Jon Loomes

When people talk about retuned guitars in the British folk tradition, they often begin with Davy Graham and DADGAD. That is understandable, as it is one of the most widespread alternative folk guitar tunings, but it isn't the whole story.

Graham’s earliest documented use of DADGAD dates from the late 1950s, and it is clearly audible on recordings such as She Moved Through the Fair and Rif Mountain. I suspect the tuning was not chosen purely as an exotic effect. Its purpose was more likely practical. By removing the third, it reduced temperamental friction, supported drones, and made modal harmony physically manageable on the instrument. It was a response to musical need, not an act of invention for its own sake.

A closely related logic appears almost immediately elsewhere.

By 1968, Joni Mitchell was using DADEAD on recorded material. I Had a King from Song to a Seagull is a documented example. Again, the motivation is not display. DADEAD functions as a suspended D sonority, avoiding the third, sustaining drones, and allowing melody to move independently of harmony. The tuning simplifies certain musical problems, and that simplification is precisely its strength.

Martin Carthy, of course, made sustained and highly developed use of DADEAB, later transposed down to CGCDGA to suit vocal range and projection. This is, to me, the most successful solution, for reasons I will come to.

The interesting thing here is that the core of both these tunings is DADEA. When transposed to CGCDG, we arrive unequivocally at double C banjo tuning, the high g now being played with the fingers instead of the thumb. This tuning is well documented in five string banjo practice from the early nineteenth century and is likely older still. Its purpose is identical. It supports drones, facilitates modal thinking, and sidesteps the instability of thirds on fretted instruments. For that matter, the intervallic pattern of Graham's DADGAD corresponds in direct transposition with 'Sawmill' banjo tuning.

The guitar, in other words, is inheriting from much older traditions.

It is a commonly held belief that CGCDGA represents a modern or idiosyncratic development. In fact, stripped of octave doublings, it is simply a cello tuned in fifths: C G D A. Carthy himself has said as much. This tuning redistributes violin family pitch relations across the fingerboard in a way that is physically and musically workable. Cellos are first recorded as having been tuned to these pitches as far back as 1532 (Hans Gerle: Musica Teutsch), although England tuned them down to Bb F C G after the French manner till about 1725. One could speculate on the orthography of regional pitch pre standardisation.

Importantly, such tuning systems minimise temperamental problems inherent in thirds on fretted instruments, that is, the tempered thirds that fight against the natural thirds of the harmonic series.

For me, what CGCDGA offers is structural clarity. It allows for two diatonic string pairs rather than one, giving the player greater melodic opportunity across the neck and more freedom to move non linearly without forcing the music back into functional chord shapes. It also allows for effortless transcription of music arranged for diatonic instruments such as the anglo concertina and the melodeon or button accordion. This is why it works so well for Morris tunes.

There are, of course, practical considerations. The first string has been tuned down a long way from its intended pitch of E. As a result it is comparatively slack, bends easily under the finger, and produces lower volume than the rest of the set. You can just about live with this on a standard 13–56 set, but once the tuning becomes a working language rather than a temporary experiment, string choice starts to matter. A heavier top string, or a custom gauge set, restores balance and allows the tuning to behave consistently across the instrument.

While on the subject of modal tunings, it is also worth noting Nic Jones’ use of CGCGCD, most famously on Canadee I O. Again, this tuning sits very close to double C banjo tuning. Both establish C as a tonal centre, reinforce it through octave doubling, and avoid the third entirely. The additional low C deepens the drone field rather than altering the harmonic logic. What changes is weight and resonance, not function.

Taken together, this history suggests not that these tunings are novel or obfuscational, but that they are accessible in the deepest sense. Players across different instruments and generations keep arriving at the same solutions because they solve recurring musical and physical problems in a reliable way. Their survival is not a matter of novelty or difficulty. It is the result of utility, logical structure, and ease of use over time.

One might reasonably ask where this line of thinking leads.

I once spoke with Martin Carthy at a festival where I was showing some of the instruments I build. He remarked, quite matter of factly, that “the problem with CGCDGA is that the top strings sound a lot lower than EADGBE. So it pushes you up the dusty end.” What he was pointing to was not tone but range. The internal logic of the tuning is strong, but it compresses the upper register. You gain coherence and structure at the expense of range.

If one accepts the logic of these tunings as rooted in fifths, octaves, and the avoidance of thirds, then the next step is not to abandon the system but to extend it. We already have the D on the third string functioning as an internal octave and pivot point. Following the same pattern of root, octave, and ninth, and continuing around the cycle of fifths, it is not unreasonable to ask why that structure should stop at six strings.

An eight string instrument tuned CGCDGADE would extend the existing logic rather than inventing a new one. This idea restores upper range without compromising the modal clarity that makes the system useful in the first place. In that sense, it is not an innovation so much as an accommodation. The structure remains. The compass widens.

Whether or not such instruments become common is beside the point. What matters is that the internal reasoning remains consistent. These tunings continue to suggest their own developments because they are built on principles that are stable, adaptable, and musically legible. Tradition, in this sense, is not fixed. It is expandable.

And yes, there is one currently part built on my bench.

Notes on judgement, restraint, and responsibility in ballad singing.

Technique can be admired in isolation. Style can be imitated. Judgement can be learned second-hand. But interpretation is irreducibly personal. It is the sum of prior decisions, revealed only at the moment of telling. In the ballad tradition, interpretation is not an overlay; it is the mechanism by which the song becomes legible.

A ballad does not arrive with instructions. Its language is often spare, its psychology oblique, its moral centre unstated. Events are reported rather than explained. Motivations are implied, contradicted, or withheld. This is not a flaw to be corrected, but the condition that allows the song to endure.

The singer’s task is not to clarify everything, but to decide what kind of clarity is appropriate. This involves choosing where to apply weight and where to refuse it; where to linger and where to pass without comment. Every choice implies a reading of the song, whether acknowledged or not.

Interpretation does not begin with the voice. It begins with the text.

Traditional ballads are unforgiving of vagueness. Their language is economical but deliberate. Small variations between verses often carry structural significance. To interpret well, the singer must understand not only what the words mean, but how they function: which lines advance the narrative, which suspend it, which open moral space rather than closing it.

Misplaced emphasis can flatten a ballad entirely. Over-investing a neutral line turns implication into melodrama. Under-investing a hinge line leaves the narrative inert. Interpretation, at this level, is close reading carried out in sound.

Restraint is decisive.

Intensity is often mistaken for conviction. In practice, conviction lies in refusal. A singer who trusts the song does not need to underline its drama. Interpretation works best when slightly withheld, allowing the listener to meet the song halfway. Authority is felt most strongly when nothing is forced.

This applies to emotional colour as much as tempo or volume. Sadness in a ballad is rarely singular. It is braided with inevitability, resignation, or simple factual reporting. Committing too early to one emotional register forecloses complexity. Interpretation is the patience to let meaning accumulate.

Timing is one of the most powerful interpretive tools. Ballads breathe unevenly. A pause can turn a statement into a consequence. Excessive rubato dissolves narrative tension. The instinct for when time should stretch and when it should hold emerges from understanding where the story is going.

Tone must also be handled carefully. Many ballads occupy morally ambiguous ground. Violence and betrayal are often presented without comment. The singer’s task is not to judge or aestheticise, but to maintain a steady presence that allows the material to stand without instruction.

This is why ballad singing resists theatricality. Excessive characterisation narrows the field of meaning. The strongest interpretations often sound plain, until one realises how carefully that plainness has been achieved.

Silence matters too. Breath, decay, and the space between verses all contribute to meaning. These margins are part of interpretation, even when barely perceptible.

Interpretation is not fixed. Songs can sustain multiple readings over time. But not all variation is growth. There is a difference between deepening and drifting. Discipline matters. Choices must be repeatable because they are justified, not because they are rigid.

Ultimately, interpretation is the point at which responsibility for meaning is accepted.

To sing a ballad is to say: this is how I understand this song, today. Not definitively, not exhaustively, but with care. The authority that follows is not claimed; it is inferred.

Interpretation does not announce itself. It feels inevitable.
It is not about mastery over the song. It is about being equal to it.

An outline of a non-linear approach to guitar accompaniment in narrative song.

Most guitar pedagogy assumes a linear instrument. Melody is expected to move along a string, step by step, fret by fret, while harmony is supplied by stacked intervals held in fixed chord shapes. This assumption is deeply embedded, but it is neither inevitable nor neutral. It privileges certain kinds of motion, certain kinds of phrasing, and ultimately a certain kind of musical thought.

Non-linear guitar playing begins by rejecting the idea that melody must travel horizontally. Instead of moving along a string, the line is dispersed across the instrument. Notes that would normally be adjacent on one string are redistributed across multiple strings, often producing different timbral weights. The result is not merely a technical variation, but a fundamental shift in how melody breathes.

This approach treats the guitar less like a fretted lute and more like a small harp. Each string becomes a resonant column rather than a lane. Melody is no longer a single thread pulled tight along one axis, but a field of points that sound, overlap, and decay into one another. Sustain and sympathetic vibration become part of the melodic logic rather than incidental effects.

In this conception, traditional chord shapes lose their authority. They are optimised for harmonic clarity and ergonomic stability, not for melodic flow. Non-linear playing replaces them with melodic shapes: clusters of adjacent scale tones distributed across strings, designed so that the hand can remain largely still while the melody moves. These shapes are not consonant in the classical harmonic sense; they are potential. They exist to be unfolded, not struck.

The left hand is reorganised around this principle. Shapes are chosen not because they spell a chord cleanly, but because they allow tones to be released one at a time, ringing into each other. Open strings, partial stoppings, and overlapping sustains are not ornaments but structural tools. The hand becomes a frame through which melody passes, rather than a grip that clamps harmony into place.

This has direct implications for phrasing. Because notes are distributed across strings, successive tones differ in timbre, decay, and dynamic envelope even when close in pitch. A stepwise line can feel spacious; a repeated pitch can acquire weight simply by being voiced elsewhere. 

Crucially, this method allows clarity and resonance to coexist. Linear playing often forces a choice between articulation and sustain. Non-linear playing avoids this trade-off. Because successive notes occupy different strings, both can occur simultaneously. The instrument speaks in overlapping syllables rather than single-file speech.

In ballad accompaniment, this matters. Narrative songs require space: for text, implication, and silence. A harp-like guitar texture supports the voice without pinning it to a harmonic grid. It provides motion without momentum, presence without insistence.

This approach also resists the tyranny of the chord change. When harmony is implied melodically rather than stated vertically, tonality can hover, darken, or clarify gradually, mirroring the way ballad narratives reveal meaning obliquely. The listener is guided, not instructed.

Non-linear guitar playing is not just a fancy trick or a textural decision. It is an approach that allows the instrument simultaneously to function melodically, harmonically, and timbrally. It treats the fingerboard as a landscape rather than a line, and melody as something that can be placed as well as moved.

Why ballads function through causality rather than emotion.

There is a habit of speaking about traditional song as though it were fragile: something to be protected, conserved, or carefully handled. This is a misunderstanding. The ballads that have lasted are not delicate objects. They are durable mechanisms. They survive because they work.

A narrative song is not primarily an expression of feeling. It is an account of actions and consequences arranged in sequence. What gives it power is not atmosphere or identification, but causality. Something happens, then something else happens because of it. Meaning arises not from emphasis, but from order.

Over time, much folk performance has drifted away from this understanding. Songs are increasingly treated as emotional containers: vehicles for mood, personality, or identification. The singer’s interior life moves to the foreground. The narrative becomes a pretext rather than the engine. This shift is rarely deliberate. It is simply easier to inhabit a feeling than to carry a structure.

But ballads are not lyrics with plots attached. They are stories in which emotion is produced by inevitability. When that inevitability is softened or rearranged, the song may remain attractive, but it stops telling the truth it was designed to tell.

Fidelity to a narrative does not mean textual purism. It does not require archaic language, accent imitation, or museum-style reconstruction. Traditional singers have always altered songs: forgetting lines, substituting verses, correcting logic, reshaping detail. What mattered was not accuracy to a source, but accuracy to consequence.

The test of a change is simple. Does it preserve the causal pressure of the song, or does it relieve it?

A ballad will tolerate almost anything except help. When a singer nudges the listener toward the “right” feeling, when emphasis replaces sequence, or when atmosphere substitutes for clarity, the song weakens. The events still occur, but they no longer compel. The listener is invited to feel rather than required to reckon.

This is why the best singers in the tradition have often appeared restrained, even severe. Their authority does not come from intensity, but from trust in the material. They do not decorate the story. They stand in the right place and let it pass through them.

That stance is sometimes mistaken for judgement. It is not. It is closer to witnessing. The singer does not pronounce verdicts; the song does. Most ballads are concerned with boundaries: between fidelity and betrayal, curiosity and restraint, desire and survival. They do not moralise. They simply show what follows.

The role of the singer is to make that sequence legible.

This has implications for editing. To shorten a song is not to betray it, provided the logic remains intact. To modernise language is not a crime, provided no pressure is lost. But to obscure causality for the sake of colour, or to introduce ambiguity where the song was precise, is to change its function. The question is never “is this authentic?” but “is this inevitable?”

Tradition does not persist because it is preserved. It persists because it is practised with judgement. Songs that continue to function survive; those that do not quietly fall away. That process is not sentimental, but it is not cruel. It is how any living craft endures.

The task is not to recreate a past moment, but to allow the song to operate fully in the present. A ballad that cannot withstand a modern listener, sung plainly and without explanation, was already on its way out.

To trust a narrative enough to leave it alone requires confidence. To resist embellishment requires belief that the song already knows what it is doing.

When this is done well, the singer becomes almost invisible. Attention shifts from performance to process. Something older than both singer and audience is allowed to speak, not as heritage, but as functioning speech.