.g. I put the mic near the nut for recording the examples above). Also see the dedicated ‘double-side’ designs of guitarist and experimental luthier Hans Reichel (an excellent suggestion kindly sent in by Tim Gilbride, who particularly recommends the Bonobo album – also check out Reichel’s ‘daxophone‘: “a single wooden blade, fixed in a block containing a contact microphone, played mostly with a bow”).

 

• What could other capo designs open up? e.g. By using single-string capos (or multiple capos), we can combine different separation intervals into the same 12-note framework. Or, we could ditch the capo in favour of some other object – like Davidlap’s koto-like plastic wedge, or Fred Frith’s jumpable drumstick (also try out pencils, chopsticks, and other kitchen cutlery). Again, this zone is far too open-ended to really ‘formalise’: just go forth and explore on instinct!

 

• How can we access more microtones? e.g. By tuning the strings to non-12tet intervals, we can further colour our xenharmonicity (also see the ‘capo pressure’ discussion above). And, regardless of tuning, we can introduce further microtonalism with the ‘justly-intoned’ natural harmonics: which, by dividing the string into equal vibrating segments, act like ‘n-th bridge’ setups – i.e. the <9fr> harmonic splits the string into 5 equal lengths: like having 4 ‘invisible bridges’, which, after adding the ‘normal’ bridge & nut, gives a ‘6th bridge’ setup.

 

• How can we go deeper into the intervals? e.g. Besides just spending more time immersed in our new double-sided zones, we can expand our general xenharmonic ear by listening to a wider range of microtonal music, using these new sounds to ‘target’ future capo+tuning combos (e.g. see my World of Tuning writeups on Indonesian gamelan, Indian tanpura drones, and La Monte Young’s ‘well-tuned’ piano). Also, we can match our separation intervals to databases such as Kyle Gann’s Anatomy of an Octave, and then see which better-theorised alternatives may lie nearby – e.g. as calculated above, the 7fr capo gives 1 octave + 226 cents: close to the cult-classic ‘septimal whole-tone’ of just intonation (231 cents = ratio 8:7), meaning we can ‘squeeze’ up to it by slightly increasing capo pressure…although, unless your guitar has an incredibly low action, normal capo pressure may well provide more than enough sharpening already. Try it all out with a strobe tuner!

 

• Where else do ‘both side’ string divisions arise? e.g. Something similar occurs when playing slide guitar: if you don’t mute, the strings will ring out on ‘both sides of the slide’, allowing for simultaneous ‘rising/falling’ motions and other strange effects (stronger with heavier slides, which act as more robust ‘moveable bridges’). A more subtle incarnation of the same phenomenon also forms part of the santoor’s characteristic timbre – the Indian zither’s 90-plus strings are struck with small hardwood mallets, which, for the split-second of impact, divide them into two sounding lengths (hear these subtle shades in Shivkumar Sharma’s legendary Kaunsi Kanada recording – and also in the ‘Sufiyana’ style of Bhajan Sopori, who uses extra-heavy mallets to summon a tone likened by some to the sounds of fluttering moths). To mimic something similar on the guitar, use hard/heavy picks (in fact, I have trouble eradicating these micro-inflections when using extra-hard gypsy plectrums…).

 

—Send me your double-sided ideas!—