File: chaissonyoungpeter-oh-fourthfingerdemo_M.mp3
Speakers:
PC – "Young Peter" Chaisson
KP – Curator Ken Perlman
PC: It makes the tune. Remember what we were talking about there today?
KP: Yeah.
PC: Like there's – When it's wrote down on sheet music, a lot of the time it doesn't call for the little finger, eh? It just calls for open D or open G or something like that.
KP: Yeah.
PC: But, it always, I always – My father always wanted me to use my little finger, you know. And he said that there was a lot of people that didn't and their music wasn't full. And there used to be a tune that he used to demonstrate, eh?
KP: Yeah.
PC: He'd get us to try to count how many times his little finger hit the string through the course of the tune, eh? And we never could. And I think I could probably think of the tune and I could probably show you what I'm talking about.
KP: Yeah, would you?
PC: I'll play it without the little finger first. Now this is not perfect without the little finger, you gotta use it sometime, eh?
KP: I understand.
"Young Peter" Chaisson plays Smith's Reel without much use of little finger
PC: That's without the little finger.
KP: Okay, and now with the little finger.
PC: With the little finger.
"Young Peter" Chaisson plays Smith's Ree, using little finger for "priming" and slow graces
PC: Maybe you can see that there's quite a difference in the fullness of the tune, eh?
KP: Yeah.
PC: At least I think so.
KP: Oh yeah. Now, but part of that is also that you're hitting - Allows you to hit two strings and get the same pitch.
PC: See, right here...
Demonstrates [catches "slow" grace note on stopped string along with open string on same pitch]
KP: Right.
PC: Okay, I'll go…
Demonstrates
KP: But you're hitting both the open "A" and the...
PC: Oh yeah, yeah. Open "A" and…
KP: And the stopped "A".
PC: Yeah. And this, this here too.
Demonstrates
PC: I guess that's what you call a grace note, I don't know.
KP: Yeah. It's a grace off a double [stop] – Two strings.
PC: Yeah, yeah.
KP: But the full sound is not only [inaudible] but from hitting the open strings also.
PC: Yeah, oh definitely, yeah.
