HALLMARKS OF THARPE’S STYLE
Thanks to the miracle of You Tube, it’s easy to see why Sister Rosetta Tharpe
is so important to the history of electric
guitar. Enter her name and “Down By the
Riverside” in the site’s search engine, and
the top hit (which had nearly 600,000
views at press time) opens on a shot of
Tharpe performing on TV Gospel Time in
a flower-print dress and a short, blonde
wig. She stands in front of a men’s gospel
choir and wears a white, circa-1961 Gibson
SG/Les Paul with a rare side-pull vibrato
strapped around her neck, acoustic-style,
with the strap attaching at the headstock. As
she launches into what can only be called a
rocking, authoritative version of the gospel
standard, fat tube distortion emanates from
her amplifier. Her powerful voice rings
through the choir’s joyful din with an infectious, awe-inspiring soulfulness. The camera
zooms in on the guitar’s three humbuckers,
and you see that she’s wielding a thumb-pick. When the camera pulls back moments
later, you see what appears to be an early-
1960s Gibson GA-19RVT combo at the
other end of her white cable.
Following the second chorus, Tharpe
launches into a jaw dropping solo that begins
with a double-stop and then leads into a series
of seething, impeccably timed chromatic runs,
a wild bend, and a series of sliding double-stops that bristle with energy, vocal-like phrasing, and a raw, powerful tone that would’ve
given Chuck Berry a complex. At one point,
she slams a chord and waves her arm back and
forth in a move that’s simultaneously testifying
and directing the chord’s repeatedly bent notes
like a choir-director’s baton—it’s supreme
showmanship that presages Keith Richards’
and Pete Townshend’s trademark “windmill”
move. Through it all, Tharpe struts the stage,
juts her head out in rock-star fashion, and generally commands undivided attention.
Tharpe’s guitar work during her perfor-
mance of “Up Above My Head” on the same
television show is slightly less distorted, but
the performance is no less rocking. Note
how she delays the beginning of her solo
until part of the verse has gone by, then
comes in confidently at exactly the right
spot. Though Tharpe’s sound was primal
and pure in its appeal, her approach was not
primitive (she also played piano and was well
schooled in music). At the beginning of the
solo on this rendition, she effortlessly—and
in perfect time—slides into chords up nearly
the full length of the neck. She then hollers,
“Let’s do that again,” upping the ante by
sliding into single notes up near the end of
the fretboard. For the G chord in the middle
of the verse (the V chord in the key of C),
she pounds the G string, bending it back
and forth between the 9 and the minor 3rd.
Like Wes Montgomery, she increases the
excitement by switching from single notes
back into chords. She finishes off with the
classic Chuck Berry-style lick—alternating
between slides up to a C# on the G string
and fingering the same note on the B string.
MAKE A jOYFUL NOISE BY JASON SHADRICK
Figure 1
This is a typical intro that Sister Rosetta Tharpe would play to kick off a gospel tune in the key of C. Check out the cool use of the 9
(G) over the F7 chord in the second measure. During the last two measures, Tharpe creates a bluesy sound by using the %3rd (E%) over
the C7 chord. The sound of the 3 of C7 (E) and the E%, creates a nice, tension-filled rub.
44 & oe oe
G7
oeoeoe
F7
oeoe oeJoe™ oe oeoe
C7 3
oe oeoeoeoe b oeoeoe oe b oeoeoeÓ
00
01
30
333
31
02
1413
2
431
2
˙
Figure 2
A common element Tharpe’s style was the use of open strings. Here, we begin with an open-string phrase that wouldn’t sound out of
place in a Freddie King tune. Make sure to give the D on beat 3 a nice quarter-step bend. In the second measure, there are some ferocious triple stops and then the lick ends with some open string pull offs that are based out of the E blues scale (E–G–A–B%–B–D).
oeOE
oeoeoe oeoeoeoeoeoe oeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoe ‰oeJ oe b oeoeoeoeoe‰oe nJ oe b oeoeoeoeoeoeoe
44 &
E7
1
3
1/4
oeoe oeoeoeoe
02
03 0
3
0
3
3
13
12
12
13
12
12
13
12
12
13
12
12
13
12
12
13
12
12
13
12
12
13
12
12
0
0
˙
320
2
02
320
2
020
2
88 PREMIER GUITAR MAY 2011
premierguitar.com
