Talk:Pinch harmonic

Pinch Harmonic

moved from - of all places - Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting/Proposals. No, I don't know why it was posted there either. Grutness...wha? 13:05, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Right now, the article for Pinch harmonic doesn't give any specific instructions on how pinch harmonics is accomplished by a guitarist. --24.20.181.127 07:46, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

First, Wikipedia is not a collection of instruction manuals. Secondly, the introduction does explain that the "nail or thumb slightly catches the string after it is picked, creating a high pitched sound in any position" and the strangely title section Pinch harmonic#Pinch harmonics further describes that "A pinch harmonic is produced by rubbing your picking thumb against the string as you pick it." Hyacinth 13:33, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Where's any mention of Roy Buchanan? 70.231.235.33 13:01, 9 September 2007 (UTC)Richard in SF

There are recordings of Chet Atkins and Les Paul doing pinch harmonics from way before 1962, and even they were probably not the first to discover pinch harmonics, so attributing them to Roy Buchanan is totally inaccurate (as great of a guitar player as he was). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.165.54.33 (talk) 19:05, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Horribly substandard language

This page deserves to be tagged as substandard. The language is too informal. For example, it uses the second person to address the reader ("you should..."). 165.123.140.215 16:45, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Lists of examples

The once helpful list of examples has turned into an "insert your favorite artist here" monster list. It would probably be easier to just list the artists who don't use pinch harmonics. If this isn't going to be limited to a few representative artists and songs (which is probably impossible to do, given how subjective such a list would have to be), I think we should at least alphabetize the lists to give some order to them and not make it appear as though some artists are more deserving of recognition as pinch harmonicists than others.-Jefu 06:57, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I think maybe it just needs to go. I see no particular purpose for it, and thinning the list would be pretty subjective. It really is just an "insert your favorite artist here" thing, unless the artist has been noted particularly for being very technically proficient and using pinch harmonics in a significant, innovative, or notable way (e.g. Satriani). That might be a reasonable alternative to the list we have now, which is horrible. Cheeser1 22:01, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I cleaned out alot of them. There should not be 30 (relatively) obscure metal bands on the list, nor should the list be very long. I realize my choices are to some extent arbitary (and like anything anyone does, biased), but I tried to leave only the more notable ones on the list (e.g. Satriani). I hope others agree, and I'll be trying to maintain the list, keeping it relevant, small, and cleaned up. Cheeser1 20:36, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the list should be kept short, however I feel that there should be more bands of different genres, and ones who used pinch harmonics more prominently in their music, and are known for it. The list can be a little longer than it is in order to provide a more broad coverage.
I added a Dragonforce song, but it was reverted. They have very highly regarded guitarists who use pinch harmonics prominently in many of their songs, thus I feel they deserve a place on the list. Pantera do too, though I don't really know enough about them to pick the best examples, just that Darrel used them a lot, and the few Pantera things I've heard confirm that. Finally, if there is a whole section of the article for their use in death metal, perhaps one or two of the "pioneering" bands should be listed, but I very much dislike death metal, so I couldn't list one - perhaps someone else can. I'll re-add Dragonforce with a more well known / better example. SouperAwesome 08:14, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Not being funny. But why the hell is Kerry King not on this list? For those of you wondering who Kerry King is, he's one of the best thrash metal players to ever walk the earth, and his solo's are trademark examples of squealing pinch harmonics. If you want an idea of a Kerry King solo listen to the solo to Anthem (we are the fire) by Trivium... Its a blatant rip of Kerry's style 81.158.72.206 13:42, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I think it's cos the list is reserved for well known songs that people will have heard and recognise, not some obscure guy nobody's ever heard of, regardless of how good at they may be.--User:KX36 17:47, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Techniques - Pinch Harmonics (rewritten)

I have rewritten this section; standardising terminology, rephrasing things, adding punctuation, adding information and generally improving it in every way :-D. I have also removed the section about Billy Gibbons and Brian May using coins as plectrums to enhance their pinch harmonics; they do it purely for image. Coins make very bad plectrums, they don't have pointy tips and they dont have any give in them, meaning they're harder to use and wear down strings incredibly quickly (weakening them often to the point of snapping).--KX36 18:53, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

I like the rewrite, but it still needs sourcing (as does most of this article). I don't know if I'm going to tag it as unsourced, sicne it does have some external links that may qualify as sources, but it would be good for us to source it a bit better at some point. Cheeser1 20:05, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Clean up

This article needs clean up. Alot of sentences are mashed together incoherently, the wording is poor, there are no sources, and it's getting a bit out of control. Wikipedia isn't a database of lists, nor is it a how-to guide. We need to keep that in mind. I've cut the lists. Anyone who uses the technique notably can be included in the body of the article. If you can't put somebody's name in there without a good reason as to why they are notably associated with pinch harmonics, they do not belong in this article. The other things that need to be done are: (1) Cut out unnecessary how-to material (this may have been cut at some point - I forget), (2) reorganize article structure based on remaining content, (3) reword poorly written parts (the whole thing?) and (4) properly source claims that need sourcing. --Cheeser1 04:11, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

I will be doing as much of this as I can find the time for. I appreciate other people's input, of course, and would love to see some of this work taken off my hands. --Cheeser1 04:16, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Sound to Signature

I don't think 'signature' is completely accurate here, yet I think it is stronger than 'sound'.

NantucketNoon 02:06, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Random artists thrown into the text

Throughout the entire text of the article, there are many guitarists, groups, and genres mentioned. They don't seem to be a complete listing, or even a listing of particularly notable guitarists/bands/genres -- and there are a lot of glaring omissions (like Leslie West's early 1970s work in Mountain which was full of the stuff). I'm not sure how to best clean it up though - does anyone else have any ideas? Luminifer (talk) 02:29, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Deleted Marcus Fenix from the list of guitarists. To my knowledge, there is no guitarist named Marcus Fenix, google comes up with no results and wikipedia does not have an article for him. Only Marcus Fenix I know of is from the Gears of War series. 173.54.225.181 (talk) 00:03, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Name?

I always knew these as pick harmonics, not pinch harmonics - in fact, the way I play them involves no pinching at all. A quick google shows that both names are valid, but it seems like 'pick harmonic' is actually more common. Any thoughts? Luminifer (talk) 04:48, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Pinch harmonic is a bit of a misnomer, but talk to 99% of electric guitarists, and they'll call it a pinch harmonic.173.54.225.181 (talk) 00:05, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

I ask because I've never actually heard someone in person call it that. Luminifer (talk) 05:21, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree with the IP address man, pinch harmonic is the informal term used by guitarists, and a new player looking for information on the technique would be done a service by being instructed to call it by the name 'pinch'. The physical technique somewhat resembles a pinch (or, at least, 'pinching' the string in two at the correct point to divide the vibrations by a ratio, if you get what I mean). No, it is not literally pinched, but many guitar terms are illogically named (tremolo/vibrato for instance)

Or, hard evidence, as the technique is refered to as 'pinch' by the following notable websites: http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/lessons/guitar_techniques/pinch_harmonics.html http://www.cyberfret.com/techniques/harmonics/pinch/index.php http://www.expertvillage.com/video/1692_metal-pinch-harmonics.htm http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/solo-guitar/pinch-harmonics/

Contrast with a google search for 'pick harmonics', while predictably turning up results, does not list many popular guitar instruction websites. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.89.156.222 (talk) 14:19, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Merge with artifical harmonic

I suggest this article be merged with that for Artificial harmonic - most of the information is the same, and this article has a lot more detail which applies to both articles. Luminifer (talk) 15:22, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Removal of material

Someone has just removed much material from this page. Some tags were removed (as "unnecessary" with no explanation). Some material was also removed with the excuse that it was original research, but then was replaced by other original research. Can someone please either remove all original research, reinstate the article, or explain how this change is actually an improvement? Luminifer (talk) 05:21, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

Frets

The technique is possible on any fretted stringed instrument

Why does it require frets? 151.200.47.86 (talk) 16:16, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Incorrect Information

"It is important to note that as only one fundamental sounds..." Wrong, wrong, wrong. There's only ever a maximum of one fundamental for any fretted note. A full-on pinch gets rid of it in favor of one of the overtones and a small mix of its upper friends, so the total number of sounding fundamentals during this procedure is usually zero, unless sort of a half-pinch is executed, which just de-emphasizes the amount of fundamental heard in favor of the overtones. Note: doing the latter consistently is a bit more difficult than a full pinch. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.152.225.21 (talk) 09:01, 1 September 2010 (UTC)