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Travis Picking Training Wheels (ft. Hayes Carll)

Lesson #525 • Nov 6, 2023

Instructional PDF 1 page

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Follow along with the print-friendly PDF!

It includes all of my notes for this lesson, allowing you to follow along at your own pace. You're free to download, print, and share the PDF across your devices.

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Description

Quick Q&A video to kick off the week! Where I take a member request (“Beaumont” by Hayes Carll) and show how to fingerpick the main riff, in a step by step manner. The big-picture lesson here is on the topic of Travis picking training wheels, as I call it — where we’ll only be playing the right thumb bass notes on a single string. This lets you get comfortable with the overall riff you’re playing, while keeping the thumb’s involvement relatively simple.

You can use this on just about any Travis picking song – but it also happens to align perfectly with what Hayes Carll plays in this song. Thanks to Larry for sending in this request – I only know of Hayes Carll’s music from the past couple years, and it’s a joy to finally learn (part of) one of his songs. Let’s get into it!

Slow Playthrough of Main Riff

Here’s the main riff I show in my video lesson above, looped several times with tabs on screen. Handy for practicing if you want something to reference in a short video!

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Hayes Carll Performing This Song

From Austin City Limits TV Recording

From the “Alone Together Sessions” Album (2020)

Other Lessons I Reference

See my Travis Picking page for all my lessons on this topic! Here’s a few I suggest though, if you’re brand new to this type of fingerstyle guitar:

Townes Van Zandt Fingerstyle, Simplified (ft. "Pancho and Lefty")

★ Instructional PDF

Travis Picking Patterns for Every Chord

★ Instructional PDF

Major Key Cheat Sheets! Must-Know Chords, Scales, and Fretboard Diagrams

★ Instructional PDF

Long Black Veil-inspired Fingerstyle Fun

★ Instructional PDF

Interested in a Full Lesson for Beaumont?

If you’d like me to make a full tutorial (and song sheet) for Beaumont, let me know by clicking the button below. If enough folks request it, it’ll be much more likely to happen sooner than later. Thanks!

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