TECHNIQUE FOCUS 1: SLIDE ESSENTIALS

The first thing to consider is positioning: where you’d normally fret a note — behind the fretwire — is where you want your slide to glide to. Always position the slide the fret, to avoid sounding flat (you may need to raise your action and/or use heavier strings to facilitate this). Next, lay your idle 1st finger on the strings behind the slide, to dampen unwanted overtones. Finally, always use pick-hand string damping (or “string guarding,” as Sonny Landreth calls it) and some palm muting on the lower strings that aren’t being played at the moment. Pick-hand damping is easier to do when playing fingerstyle because you can simply rest the fingers that aren’t picking on the strings that aren’t in play. If you’re playing with a pick, you’ll need to develop a “hybrid damping” technique, whereby you place your 2nd, 3rd and 4th fingers on the high strings to keep them muted when not used. If you’re playing a lick across the strings, aim to mute the previous string while simultaneously picking the next, unless, of course, you want the notes to ring, or “bleed,” together.