Chords for Stefan Grossman teaches "Candyman" by Rev. Gary Davis

putting some variations into this key of C.
And let's take the tune Candyman.
We heard Reverend
Davis play this at the beginning of this video.
He just played an instrumental version.
Let me just
run through it real quick and sing it the way he used to sing it.
Now you would play this as if a
woman and a man were singing.
So I'm going to imitate the woman's voice and I'm going to
imitate the man's voice.
Don't get worried about this.
[C] And let's hear what happens.
It's a lovely guitar arrangement, _ which we'll be [G] discussing and I'll be teaching it to you.
_ [C] _
_ _ Reverend Davis said he learned this in 1905 in the [Am] Carolinas.
There was [F] a guitar player called
[C] Porter Irving that came to [Em] his town and he was [C] singing this. _ _ _ _ _
That's [E] the woman [G] singing.
_ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Am] [F] I'd give anything [C] in a god [G] almighty world [D] to see my [C] Candyman home. _ _ _
And get the picture, get the baby some [G] beer.
Run and get the picture, get the baby some.
[C]
Run and get the picture, get the baby some beer.
Run and get the picture, get the baby some beer.
Run and get the picture, get [Am] the baby some [F] beer.
I'd give anything in a [C] god almighty [G] world to see
my [C] Candyman home.
All right.
Let's pick it on that guitar.
_ _ _ [G] _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [F] _ _ [C] _ _
[Dm] _ [G] _ [C] _ Now Reverend Davis used to call [Bb] this style
of playing old-fashioned picking.
I guess that was because it came about at the turn of the century.
He sort of looked down his nose at it, saying that that was the way the old-fashioned players
would play guitar and he would play much fancier, much more complicated.
And indeed he did.
But this
way of playing guitar really has a lot of charm and I'm fascinated by it, as I hope you are.
Well, [C] let's take a look at Candyman.
There's a couple of lovely tricks to this.
We're in the key
of C and we have our pinky with the C chord on the third fret of the first string.
But our middle
finger is going to be traveling down to the second fret of the third string.
We'll have this phrase.
[Am] It travels [C] down and it goes back home and it's very important to me that that middle finger
goes back to the second fret of the fourth string to get back into its C chord.
_ _ [Am] [C] Back home [Am] and back
down to the second fret of the third string.
Now Reverend Davis only used two fingers, as I
mentioned.
So I'll be playing this with two fingers every once in a while, a little help from
my middle finger.
You see what's comfortable for you.
Take a look at the tablature.
Again, there's
nothing [C] difficult about the chord positions.
We just have the [F] C, the F, [G] and a G chord.
So I think
we'll be ready now to split the screen and we'll [Ab] play it slowly together and then we'll bring it
up to tempo.
You ready?
Let's split that screen.
[Fm] _
[C] _ _ _ We start off with a C chord without pinky.
Then we
take that pinky off.
_ _ [G] A G7 chord now.
_ [C] _ A C chord.
_ Put that pinky down. _ _
C chord without the pinky.
[Am] Roll [F] into your F.
_ [Dm] [G] Watch how I'm playing my C chord there.
_ _ [C] _ _ _
One more time.
_ _ Make sure your
middle finger is going [G] back home.
_ _ _ _ [C] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ Now you can play around with this arrangement.
_ _ Let's see [Am] what I can [F] do.
_ [Dm] _ [G] _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
Here we go.
_ _ _ I'm going to hammer into that C chord.
_ _ _ [G] _ _ [Dm] _ [G] _
[C] _ _ _ A little decoration. _ _
_ _ _ _ Let me do a variation for [Am] that end tag.
[F] _ _ [C] _ _ _ [Dm] _ [G] _
[C] Let me bring it up to tempo. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [G] _ _ _ [B] [C] I'm throwing in everything I can. _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Am] _ [F] _ _ [C] _ _
[Dm] _ [G] [C] One more time. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [G] _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Am] _ [F] _ _ [C] _ _
[Dm] _ [Bm] _ [C] _ _ _ _ _ _