Jerry Donahue, “The Beak/The Claw”: Fantastic string-bending!

[Caevan O’Shite]

Kristina Donahue:  "My dad, Jerry Donahue, playing “The Beak/The Claw” featuring his string-bending technique in The Equinox special episode on the electric guitar: “Twang, Bang, Kerang!”, which aired on Channel 4 in the UK in 1987."

https://fb.watch/coNOCz60CP/

I highly recommend that you clonk on that link and watch and listen to this video! You'll be glad you did.
 
 
 

[KuruPrionz]

Pretty good, for a guitar player. 😳

Thanks for sharing!!!

 

Running circles around just about everybody on just about every instrument. 

I haven't got much of that down at all, certainly not the right hand technique.

 

I did spend a bit of time learning how to sound like I have a whammy bar when I don't but that's different, more of a cave man style compared to Jerry. 

 

This is fun but you gotta turn up the volume, it's pretty quiet - Hellecasters live. Jerry blasts about 20 minutes in, awesome but they are all awesome. 

It is noted that Jerry is the only one playing a "proper" Tele, the other two are using whammy bars and rosewood fretboards. Not right in the head is what. 

 

 

[surfergirl]

I put string bending in a category with slide, neither worked out well for me.  

[KuruPrionz]

1 hour ago, surfergirl said:

I put string bending in a category with slide, neither worked out well for me.  

Persistence is key. 

Slide and bending are best done with different setups as well. High action for slide (I just play a lap steel, no frets and the action is 1/2" high or more) and you want low action and light guage strings for bending. If upward bends on the high strings are not working out yet, try downward bends on the low strings and see if those are more fun now. It's a process, not something that you suddenly can just do. I guarantee Jerry Donahue spent years learning little by little to get to that piece above. 

 

So don't give up yet!!!! 😇

[desertbluesman]

3 hours ago, surfergirl said:

I put string bending in a category with slide, neither worked out well for me.  

I use a lot of string bends and I do use a lot of fake slide techniques without using a slide. Bends and sliding the finger down or up as a resolve to a lead passage humanizes the sound. Makes the resolution sound more "feel" than just stopping to resolve a passage. I have enough experience doing the slide-less slide technique to make it sound smooth without the guitar hiccup at each fret as it passes the frets. Listen to this song https://www.soundclick.com/music/songInfo.cfm?songID=5913545 I do that technique in almost every song to make it sound more "feel".

[Caevan O’Shite]

  

On 4/15/2022 at 11:33 AM, KuruPrionz said:

Pretty good, for a guitar player. 😳

Thanks for sharing!!!

 

Running circles around just about everybody on just about every instrument. 

I haven't got much of that down at all, certainly not the right hand technique.

 

I did spend a bit of time learning how to sound like I have a whammy bar when I don't but that's different, more of a cave man style compared to Jerry. 

 

This is fun but you gotta turn up the volume, it's pretty quiet - Hellecasters live. Jerry blasts about 20 minutes in, awesome but they are all awesome. 

It is noted that Jerry is the only one playing a "proper" Tele, the other two are using whammy bars and rosewood fretboards. Not right in the head is what. 

 

 

Prrretty awesome! Great performance, phenomenal musicians, wonderful music. Thanks!
   
 
 

[desertbluesman]

22 hours ago, surfergirl said:

I put string bending in a category with slide, neither worked out well for me.  

By the way I do not use a whammy bar at all. In fact if I buy a guitar that has a whammy I lock it down solid, and remove the whammy arm and put it in the guitar case never to be used again, unless I sell the guitar to a whammy liking player. (As in the Agile Strat Clone pictured below that I bought a decade or more ago).

[Larryz]

+1 DBM, Back in my Strat days I used to run 9's and bend 1 1/2 step full bends.  I rarely used the whammy unless it was a surf tune and usually as a finishing touch.  Eric Clapton blocked out the whammy on my Clapton Strat with a wood block.  It could be removed and it came with a whammy bar if one desired to use it that way.  As I got older I went to 10's and seldom bend more than a 1/2 step.  I found myself always bending to a certain note (i.e., usually a b5).  So I just decided to play the note now and then with and without bending. I also bend to a sharp 9.  So when I find notes that thrill me, I'll still bend.  I find myself not having to tune as much when I bend fewer notes and keep the bends to 1/2 step bends.  I also have fewer arthritis pains and seldom have snap finger anymore.  So I get to play more in my old age...

 

Not trying to discourage anyone from bending and I hope SurferGirl keeps giving bending a good try.  The above great videos of Jerry posted by Kuru and in the OP by Caevan, should inspire all guitar players to learn to bend a few notes.  It really does add to the unique sounds that the guitar is capable of, to be discovered by both new and old players.  I find certain of my guitars still inspire me to bend strings when remembering certain tunes (blasts from the past).  I'm now running 11's and mostly play rhythm guitar which contributes to my bending less. 😎

[KuruPrionz]

And now, Roy Buchanon. 

No Telecaster playing bunch of crazy good chicken pickin' plank spankin' shredder video thread is complete without a dose of RB.

 

 

[Caevan O’Shite]

I do plenty of string bending with my fingers, but generally a bit more typically than the extreme prowess within chords and all that Jerry Donahue so aptly demonstrates in that tour de force I posted above!  

On my Les Paul- which has a short-ish scale length, and thus lighter string tension than, say, a Strat or a Tele- I bend notes all over the place on a set of 11's tuned to Standard, 'Concert Pitch'. If I want to- I can bend the 1st, 2nd, 5th, or 6th string up a whole-step at the 2nd-Fret; the 4th string up a half-step, and the 3rd string up a a step and a half! I can even bend most of 'em up a half-step at the 1st-fret. Just to point out that it's doable.

On a Strat or a Tele, I might have to go to a set of 10's to still be able to do much of that. Note that bending notes to correct pitches on a Strat with a "Tremolo" bridge can be a little more difficult to get just-right, as bending a string pulls on the spring-loaded trem- which (A) requires more bending-pressure than usual to reach the correct pitch, and (B) pulls the other strings a little flat at the same time.

Someone who just might be switching from a Strat to a Tele or ASAT (eghemn   ) would find said Tele or ASAT to be much easier to bend on, along with a bolder attack and attitude...    

(My good cat buddy Oscär loves it when I play "MEE-Arr, Mee-arr" doing whole-step bends on the 1st and 2nd strings at the 2nd-Fret that way for him, and when I do, he'll often climb up nearby and rub his head on my guitar's headstock and tuners, and my hand and shoulder.)


I love 'oblique bends', where one or more notes are held steady while one other is bent. Sometimes that evokes a pedal steel, while most of the time it's a staple of Blues and Rock playing.

Sometimes, bending a note up less than a half-step is exactly what the Doctor ordered, especially with oblique-bends. Effectively a Quarter-Step up or so; a "Blue Note"! 

Playing Blues or Bluesy, Rootsy Rock in the Key of E or Em, over an E or Em chord, lay the tip of your 1st-finger ("index") finger across the 2nd and 3rd strings at the 12th-Fret;

then pull downward on the 3rd-String to make it go sharp by less than a half-step, while letting the finger glide over that 2nd-String, still holding the string down, fretted, holding the note without bending it. Bluesy "a ringin' a bell"!

Find other positions on the 2nd and 3rd strings to fit other keys.
 

  

12 hours ago, KuruPrionz said:

And now, Roy Buchanon. 

No Telecaster playing bunch of crazy good chicken pickin' plank spankin' shredder video thread is complete without a dose of RB.

You kid us not. An epic titan, a legend. To those who may not know, no less than Jeff Beck dedicated one of his most famous signature pieces to Roy, and the Rolling Stones asked him to join the band- and he politely turned their offer down.
   
 
 

[KuruPrionz]

RE: Caevan's post above - I am a string stretching fool, it is the primary reason I scalloped my fretboard on my main gigging Strat (blocked bridge too).

The notes that are not on the tempered scale are essential for blues, it is not a tempered scale music.

Neither is Middle Eastern or Indian music for that matter. 

 

Here is Jeff Beck using a slide, stretching notes with his fingers and/or vibrato bar to play a lovely Middle Eastern influenced melody. 

 

[Scott Fraser]

Oh yeah, I've been a fan of Roy Buchanan since his first album, in the early 70s. One of the great Telemasters. And Jeff Beck, well, he's just in a whole other category by himself. Nobody has come close to accomplishing his level of mastery of all the elements which make the Strat unique. As far as string bending in the service of melodic shaping of phrases I'll submit David Gilmour as the master. One bend and you instantly recognize it as Gilmour, just by the shaping and velocity of the pitch glide. 

[desertbluesman]

+1 on Buchanan, Beck, and Gilmour. All three are different in their approach, and quite excellent.