Michael Hedges, "If I Needed Someone"

When I first started playing the guitar seriously, about 20 years ago, I only wanted to learn how to sound like Leo Kottke. About 5 years later I discovered the book Rhythm, Sonority, Silence, which focused on several of Hedges' solo compositions. I started learning the pieces in the book and couldn't believe the sounds I was able to get out of my guitar. The magic of Hedges' composition and arrangement is in part a study of the tonal palette of the acoustic guitar, and his arrangement of "If I Needed Someone" takes full advantage of this. 

In "If I Needed Someone" the intro makes use of a mix of natural sounded notes, natural harmonics, artificial harmonics, pull-offs from a fretted note to a harmonic, and right-hand string-stopping. The verses use what has been termed as his in-out technique, where the right hand has two general motions, in towards the strings, and out away from the strings. On the "down" portion of the beat, the hand moves in and is most often using the middle finger to gently flick into the indicated string, often times this is accompanied by the thumb coming to rest on one of the bass strings. This is not at all dissimilar to clawhammer technique on the banjo. On the "up" portions of the beat, the pinky drags up to create a strum on the treble strings, sometimes this is accompanied by a pluck on the bass string with the thumb.

I took advantage of the opportunity to fill in Michael's right-hand string-stopping. Those of you who have studied Michael's published music are probably very familiar with this. The horizontal shaded lines placed on the tablature staff show where and when Hedges placed his fingers to either stop a previously ringing string, or to prepare to pluck a string. I added in some percussion notation as well, an extended stem with a black box is a bass drum hit, executed by hitting the face of the guitar with the heel of the right hand. This should be a subtle effect, not an incessant banging away at the instrument. When a rectangular box is above the black box that means a snare accompanies the bass drum hit. Snares are the result of the right hand thumb hitting the 5th or 6th string just enough to produce an audible tick, once again, a technique that sounds best when it is subtle and not used in excess. Enjoy and have fun! I expect to see some questions and a lively discussion of the technique below.

Video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/TQEcPth4HVc