Slide Guitar

Definition:

Slide guitar is a particular technique for playing the guitar that is often used in blues-style music. The technique involves placing an object against the strings while playing to create glissando effects and deep vibratos. It typically involves playing the guitar in the traditional position (flat against the body) with the use of a tubular “slide” fitted on one of the guitarist’s fingers. The slide may be a metal or glass tube, such as the neck of a bottle. The term “bottleneck” was historically used to describe this type of playing. The strings are typically plucked while the slide is moved over the strings to change the pitch. The guitar may also be placed on the player’s lap and played with a hand-held bar and is then referred to as “lap slide guitar” or “lap steel guitar”.

Other Guitar Term

a clef (looks like an ampersand “&”) placing the G note above middle “C” on the second-lowest line of the staff. The staff is the five lines where notes and musical directions appear.

A piece of leather or fabric worn to support the guitar when standing. Straps attach to the button-like connectors on the sides of the guitar body. Some acoustic guitars that do not have the connector at the top end of the body require a small band that loops around the the headstock of the guitar just above the nut. This band allows for a guitar strap to connect to the top half of the guitar.

Standard tuning defines the string pitches as E, A, D, G, B, and E, from lowest (low E2) to highest (high E4). Standard tuning is used by most guitarists, and frequently used tunings can be understood as variations on standard tuning. There are hundreds of such tunings, often minor variants of established tunings.

Scale length refers to the distance between a guitar’s nut and its bridge. So in other words, a guitar’s scale length is determined by the gap between the two main components that seat its strings. It can therefore be thought of as the measurement of the maximum sounding length of a guitar’s strings. (https://blog.andertons.co.uk)

The guitar saddle can be a piece of bone or plastic on an acoustic guitar and a metal construct on electric guitars that is attached to the bridge and lifts the strings to the desired height transfering vibration through the bridge to the soundboard. The height of the saddle raises or lowers the action of the strings of the guitar.

An open string is any string that is played without fretting a note (placing any finger on the freboard).