Murpheys skinny 8th string (7th)

Kevin Brown · From: England

Slowly moving towards Murpheys 8 string tuning C6th hi G (i believe)

Would he have used this 7th during his solos, which might explain his amazing 'jumpiness' re pitch, or did he just use top strings and throw in the 7th to enhance his arrangements and thrown a major 7th chord in.

By the way just received his 70s jazz album and in serious ear training at the mo

Stephan Miller · From: Silver Spring, Maryland, USA

Kevin, it's only speculation, but to me that out-of-sequence B landed at the bottom end of this tuning (lo-hi: b C# E G A C E G) because it gives a compact grip of this very cool ninth chord-- C# E G B. I've searched the Forum archives but there's been very little discussion of the benefits (I'm sure there are more, like the jumps in register you mentioned) of the B that Joaquin favored at the low end of his C6/A7 tuning.

Mike Johnstone tried this tuning for a while. Also, John McGann has tabbed out a lot of Murphey's playing in book form (I think the Elderly catalog still offers it) and he may be able to shed some more light on this.

--Steve

Edward Meisse · From: Santa Rosa, California, USA

The forum has that book. Check the catalogue.

Michael Johnstone · From: Sylmar,Ca. USA

I love that tuning and would urge anyone to go for it. I tried it with the hi B at the bottom but I couldn't get used to the small string and high note down there - it was against all my instincts.What I do now is move all the strings down a notch and put the hi B as the 1st string.It makes a lot more sense to me like that but when you saw Murph play it,he got around on it real smooth. There's a Byrd style 3-note dom7 chord forward slant on strings 2,3 & 8 you can't get without having it as the 8th string.But hey you can't have everything and plus there's another Dom7 voicing built right into the tuning.
The other thing I do now is tune the whole neck down a half step to B so it lines up positionwise with my B6 pedal guitar and gives me less to think about when I switch back and forth. But yeah it's my main do-it-all non-pedal tuning.Highly recommended.

Kevin Brown · From: England

Michael thats very interesting, in fact at present I have put it on the top of my A 6th, I fluctuate it from a 6th to 7th to major 7th depending on the tune, takes time to get your head round the top string soloing, you have to adjust for each tuning, it does throw your c6th c3 note clusters towards the bass strings which can sound a bit 'mushy' so still working on it
Thanks Michael

Stephan Miller · From: Silver Spring, Maryland, USA

Correction from last post, it's a C6/A9. It's got that particular dom9 inversion I like (3rd on the bottom, doubling as a minor 6th) that you see in B11, and in E13 with the 8th string G#. I can see using this 7th at the bottom of A6 as well, with a wound string.

Kevin Brown · From: England

Thanks chaps, Im going to nail this in the next day or two.
This is what John Mgann says of Murpheys tuning, no sign of a high G or let alone a B for that matter

[i]The C6th tuning is a wonderful invention given to us by Jerry Byrd. Nested within the tuning are major, minor, minor 7th, and many more partial chords and combinations. Joaquin used different variations on the tuning over time, but the solos herein are mostly played in (low to high) (G) A C E G A C E tuning.[/i]

This is telling me to stick to a basic C6th tuning for top string soloing !

MIchael would you be kind enough to give me your string guages, much appreciated. And to wrap it up are you saying this is your tuning lo-Hi C# E G A C E G B

Michael Johnstone · From: Sylmar,Ca. USA

Strings would be from top down B(.020),G(.012),E(.014),C(.017),A(.022),G(.024),E(.030),C#(.036). I spoke to John Mcgann when he was researching the book and he is well aware of Murph's tuning but maybe he thought that for the masses a simpler approach would be in order - and in fact a hell of a lot of Murph's solos can be played on a straight C6. But to me the B and C# when properly exploited make the difference between settling for smaller fragments of chords or getting more complex voicings. A lot of melody is also handier with those extra notes.

Mike Black · From: New Mexico, USA

Edward Meisse · From: Santa Rosa, California, USA

That's been covered, sir. Mr. Johnstone prefers it on the top. He finds that a more comfortable position for it given its high pitch. I think he's got a point. But I do wish I knew why Murphey put it on the bottom.

Gary C. Dygert · From: Frankfort, NY, USA

I can't wrap my mind around a scrambled tuning either. Has there been any discussion of this type of tuning on the forum? I'd like to see other players' takes on the subject.

Mike Neer · From: NJ

I'm sure it was on the bottom to keep it out of the way for his singles string work.
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Michael Johnstone · From: Sylmar,Ca. USA

That wasn't the only tuning Murph had with out-of-place strings. He also had an F#9 thing with a small string in the middle of the tuning tuned to a 7th. Tunings like that are called "re-entrant" tunings.The 5 string banjo is another example. When Buddy Emmons started using chromatic strings on his E9,he put them at the bottom - because of the mechanical limitations of the steels in those days.Yet another recent example was the late great Leo LeBlanc who had a single high chromatic string at the bottom of a 10 string E6/9. It's not a new idea.And what about the so-called standard E9 tuning with it's out-of-sequence chromatic strings? Everyone seems fine with that.So there can definately be some advantages to out of sequence strings and you can get used to anything.

Stephan Miller · From: Silver Spring, Maryland, USA

OK, I've already put forth my solution or theory or whatever at the top of this thread, but here it comes again from another angle....for decades some players have liked to retune the fifth string (E) of an 8-string A6 tuning, down a half step, giving this B11: (lo-hi) F# A C# D# F# A C# E. One huge benefit-- the resulting tuning contains this dominant ninth inversion on strings 5-4-3-2: 3rd, 5th, dom 7th,9th. Very sweet, jazzy chord, and it can also be framed as a "minor sixth" (6-1-m3-5).

Now, Murphey clearly had been trying out Jerry Byrd's C6/A7, and he also liked C6 with the high G. So let's say he's looking at the combination of those two tunings-- C# E G A C E G ....wants to fill out his 8-string tuning.... realizes that if he adds B (pitched between the A and C) he will have the same cool dom9 inversion found in B11-- only it's A9 (C# E G B) on the open strings instead of B9.

He doesn't put the B between the A and the C as it would totally louse him up. He puts it on the bottom of the tuning instead of on the top because he wanted to play his new 9th chord with a compact 8-7-6-5 grip instead of a no-fun-at-all 8-7-6-1! So there it sits, as the sweet 9th of a 3-5-b7-9, voiced on the top but played on the bottom. (I'm sure by the time he had it strung up he'd thought of a few other uses for it.)

So says I. Hey, I don't know. But what do you think?

--Steve

Michael Johnstone · From: Sylmar,Ca. USA

He did use it as a ninth tone in an A Dom situation but mostly he used it as a maj7 in the C form and would let it run together and ring against the major triad as a chord or an arpeggio the way E9 pedal players do. Good examples of that are in the suite of solo improv tunes he does on the "Murph" CD. He also used it as well as the C# string to sketch fragments of diminished chords and altered chords like 7#9s and m7b5s which you need those tritone intervals to do. His use of rootless chords and chord substitutions was very advanced too and even though he would always downplay his grasp of such things,his playing revealed otherwise.
So there's a lot more to that tuning than meets the eye.

Edward Meisse · From: Santa Rosa, California, USA

Just today I got a used Morrel 8 string. Got it from a friend who had just 6 middle strings on it tuned to low C6. It's going to be my camping and trunk of the car guitar. I have resisted using C6/A7 tuning because on a 6 string I think it takes away as much as it gives. After long consideration, I decided to use Mr. Murphey's version with the B on the bottom. The B on the bottom of this tuning gives back everything you had with the C natural, in different locations of course, and then some. I have been converted. Add me to the list of strong recommenders for this tuning. I have much less experience than Mr. Johnstone, but I highly recommend also getting used to the B on the bottom (sorry about the repeated puns). I think it's MUCH more useful there. Am I ever excited!! Yeeehaww!! Mr. Green

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