HEAVENLY HARMONICS
All styles, acoustic & electric
Join Andy Saphir as he reveals how to play technically impressive and musically satisfying harmonics of all types, across many styles.
Harmonics are basically ‘overtones’ (additional musical frequencies normally higher than the original note) that resonate naturally around a note when a string is plucked. On a guitar, we can pinpoint some of these and play them as isolated notes in their own right without necessarily hearing the original note. These are what we generally refer to as ‘harmonics’.
On the guitar we are lucky because there are numerous approaches we can use to achieve harmonics, with each approach using a different technique that gives a unique sound which in turn can create a different musical mood or feel. We can use both an acoustic or electric guitar for most of the harmonic techniques, with the characteristics of the instrument adding to the musical flavour. For example, natural harmonics played on a steel-string acoustic can give a haunting, mystical feel, while a slapped harmonic can give a sharp, zinging, percussive sound. On the electric, with a healthy amount of distortion and a humbucking pickup, a pinched harmonic can make the guitar squeal like it’s being tortured!
In this feature, we’re going to look at six harmonic producing approaches which will be split into five exercises of each type. In addition, there’s a 16-bar rock solo and a 16-bar fingerpicking acoustic solo to learn, featuring a variety of these techniques.
Before we dive into the exercises, we’ll look at each of the six approaches and explain what they are and the technique of how to play them. As a rule, harmonics will ring out most clearly when using the bridge pickup, but experiment with sounds and pickup positions to see what works and sounds best for you.
NATURAL HARMONIC: This is probably the easiest type of harmonic to play. The natural harmonics live at specific places along the string’s length, but are most easily found at the 12th, 7th and 5th frets. The 12th fret harmonic produces a note an octave higher than the open string, the 7th fret harmonic creates a note a 5th above that, and the 5th fret harmonic creates a pitch two octaves higher than the open string. The finger of the fretting hand should touch the string (not press it down) directly over the appropriate fret (not just behind it as when fretting normally), then pick the string with either a pick or thumb/finger of the picking hand. Immediately pull your fretting finger away from the string, which should allow the harmonic to ring out clearly. Using a clean tone here can produce a bell-like ring, but with a distortion tone on the bridge pickup, a ringing ‘cry’ or ‘shriek’ can be achieved; for example, the whammy bar dive bomb open sixth string followed by a natural harmonic over the 3rd fret third string as the whammy bar is let back up is a classic!
ARTIFICIAL HARMONIC: This approach can produce natural sounding harmonics anywhere on the neck. Following the principal that an open string that’s played 12 frets higher is an octave above that note, we can fret any note and using the extended first finger of the picking hand, touch that string 12 frets higher and pick it with the thumb or a remaining finger of the picking hand, to create the harmonic. This can be a tricky technique to master, and some experimentation will be necessary to find the approach that works best for you. I use my extended first finger to touch the string and with my hand in an arched ‘classical’ style position, I pick the string with my thumbnail. You may want to experiment with a thumbpick if the classical positioning doesn’t work for you, or use the side of your thumb. You could even try using one of your other fingers to pluck the string.
HARP HARMONICS: These are a combination of artificial harmonics played with regular notes. By fretting an appropriate chord shape, a lower-string artificial harmonic is followed by a regular plucked higher-string note. This can create a lovely ‘cascading’ harp-like sounding series of notes that blend beautifully together. By using the thumb to play the artificial harmonic, the third or fourth finger of the picking hand can be used to pluck the relevant higher string. Again, this is a tricky technique to master, but legendary players like Chet Atkins and Lenny Breau were masters of this art.
TAPPED HARMONICS: These harmonics are created by normally fretting a note with the fretting-hand finger and using a finger of the picking hand to tap onto the string over the fret an octave higher (or elsewhere to produce different pitches). This type of harmonic can sound great on either electric or acoustic, but it is often used in a rock context on the electric with a distortion sound. If you hold the pick between the thumb and first finger, you can use your second finger for the tap to enable you to switch easily between regular picking and tapped harmonics. For
“On the guitar we are lucky because there are numerous approaches we can use to achieve harmonics for a different mood or feel”
support, rest the heel of your picking hand on the body of the guitar for lower-string tapped harmonics, and on the lower strings for tapped harmonics on the higher strings. A quick ‘bounce’ of the finger tapping onto the appropriate fret creates the harmonic.
SLAPPED HARMONICS: This technique produces harmonics coupled with a percussive hit as the finger literally hits the strings directly over the required fret to produce the sound, creating simultaneous sounding harmonics across a group of strings. It can sound great on a steel-string acoustic but also works well on an electric. Normally done with the picking hand, a quick wrist flick performed with the hand in mid air above the neck with the flat of the first or second finger bouncing off the strings over the appropriate fret produces the harmonics. My preferred method is to use my first finger flicking or sliding off my second finger, which seems to gives a more solid attack. Slapped harmonics are easiest to produce an octave higher (12 frets) than the fretted note (or open strings), but having said that, they’re still not easy to do, as any mis-hit tends to fail to produce a clear ringing harmonic.
PINCHED HARMONICS: These harmonics tend to live exclusively in the realms of rock guitar playing, and produce a characteristic ‘scream’ or ‘squeal’, which can sound very exciting. A relatively heavy distortion tone is required, preferably using a humbucking pickup in the bridge position for the best results. The technique is to play the string with the pick, locating the side of the thumb over a point on the string that will create a harmonic, (normally these points will be between the neck and bridge pickups, producing a harmonic in the second octave higher than the fretted note), and at the same time as picking the string, the thumb touches or digs into the string at that relevant point which creates the harmonic. Pair this picking hand technique with some wide rock vibrato to get the characteristic sound. Pinched harmonics on the third string tend to give more of the higher pitched ‘squeal’, whereas lower string ones give a thicker ‘cry’.
“As a rule, harmonics will ring out most clearly when using the bridge pickup, but experiment with sounds and pickup positions to see what works and sounds best for you”