How do you use your tremolo?

[Hubert Stumblin]

Does that "vibrato" pedal vary the volume ? The 'depth' and 'rate' knobs make it sound like it's really just another vibrato tool.

 

 

If you look carefully he labels the pedal a tremolo, which it is. It varies the volume. There are vibrato pedals of various types like the Univibe or Rotovibe that try to mimic the sound of a Leslie. There are also pedals that act like a guitar's vibrato allowing you to wiggle a little or even dive and pull up in pitch using a "tredle" a la a wah-wah pedal.

[Mcfontio]

If you look carefully he labels the pedal a tremolo, which it is. It varies the volume. There are vibrato pedals of various types like the Univibe or Rotovibe that try to mimic the sound of a Leslie. There are also pedals that act like a guitar's vibrato allowing you to wiggle a little or even dive and pull up in pitch using a "tredle" a la a wah-wah pedal.

Hey, just checkin. Everyone I've ever known has made the heinous tremolo/vibrato mistake.

I'm kind of surprised people actually buy "vibrato" pedals.

[BATCAT]

I'll use my fingertips to get a little vibrato when a note or chord is ringing out, or I'll hold it in my palm as I strum for this kind of thing:

 

[YOUTUBE]l9-NOIalUYU[/YOUTUBE]

[cephus]

I grab it and shake it. My strings are too stiff to get enough wiggle with my fingertips. The only time I divebomb or anything like that is on a couple hendrix songs we do sometimes and only if we do them at the end of the set

I like the bigsby for shaking chords the best. The fender trem doesn;t sound at all the same when you shake it. But the fender will let you go alot further and tends to keep in tune a little better. You can shake either one an stay in tune, though.

[MrSandMan]

Artificial Harmonic + Dive Bomb = SEX

[dabbler]

I wonder why nobody corrected Leo Fender when he made the tremolo/vibrato mistake? Calling a vibrato bar a tremolo bar is incorrect but we're pretty much stuck with it now so there's no use in debating it.

Would YOU have corrected him????? I can hear him now, "Sonny, when you get your own amp/guitar company and have been around awhile, then you can correct me. Until then, shut yer mouth!" Well, OK, maybe he wouldn't quite have said it like that, but I sure wouldn't have told him he didn't know what he was talking about!

[Armchair Bronco]

I have a trem on my CP Jaguar Special HH and I liked it until I put a Bigsby B5 on my SG Classic. Now the Jaguar trem seems so floppy and flimsy in comparison to the Bigsby that I'm tempted to just take it off.

 

With the Bigsby, I like to wrap my pinky or my pinky + ring finger around the very tip of the arm, then do really rapid one-quarter vibratos up and down. When I'm not using it, I flick it down and it stays put just out of reach.

 

Much better design than the trem arm on my Jaguar.

[Snambo]

Do you use your fingertips to control it, gently pushing up and down on it, or do you grab it with your whole hand and use it like you were punching the munchkin? Is it a tool to give you subtle vibrato or a phallic symbol to be wailed on like a faux-cock to be beaten and punished so that a tight 20+ fret pinch harmonic can be pushed into the range of hearing of a bat? Just curious.

 

 

Depends on the guitar really. I have an Ibanez with a locking tremolo (yes - I did just use the trem word!) that I wank all over the place - but it's not my number one. 99% of the time I'm a very light warbler with my standard trem guitar. I don't care to much to for dive bombing. It's not my thing... unless I'm wearing my space helmet.

[_pete_]

Would YOU have corrected him????? I can hear him now, "Sonny, when you get your own amp/guitar company and have been around awhile, then you can correct me. Until then, shut yer mouth!" Well, OK, maybe he wouldn't quite have said it like that, but I sure wouldn't have told him he didn't know what he was talking about!

I would've told him. He was flat out wrong.
I would have told him that Gibson would laugh at him.

[BydoEmpire]

On my 57 reissue strat I use my fingertips and use it more gently - bending in and out of notes, or for a softer vibrato effect. On my Floyd-equipped Jackson I tend to grip it a little more and do more dive-bomb type stuff, but that's just because if I'm playing my Jackson I'm in the mood for that kind of thing. I almost never use the bar on my SRV strat, it basically sits in the case. Not sure why that is.