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The Carter Scratch, Part 1: Basic Rhythm Technique

This lesson is part of the course Maybelle Carter–Style Guitar with Cathy Fink.
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Learn to play guitar like the legendary Maybelle Carter of the Carter Family, whose recordings are one of the backbones of the old-time country music and bluegrass repertoire and helped create the country music genre. Includes transcriptions of Maybelle’s thumb-lead style on classic songs.
 
 
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The Carter Scratch
 

Cathy gets you started playing melodies in the bass in this video. She starts by showing you how to play a C major scale with your thumb while your left hand stays in a C chord shape as much as possible. Then she shows you how to alternate melody notes with the thumb and your index finger stirring the chords.

 
 
 
The Maybelle Carter–Style Guitar Subscription Includes:
  • Detailed instruction on Maybelle Carter’s thumb-lead style of guitar playing
  • Transcriptions of Maybelle's leads on classic songs like “Keep on the Sunny Side,” “The Worried Man Blues,” “Wildwood Flower,” “My Dixie Darling,” and more
  • Examples of Maybelle's fingerpicking style on "Victory Rag,'" "Cannonball Rag," and "Hello Stranger"
  • 20 complete songs to play
  • High-quality video with multiple camera angles so you can see close-ups of both hands in action
  • Detailed notation and tablature for each lesson
  • Play-Along Track videos and audio downloads so you can play along with Cathy
 
 
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The Carter Scratch  
 
The Carter Scratch  
 
The Carter Scratch, Part 1: Basic Rhythm Technique
The Carter Scratch, Part 1: Basic Rhythm Technique
 

In this lesson, you’ll learn Maybelle Carter’s picking-hand technique, commonly called the “Carter scratch.” Maybelle used a thumbpick and a fingerpick on her index finger, but she turned her fingerpick around so it was opposite to the way fingerpickers wear fingerpicks. This is because the Carter scratch includes a down strum with the finger, not an up pick used in fingerpicking. You don’t need to wear a fingerpick, though, In fact, you can play the Carter scratch with a flatpick, but it’s worth trying it with a thumbpick. Maybelle’s daughter Anita said that what her mother did was play the melody notes on the bass (with the thumb) and “stirred the other strings with her fingers.” Maybelle played everything out of C position, with standard shape C, F, and G7 chords. Cathy starts by showing you the basic “Carter scratch” with a boom-chuck rhythm and then some rhythmic variations, and shows you how to play them with a thumbpick or a flatpick.


  The Carter Scratch, Part 1 Notation/Tab (Available to subscribers)
 
 
 
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