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The capo often gets some flack amongst higher-end musicians and I think it’s about time someone came to its defense. The anti-capo argument often goes a little something like this:

“Why do you need a capo? Why not just learn to play in all of the keys?”

Makes sense, right? Well, only if you believe the capo’s sole job is transposition. What many who make this argument fail to appreciate, I think, is that use of the capo is often just as much about voicing and tone as it is about changing keys.

I am not a very good acoustic guitar player, but I can play in all of the keys. That’s because I know how to play bar chords which make it pretty simple to hammer out major and minor triads on pretty much any pitch. So, why use a capo? Because I am compelled by voicing.

Ask a piano player to play a G chord and you might get any number of results. Maybe a triad. Maybe four notes in each hand. Maybe adding the “2″ and leaving out the “3″. Pianists can make a G chord sound many different ways by the way they voice the chord.

Guitarists also like to have these voicing options, but the configuration of fingers on frets is a bit limiting. Like playing twister with your fingers, there are only so many different ways you can approach the neck without hurting yourself. So, what’s a guitarist to do? Well, some venture out into alternate tunings to provide some voicing variety. Others use capos. Some even use multiple capos in various configurations. In all cases, a guitarist is not simply cheating his way into a difficult key, but rather creating new ways to sound the chords.

One specific example revolves around open voicing chords. An open voicing chord is one in which at least one string on the guitar is left “open” and not fretted. Naturally you can see how an open voicing can only work on a single pitch since trying to move up and down the fretboard while leaving one or more strings open doesn’t work too well. That is, unless you use a capo. So, if you like the sound of the open voicing G but you want to play the song in B flat, then put a capo on fret three and listen to it ring.

I believe the capo is an absolutely essential accessory for the acoustic guitar. Just like a mute provides a brass player with a whole new world of tone possibilities, the capo does the same for the guitarist. And hey, sometimes brass players might just use the mute because they are not good enough to play soft without it. In the same way, acoustic players (including me) might sometimes use a capo to cheat into a difficult key.  Even so, mutes are still viable tools for brass instruments and capos are equally significant for the guitar.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 29th, 2007 at 4:45 pm and is filed under Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.