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The
technique employed in the previous example is the 'Upward Warp' technique. The Upward
Warp is a combination of a position, or pose of the guitar, a series of pivot points, and
a movement in the fretting hand. The idea behind this combination is an increased
economy of movement, meaning we expend less effort to get a greater depth, and dramatic
effect. While we can achieve a similar effect on the
horizontal, natural playing position on guitar....You will find that you're putting in a lot more
effort, meaning a lower economy of movement on the horizontal plane. This is mainly because
we're working against the friction of the strap and also we don't have as many pivot
points to work with. Okay, so let's have a look now at how you
can use the Upward Warp in your playing. So, for the next example, we're going to be in
DADGAD tuning.
Okaaay, so once you've tuned down your guitar you want to assume the position. So, from
the player's perspective the position is like 11 O'clock on a clock face. We don't want
it (the neck) so high that we're hitting ourselves in the face, but we want it high enough so
we get the pivot points. So, the first pivot point is going to be our hip, and our leg.
So this is where the guitar actually bounces off, it's the fulcrum of the movement. The
second pivot point is this fleshy part of the hand, just before it becomes the thumb
(so the palm). We're going to use this part of the hand and sandwich it in-between the
bridge of the guitar and the sound-hole of the guitar, just about here.
Now, using the fretting hand, we're going to push the guitar neck away from the body,
and then back towards the body. This is what creates the warbled effect itself. So let's
take an example with a partial barre chord so what we're going to do is the 1st fret
using our first finger we're gonna get the 6th, 5th, and 4th strings. We're gonna leave
the other three strings open. And basically arpeggiate the chord like so...
Then we move to the second chord, which will be open, open, 4th fret using our ring finger,
and the rest of the strings are open. Okay, so let's look at this pattern using
the upward warp effect.
Because the Upward Warp is an organic effect, meaning we're creating it with just our hands,
we can determine what rate we want the warbled effect to be.
So we can have a very wide, dramatic sound...or, a faster warp. In some ways it's synchronised
with the speed of our playing, but we're always in control, meaning we can go from a slower
rate, to a more subtle effect.
The effect works particularly well in dropped tunings, and down tunings. The effect also
works better on 1st position chords because we're nearer to the end of the neck meaning
we have more control over the warp. The effect works particularly well on harmonics as well.
So I hope that you find a use for the Upward Warp in your playing, and that it serves you
very well. Thanks for watching!