E-B-G-D-A-E

• OVERVIEW •

Spare a thought for left-handed guitarists everywhere – though they can count Hendrix, Iommi, Cobain, McCartney, and many other six-stringed innovators among them, this comes as little solace whenever there’s only a ‘normal’ guitar lying around to jam on at a party.

 

This ‘mirror of Standard’ is an intriguing workaround: the EADGBE order is reversed, as per a lefty axe – preserving the shapes, but reshuffling the note registers in disorderly, mega-slack fashion. Great for a different illumination of the fretboard’s geometry, however you choose to angle it – 5ths predominate rather than 4ths (5ths are ‘inverted’ 4ths: i.e. 7 frets up vs. down). According to tuning guru Bill Sethares, “scales are more confusing than chords: the sound often rises when you expect it to fall [and] ‘alternating bass’ turns into ‘alternating treble’…There are some surprises too, some chords that don’t ‘exist’ in Standard”.

 

Try it both ways, and see how it works as a right-handed hack on a lefty-strung guitar if you get the chance. And more broadly: to feel how much you’ve trained your hands for their specific guitaristic functions, just flip an EADGBE-tuned guitar round and try playing the music you think you know – a trick I use to help confidence-shy students who don’t realise how much they’ve learned since starting (also useful as just another method of chaotic creative shuffling – for all the initial unfamiliarity, you’ll be surprised how quickly your brain will adapt: after all, musical learning is much more about the mind than the muscles…).

 

(n.b. From my own teaching, I tend towards thinking that leftie beginners should just learn right-handed. The guitar’s ‘pick-up-and-play’ inclusivity is important, and nobody uses a left-handed flute, piano, sax, etc. Then again, variety is also crucial, and there is plenty going on here – e.g. left-handed sportspeople who stick with their southpaw inclinations seem to enjoy disproportionate success: although the guitar isn’t really physically ‘oppositional’ like boxing, tennis, cricket, etc. More sonic-pugilistic insights below, including fascinating direct input from multi-instrumentalist and MMA practitioner Benn Jordan…)

Pattern: 7>(8)>7>7>7

Harmony: Emin7(11) | 1-5-b3-b7-4-1

• TUNING TONES •

• SOUNDS •

To further explore these ‘mirrored’ perspectives, we can look to a plethora of guitarists who take atypical attitudes to the physical basics: after all, anyone who flips over without a restring is essentially in a ‘non-Standard’ tuning all the time (although many who do this, such as Elizabeth Cotten and Albert King, add further twists and turns too…). There’s also more pragmatic instances: e.g. Dave Kilminster, who switched sides in his youth after a go-karting injury, and Robbie Merrill – a right-hander who flips due to a birth defect of his left middle finger. Not to mention Michel Angelo Batio’s ‘double-guitar‘ shred style, as well as the two-handed tapping of Stanley Jordan, Ichika Nito, and others.

 

Benn Jordan – a.k.a. The Flashbulb, Acidwolf, and other monikers – is another natural leftie who learned on an upside-down rightie guitar. He definitely knows a thing or two about both-handed co-ordination – aside from creating his own astonishing audio-visual productions, he competes in amateur Mixed Martial Arts as a jiu-jitsu-trained welterweight. Just the man to flip things round for us (…is it similar when fighting southpaw?).

 

Watch his video below, including the time, aged 19, he “applied for a scholarship to the University of Montana to study guitar under Christopher Parkening. I got it, full ride…but they took it away when they found out I played upside-down” (“don’t feel sorry for me, I’m really glad things turned out the way they did”). And on the broader impulses behind it all, “I’m pretty much an organism that shits out art constantly. When I get overwhelmed I go to an MMA gym and get punched in the face, then return to shitting out art…” (Something I’ve also done…only without the implied step of returning to the MMA gym for the long term. Obviously I only dropped out to, like, protect my hands and stuff.)

 

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• Upside-down learning – Benn Jordan (2020):

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“My entire life people have been either telling me it’s ‘wrong, pointless, stupid, gimmicky’, or that it’s ‘wildly creative, innovative, eccentric’ – it’s very rarely in the grey area…Most of these questions can be answered by telling you my topsy-turvy guitar story…When I was about 5, I went to the Wisconsin State Fair with my grandfather, and he bought me a nylon-string toy guitar, strung for ‘normal’ right-handed players…a year or two later, my cousin got me a full-size electric…To be totally honest, I don’t remember that ‘oh shit’ moment when I figured out I was playing the ‘wrong’ way…” (Benn Jordan)

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More musico-pugilism: I emailed Benn with some of these questions – and he replied within a few hours with some intriguing ambidextrous insights. As with the guitar, he switches things up in the octagon – but for different reasons: “I used to fight southpaw [right foot forward], but had a slap tear in my shoulder that made me switch. This resulted in really powerful left jabs, so I kind of concentrated on switching stances a lot…For example, if you’re standing orthodox [left foot forward] and throw a long counter-cross, you can land in southpaw without having to adjust backwards. It’s a surprisingly deceptive way to manage ring control!”

 

And on the odd manual marriage of MMA striking and fine-tuned musical skill: “My hands have many breaks, that have both healed via treatment or smaller fractures that went untreated. But I also have pretty bad Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. I honestly can’t say if it’s related…instrument playing or using a computer has so many repetitive movements. If I could throw as many punches as letters I type and notes I play, my shoulders would likely disintegrate. I don’t really mind the pain as much as the pressure or inflammation. These days I have to take ibuprofen before a gig, otherwise my hands will slow down after about 20 minutes of fast playing.” (As someone who has missed many cumulative months of playing time through sport-induced broken arms, dislocated shoulders, tendon issues, and so on, this slightly terrifies me – no injury absence pay for us freelance guitarists – but also makes me think: ‘Well if he can play so good despite mashing his hands up, then maybe I could risk things a little more?’. Although I’ll probably start back with climbing rather than punching anything…)

 

He also shared a pleasing tale of incidental tuning invention: “I once drove from Chicago to New Orleans [~1500km] in the Winter, with a fresh set of strings on an acoustic – and the drastic temperature and humidity change gave me a near-perfect D-B-G-D-G-C. I’ve stuck with that a whole lot [e.g. Louisiana Mourning below]. I really love the way it just gives me an ‘American folk’ sound almost instantly.” Guided by the spirits of nature…

 

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• Louisiana Mourning (Monticello) – Benn Jordan (2019):

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A post shared by Benn Jordan 🎛️ (@bennjordan)

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• NUMBERS •

	6str	5str	4str	3str	2str	1str
Note	E	B	G	D	A	E
Alteration	0	2	-7	-5	-2	0
Tension (%)	0	+26	-55	-44	-21	0
Freq. (Hz)	82	123	98	147	220	330
Pattern (>)	7	8	7	7	7	–
Semitones	0	7	3	10	17	24
Intervals	1	5	b3	b7	4	1

• See my Tunings Megatable for further such nerdery: more numbers, intervallic relations, comparative methods, etc. And to any genuine vibratory scientists reading: please critique my DIY analysis!

• RELATED •

—Associated tunings: proximities of shape, concept, context, etc…

• Mesopotamian: another curious re-entrant register swap
• New Standard: a craftily reimagined stacking of 5ths
• Zen Drone: super-inclusive for playing ‘both ways round’

• MORE INFO •

—Further learnings: sources, readings, lessons, other onward links…

• Leftfield pedagogic musings: a quick list of lefties here, and Bill Sethares‘ writeup for more on the tuning (p.48) – and also see Miche Fambro explain how fellow lefties find it harder to ‘watch and copy’ the movements of other guitarists, meaning they have to develop the ear more directly (a fair counter-argument to my ‘just learn right-handed’ stance…after all, being blind is famously no impediment to virtuosity: can any guitarist ‘multi-layer’ with more harmonic freedom than Raul Midón?)
• Benn Jordan’s hyperlearning: apart from his excellent lefty video and direct insights above (thanks!), learn how he leaked his own music to torrent sites, and about his broader zest for new shapes and experiences – via interviews and Reddit Q&As (“I’m just super-passionate about everything I do…we live in this amazing time of collective knowledge…information is so plentiful that I get excited when questions or problems are ‘ungooglable’. I can’t bear letting any of that go to waste in my short time on this earth”. I send solidarity for the spirits behind this quest!)

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Header image: Pablo Picasso’s Girl Before a Mirror (1932)