Phish’s Trey Anastasio detailed his approach to acoustic guitar in a new interview with Guitar Player. Anastasio spoke to Jimmy Leslie about his recently released solo album, Mercy, composing classic Phish songs, the acoustic guitar gifted to him by Phish keyboardist Page McConnell and more.
The interview begins with Anastasio discussing his introduction to learning to play guitar and his fondness for Guitar Player and Frets magazines. Trey then talks about the compositional structure of Phish songs like “My Friend, My Friend,” “Stash” and “The Squirming Coil.” Anastasio referenced Bach’s harmonic modernization and its influence on his own writing style, explaining:
“I still play that way [theme and variation] in every single Phish jam. I’m searching for a theme, and that’s the essence of a lot of the compositions. ‘My Friend, My Friend’ takes a theme and runs with it. The middle of ‘Stash’ sounds heavily composed, but it’s really a simple phrase that goes through different key changes. The middle part of ‘The Squirming Coil’ is another example of a Phish song that takes a little piece of the melody, stretches it out and then divides it.
“That’s so valuable later on as a guitarist when you become an improviser. During a lot of Phish jams, I’ll land on a simple phrase, almost childlike, and then run with it. Some of my favorite improvisers work that way. The best example would probably be [saxophonist] Sonny Rollins. He would do these long improvisations building on a theme that was very childlike, but not childish.”
The conversation touches on different tunings employed by Anastasio on songs like “The Inlaw Josie Wales” and “Time Turns Elastic.” Anastasio explains his preference for flatpicking while playing acoustic guitar while noting he continues to incorporate new fingerpicking techniques within his playing.
Anastasio “geeked out” about the guitar McConnell gifted him last year that was built at Circle Strings in Burlington, Vermont. Regarding the instrument constructed by luthier Adam Buchwald, Anastasio said:
“It’s a dreadnought made from koa, which he calls the Mother of Curl, with a 100-year-old German spruce top. I’ve never been in love with a guitar like this before. I have an old Martin that I also love, but I’ve never had an experience like this, where I just fell for a guitar. It completely changed my music landscape. There would be no Mercy if he hadn’t given me that guitar. It’s so balanced and stunningly beautiful. The low end sounds so good, and it plays so well.
“He used a Plek machine. I’d never played a Pleked guitar neck before. Every note up and down it is spot on and rings out. There’s no buzz. So the guitar is old and new. Me and [producer] Vance Powell used to have this joke where we’d say, ‘A guitar doesn’t play well until it’s old enough to forget that it’s a tree and accept that it’s a guitar.’”
Anastasio also talks about his array of vintage Martin acoustic guitars, becoming more comfortable playing solo acoustic shows, the amplification setup that he copped from Michael Hedges and other topics related to his acoustic approach. Visit Guitar Player to read the full interview.
Anastasio performs with Phish tonight in Philadelphia. Trey Anastasio Band‘s Fall Tour 2022 tickets go on sale this Friday, July 22.
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