Aaron Jaxon breaks down the fiddle tune Big Sandy River for flatpicking guitar, starting with a straightforward two-part melody, then showing an advanced version with licks and bluegrass ideas. Tabs are in the description, and backing tracks let you hear it at tempo.
Hey there, it's Aaron Jaxon coming to you today, and I want to give you two different ways of playing the classic fiddle tune Big Sandy River. All right, so welcome to a little lesson here on one of my favorite fiddle tunes for flatpicking guitar, Big Sandy River. Now Now down in the video description, I'm going to link to a couple of my favorite recordings of this tune. So if you're unfamiliar with that, check those out and listen to them. That way you can get really familiar with this tune. So what I want to do today is just give you a basic melody version of this tune and also a more advanced version. So no matter where you're at in your playing, you can learn this tune, you can implement these ideas and use them in your own playing. You can get the tabs for this lesson down in the video description and in the top pinned comment. So let's go into just the basic melody version of this tune. Before I teach it to you, let me play it for you. Okay, so let's jump in and just do the A part to the basic melody version here, and we'll go 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. Okay, and that really is it. We're just gonna play that twice.
So 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and You just play it again.
3.
Okay, so just a couple of things on this with this tune. So whenever you're playing this, um, the— this little first part that pretty much everybody will play it that way, but then this next part over our D, um, is, is a bit subjective. the deca decadeka deca deca deca deca deca deca. People will play that part a little differently. So what I'm doing for this lesson, I've taught versions of it too that went okay and some people will play that a little bit differently just depending on who the person is there. So just know that that part right there is a little subjective. But almost everybody when they're playing this tune will do the. But then that next That'll, that'll kind of vary from person to person there, so there's a little bit of subjectivity to that there. But anyway, that's the A part to just kind of the basic melody here. Okay, so let's jump in and do the B part here, and we'll do 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. We just play that again. There we go. Okay, so that's our basic melody there, just kind of on the B part. You know, pretty classic, um, sounding fiddle passage right there. All right, so one more time, let me go all the way through, uh, just the A part and the B part. to just this kind of basic melody version of Big Sandy River.
We'll go 1 and a 2 and a 3 and a 4 and a To the B part.
There we go. All right, so one more time, let me play this basic, uh, melody version to Big Sandy River up to tempo and with a backing track, and that will sound like this. Let's do another version here where I'm going to throw in some licks and passages and key places to just change it up and spice it up a little bit while staying true to the tune and the melody at the same time. But before I teach it to you, let me play it for you. All right, so let's jump into like break 2 of Big Sandy River, and that'll go like this.
1 and 2 and 3 and 4.
Okay, so I'm, I'm still staying— I'm still playing our— that little part. But then when, like I was saying in the, in the break 1 part of this this, that little D part, which is a little bit subjective, I'm taking a little bit more liberty there and I'm just kind of throwing in some 1-bar D-shape licks over that. So this first one, you know, just kind of a D pentatonic, okay? And then back over here, and then I'm ending with this kind of Brian Sutton, all right? And then again, back to the melody, and then I'm coming up here and doing a just classic D bluegrass lick, and then back to the melody, and then ending with what I did in break 1. Okay, so just some cool little ideas that we're throwing in in key places in this tune. So let's jump into the B part now, and we're going to go 1, e and 2, e and 3, e and 4, e. Okay, so really, um, the first half of that B part, I'm playing exactly the same thing that I did on the A part. So there's no difference.
So there's no difference there.
No difference. And then The second time through that B part, I'm taking that melody up an octave. And then really right here, I'm throwing in the old Tony Rice classic, but then I'm landing on C, and then going back to, um, kind of our, our basic melody right there. So that kind of second half of the B part. Okay, so one more time, um, A and the B part of this kind of second break to Big Sandy river will go 1, e and 2, e and 30, e and 4, e and Into the B part. 3. All right, there's some cool ideas to add into that tune. So one more time, let's hear that up to tempo and with a backing track. Okay, so two different ways. There's like a basic melody version and then a version that has a little bit more flash and some licks and phrases in key places there. Again, down in the video description I've linked to some of my favorite recordings of this tune so you can check that out if you're not super familiar with this tune. But I hope this lesson gives you an amazing tune to add to your repertoire and gives you some licks and some phrases that you can start to use as a part of your vocabulary and apply them to this tune and to other tunes. As always, I want to thank you for hanging out, and I will see you next time.
