Spanish Fandango Taught By Pat Kirtley Part 1/2
Now let’s look at our next tune. It’s called Spanish Fandango and it’s in the tuning called open G which has been called the Spanish tuning.
Well that tune is called “Spanish Fandango” and we’re now in open G tuning. Or actually we’re going to get in open G tuning. The reason that open G tuning has been called by some people Spanish Tuning is exactly because of that tune. The Spanish Fandango was a very popular tune in the era that they call the Parlor Guitar Era, when I guess mostly women learned to play the guitar and they played it in the parlor for people and gave little concerts and things.
This was a popular tune at that time and I’ve heard that many mother’s maybe in the, I don’t know, early 1900’s, from 1900’s or maybe 1940 even. Moms taught their sons to play guitar sometimes and sometimes they teach them that tune. So let’s learn how to play it.
First we need to get into open G tuning. To get into Open G, before we did dropped D and if you're guitar is still in drop D then you already have the low D that open G requires. But let’s start from the top and I'm in standard right now. And we’re going to take the top E string down one step to D. So, and you can octave match it with the fourth D string like we did the low string before in drop D tuning. So, here we go. When you get in tune, when you get well in tune, it will sound like there’s no beating note, that wavering sound will go away.
The next string we change for open G is the A string, fifth string is going down one step to G; it’s going to become our G string. You can octave match it with the third string G. Once it’s very in tune you’ll know it, okay. Now, we’re going to take the bottom, the D string, bottom D, if yours is already tuned from previously, we’re going to leave it there. If not down, one step and match it with the fourth string.
One thing you have to be very careful about doing when you tune your guitar in alternate tunings is to go in the right direction with the tuner. Most of the alternate tunings that I used are tunings that take the strings down in pitch which means there are the strings that slacker, there’s less tension on it. When you take a string up in pitch, most guitar strings won’t stand very much upward change without breaking. And it’s kind of dangerous to have your right hand in position and be changing the string and then going up when you think you’re going down.
And if the string breaks it can cut your wrist like what happened to me when I was about nine years old, when I was tuning the guitar in the wrong direction and it sort of slashed my wrist or tried to. So always play the string while you’re tuning it and you’ll know whether you’re going up or down. Don’t accidentally go up when you didn’t mean to go down. So now, we’re on an open G and it sounds like this. And actually the open guitar now is a chord, it’s a G chord.
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