Blistering Bluegrass Guitar Licks- Learn Bryan Sutton's Classic "Decision At Glady Fork"

Hey y'all, it's Aaron Jaxon coming to you today, and I want to welcome you to a little lesson tutorial on Brian Sutton's classic flatpicking tune Decision at Glady Fork. I've always loved this tune, it's always been one of my favorites, and it really has a special place in my heart because this is really the tune that— I mean, probably the tune that got me into this kind of guitar playing and got me into bluegrass music. It was kind of my entry point to it. I remember, um, a long time ago when I was a teenager taking guitar lessons, I walked into lessons one day and I had a really cool guitar teacher. He was very eclectic. He liked a lot of different players. And, um, but he came in one day and he said, dude, listen to this. And he had Brian Sutton's first solo record, I think it's called Ready to Go, on CD. And he put it in his big CD player, and he played this first track, he played this tune, and I just immediately fell in love with it. I knew I had to figure this stuff out. So anyway, this tune has a very special place in my heart, and I wanted to show it to you here because it's really fun to play. Obviously, the way Brian plays it, he plays it very fast because Brian is a beast, but this tune actually sounds good at slower tempos as well. And it's got like a lot of hammer-ons and pull-offs in there, so it's not— it's maybe not as hard to play as it sounds whenever you're hearing Brian, you know, play it, you know, with the speed and power that Brian plays with. But this— it's— this tune is maybe a little bit more accessible than you might think. I just wanted to say that there. And also, I'll be referencing exactly what he plays on the original recording. This is basically like the first solo he plays to this tune from the original recording, which I've got linked down in the video description. Also in the video description, you can get the tabs for what I'm going to show you today totally for free. I've also got that in the top pinned comment, so feel free to check that out. Let me quit jabbering and let's jump into the lesson here. Okay, so let's start with kind of the A part of this tune, and I'll kind of go through real slowly and play you kind of the theme of this song, and it goes like this. We'll do So that is kind of— that's basically the A part. He plays that twice. Um, he does, you know, and the second time through kind of adds a little But, but real quick, let me go and just kind of analyze this main A part here. So we'll start with— and that's just with your pick there. Let's just do down, and then we'll do 2 hammer-ons up on the 4th string, down on the 3rd fret of the 4th. All right, so you can pick all that if you want, but I think it sounds good with the hammer-ons. All right, and then this next part we'll do So with the pick on that, um, down, down, down, up, up, down, down, up, down, down. Okay, a lot of downs there. So down, down, down, up, Okay, so that's kind of the first phrase in there.

Down, down, down, up, up, down, down, up, down, down.

Okay, so sometimes we'll throw in a bunch of down strokes. In a row when we're using a phrase that has a lot of hammer-ons and pull-offs. But what's cool about that is it's actually easier to play fast than if we were picking everything, in my opinion at least. Okay, and then from there— so that's kind of the first phrase in that A part.

And then we'll do So that is— and then with the pick, we'll do down, down, down, up, down, up, down, down, up, down, down, down, down, up, down. Down, down, down, up. Yeah, okay, okay.

So to kind of go back from the beginning, and then we'll come into the next phrase of the A part, which is So that is— let me do it a little slower here. So again, coming up here, I'll do my best to try to say the pick strokes out loud. It's very challenging.

So we'll do down, down, up, down, down, up, up. Down, up, down, up, up, down. Okay, okay.

And then for the last phrase on this A part, we'll do— whoops. Okay, so again, it helps me to think of this A part kind of in 4 different phrases there. So the first one being And then the second one being—

and then the third one being— and then the last one—

Okay, so the way he kind of puts that together, because he plays that twice there, um, I think at the very beginning of this tune on the original he ends up playing it 4 times. I'm basically like playing it like from when, um, like when the full band comes in, because he plays it at the beginning, that A part, like where they're kind of just doing diamonds. You know, plays it like that. I'm kind of taking it from where the full band comes in there. So yeah, let me go— I'll go through this A part twice here.

So we'll do—

so phrase, first phrase, second phrase.

Third, fourth, and then back in.

So the second time through We end with the— okay, so that's the A part. That's kind of the main theme of this tune here, and there's some challenging things in that, but I think that's a little bit more accessible than maybe it sounds. Again, whenever you're hearing Brian just, you know, just destroy it on this tune. But that, that's the A part there. Now let's jump into the B section here. And kind of like with the A section, for me, this B part, it really helps if I think about this in 4 separate phrases, because this B part has a There's a lot of notes in this, um, but, um, let me jump into the B part here, um, and we're gonna do, um Okay, and then after that it jumps back into the A part. So again, let's kind of break this down into 4 phrases here. So the first one being— okay, so one more time on this first phrase. All right, and then we'll do— for the second phrase, we'll do— no, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, this is all, this is all what I'm thinking of as the first phrase here. So yeah, for this first phrase, we'll do Okay, so one more time on the first phrase here.

We'll do—

all right, let's now jump into the second phrase of this B section. We'll do Okay, so we've got 2 phrases so far, and again, I just want to bring your attention to like how many hammer-ons and pull-offs there are in this. Um, so first phrase, second phrase. Okay, so yeah, a lot of hammer-ons and pull-offs in this phrase here. It just makes it a little easier easier to play fast. So let's keep going here. Now let's jump into the third phrase.

We're gonna do—

okay, so one more time on that one. And then we'll jump into the fourth and final phrase of the B part, and we'll do— okay, one more time on the fourth phrase. So again, just a lot of hammer-ons and pull-offs. So let me play the third and the fourth phrase of this B section back to back. Here, we'll do And then from there, he goes back into the A part and plays it once, and we'll do And there we have it. So, um, one more time, I'll go ahead and, um, let's, let's have a listen to how all of this sounds, um, with a backing track and up to tempo. Okay, so that tempo that I'm playing it at, I think it's a little bit slower than the original recording. But one of the things I like to tell my students when I'm showing them this stuff is try not to let the speed that someone like Brian plays it at intimidate you, because what's cool about this tune is it sounds really cool when you play it slow. So don't, you know, don't listen to it at a really fast tempo and think, well, I won't be able to do that. You don't have to do it at that tempo. Play this as slow as you need to get these phrases underneath your fingers, because again, they're maybe a little bit easier to play than you might think because it does use so many hammer-ons and pull-offs. And this tune is actually a really great exercise in getting your hammer-ons and pull-offs nice and loud and clean and clear. And it also just makes it a little bit easier to play fast. So just go through with this stuff, take it nice and slow. And again, hit the, uh, hit the link down below, um, for the tabs for this. I've also got the chords written out on that, that way you'll know exactly, you know, what the, um, what the chord changes are and, you know, the— how these, these melodic phrases fit over the chord changes there. But, um, anyway, I love this tune. Um, I know you will too. And again, don't let the speed of this intimidate you. Slow it down, play it as slow as you need to. And there's just some great passages, some great phrases from, you know, one of the, one of the best players in this style. So as always, thank you so much for hanging out, and I will see you next time.