{"id":147529,"date":"2025-04-16T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-16T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/?p=147529"},"modified":"2025-04-15T12:33:28","modified_gmt":"2025-04-15T19:33:28","slug":"sue-foley-teaches-the-guitar-stylings-of-maybelle-carter-and-elizabeth-cotten","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/sue-foley-teaches-the-guitar-stylings-of-maybelle-carter-and-elizabeth-cotten\/","title":{"rendered":"Sue Foley Teaches the Guitar Stylings of Maybelle Carter and Elizabeth Cotten"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Sue Foley on the Guitar Stylings of Maybelle Carter and Elizabeth Cotten | Lesson\" width=\"1290\" height=\"726\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/bwF5bWc5kJ0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Sue Foley is both a guitarist and a scholar, and she was kind enough to create this exclusive lesson, breaking down key techniques from some of the musicians she celebrates on\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/42dD46N\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">One Guitar Woman<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In&nbsp;<strong>Example 1<\/strong>, Foley demonstrates the Carter scratch, a technique pioneered by Maybelle Carter in which the guitarist plays single-note melodies on the bass strings while adding chordal accents on the upper strings. \u201cIt\u2019s a kind of counterintuitive way to think about playing melodies on guitar,\u201d Foley says, \u201cwhich gives us this real richness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As she mentions in <a href=\"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/with-one-guitar-woman-sue-foley-honors-the-women-who-helped-shape-guitar-history\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">this interview<\/a>, it took her quite some time to decode exactly what Carter was playing on \u201cLonesome Homesick Blues\u201d (similar to&nbsp;<strong>Example 2<\/strong>). Eventually, something clicked. \u201cUsually, you can just go online and learn a song,\u201d Foley says, \u201cbut in this case, nobody was playing it right\u2014at least not solo and not the way Maybelle Carter did. I\u2019m pretty sure this is the correct method: it\u2019s in an open tuning, either open E or D, and played with a flatpick.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Elizabeth Cotten\u2019s fingerpicking style was deeply idiosyncratic, full of unexpected rhythmic and harmonic nuances. Foley is particularly drawn to those quirks, like the subtle phrasing shift in Cotten\u2019s \u201cOh Babe It Ain\u2019t No Lie,\u201d the inspiration for&nbsp;<strong>Example 3<\/strong>. \u201cShe draws out the chords in unexpected places,\u201d Foley explains. \u201cI just listen and try my best to adopt her style. But it\u2019s impossible to sound just like Elizabeth Cotten\u2014she only sounds like her.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1084\" height=\"1452\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/AG352-SUE-FOLEY-NOTATION.png?resize=1084%2C1452&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Sue Foley teaches the guitar styles of Maybelle Carter and Elizabeth Cotten notation and tablature, page 1.\" class=\"wp-image-147367\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/AG352-SUE-FOLEY-NOTATION.png?w=1084&amp;ssl=1 1084w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/AG352-SUE-FOLEY-NOTATION.png?resize=373%2C500&amp;ssl=1 373w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/AG352-SUE-FOLEY-NOTATION.png?resize=764%2C1024&amp;ssl=1 764w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/AG352-SUE-FOLEY-NOTATION.png?resize=768%2C1029&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/AG352-SUE-FOLEY-NOTATION.png?resize=224%2C300&amp;ssl=1 224w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1084px) 100vw, 1084px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<div>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/store.acousticguitar.com\/products\/no-352-may-june-2025\" name=\"magazine\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"width: 150px; height: 198px; margin: 0px 20px 10px 0px;\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/001_352_Cover-150px.jpg?w=1290&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Acoustic Guitar magazine cover for issue 350\"><\/a>\n<p style=\"font-family: sans-serif; margin: 0px 0px 15px 0px;\">This article originally appeared in the <a href=\"https:\/\/store.acousticguitar.com\/products\/no-352-may-june-2025\">May\/June 2025<\/a> issue of <em>Acoustic Guitar<\/em> magazine.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In this lesson, Foley demonstrates the Maybelle Carter-pioneered Carter scratch, and the rhythmically rich, idiosyncratic fingerpicking style of Elizabeth Cotten.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":147530,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"In this lesson, Foley demonstrates the Maybelle Carter-pioneered Carter scratch, and the rhythmically rich, idiosyncratic fingerpicking style of Elizabeth Cotten.","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1152],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[1541],"class_list":["post-147529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-play-like"],"blocksy_meta":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/sue-foley-maybelle-carter-elizabeth-cotten_sm.jpg?fit=900%2C506&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"authors":[{"term_id":1541,"user_id":24,"is_guest":0,"slug":"adam-perlmutterstringletter-com","display_name":"Adam Perlmutter","avatar_url":{"url":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Adam-Perlmutter.jpg","url2x":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Adam-Perlmutter.jpg"},"author_category":"","user_url":"","last_name":"Perlmutter","first_name":"Adam","job_title":"","description":"Adam Perlmutter holds a bachelor of music degree from the University of North Carolina-Greensboro and a master's degree in Contemporary Improvisation from the New England Conservatory. He is the editor of <i>Acoustic Guitar<\/i>."}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147529"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147529\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":147610,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147529\/revisions\/147610"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147529"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=147529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}