Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred A7

[Emilio]

Hello all

I have been working on "Mary’s Little Lamb" and am struggling to get the up strum on the barred A7 to sound right.

I realise tone is subjective, but my quibble is the high E "on the barred A7" note sounds a bit piercing to my ear on the up strum. It seems that no matter what I try, I just cannot get it sound smooth like Griff’s version on his Tele

When I use the 2 note A7 chord "which uses the open high E" in the piece, it seems much more pleasing to my ear.

The Gear:

Swamp Ash bodied 57 RI Start, maple neck (American made)
Ernie Ball Skinny Top Heavy Bottom Nickel Wound .010 - .052

I seem to be getting similar results on both my solid state & Valve AMP’s, and my Line 6 Pocket pod playing though the clean channel

Does anyone have any recommendations to tame this thing down a little?  

Is there any special technique or something?

Thanks

:-/

Emi (UK)

 

[RichC]

Re: Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred

Emi: I have problems from time to time with the high e on some chords and some positions. It can be very frustrating.Sometimes the guitar needs to be adjusted: do you get a pretty even sound out of all six strings.It may be you have a bit too much treble dialed in on your guitar or amp. Or you may try the same chord with your guitar on just the rhythem pickup. Or try a fatter pick or a softer upchuck  or mabey your hitting the high e with too much pick. Try shortening up on the pick. Or mabey your being too hard on yourself. Try making a recording and have others listen to it see what they think. Sometimes at my present level of guitar competency I have to come back to something a few months later and try again if I just cant seem to get it any better. Im sure others will have meaningful suggestion for you to try.Let us know what works. Good Luck

 

[MikeS]

Re: Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred

Emi, Since what you are talking about is how it sounds, not how it's played, it is kind of subjective, so if you like the two finger A7, play that. However, I think that the point of the lesson may be to learn the Barre A7, because you will use that barred A chord A LOT. Having said that , I just played the chords for that song and found myself using my first finger for the barre and my pinky for the high E. Eventually you will use your first finger to Barre basically where the nut is for the A chord. This makes it easier to use the ring finger to barre the moving A form, and to drop the pinky for the 7th.
Mike

 

[gpower]

Re: Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred

Emi, if the high side seems a bit much, lower the pickup/s on the treble side a couple of turns. That should tame things. The spec on your guitar has the treb side 2/64 higher than the bass side, I believe. I have all mine set level and lower than spec.

When I do a setup, I begin with the neck pup and adjust it to where it sounds best, to me. Don't be intimidated to play with the height, you can always return it to spec. Once I get the neck pup where I like it, I adjust the mid pup to approx. the same output as the neck. Then set the bridge to the mid.

 

[Emilio]

Re: Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred

Hello all
I have tried a combination of all your suggestions and have noticed a considerable improvement in the up strum on this A7 chord.

The changes I made were as follows:

Lowered the bride pickup and played around the treble settings on my amp
Changed my pick to something thicker with more rounded edges
Played around with my technique.

I think I was digging in a bit too deep on the up strum. I managed to solve this by relaxing my hand a little more on the up strum and merely brushing on the high e

I am much happier with the sound now and will be uploading my efforts for some review as soon as I get the opportunity

Thanks for all your suggestions. These have been a great help

 

[Griff]

Re: Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred

My approach is always to give you the options and the "standard" or "common" voicings and chords. If you don't like the sound of that voicing that I used, then use the one you like. In the event that you "have" to play the other voicing, you'll know it, but there's no reason not to use the one that is more pleasing to your ear.

We all have certain chords and shapes that we gravitate to. It doesn't do anything but make you sound like you  

 

[jhagan421]

Re: Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred

Well said Griff!  Now to get that ME sound be a good one

 

[Emilio]

Re: Slight niggle with the up strum on the barred

Hi Griff

Your comments on the CD lesson about using whatever A chord takes your fancy were absolutely spot on.  I learned a valuable lesson on changing voicing’s and added another useful chord to my arsenal
With the aid of some very useful suggestions from this forum I persisted and finally think I made an improvement to the A7bar. I did this by changing my pick to medium gauge, being less aggressive on the up strum and some minor changes to my setup.

I have posted my Acoustic attempt of "Marys little Lamb" on the recordings area and am open any feedback from the forum

Big thanks to you all