Brett Garsed is one of the guitar world's most revered triple threats. His virtuosity with legato, hybrid picking (he picks with his fourth finger, too) and slide is nothing short of masterful. His reputation goes all the way back to the '80s when his growing reputation resulted in him playing on John Farnham's 1986 album, Whispering Jack.
Handling all guitar duties on the biggest-selling album by an Australian in Australia's history, Brett's guitar chops were well used. None more so than the solo at the end of the album's huge hit single, You're the Voice.
How huge?
On last check, the numbers were 259M plays on Spotify and 35M views on YouTube.
You’re the Voice is a rousing anthem written by British songwriters Chris Thompson, Andy Qunta and Maggie Ryder that incorporates rock and Celtic influences, plus an actual bagpipe solo. Asked to provide an outro guitar solo, Brett incorporated bagpipe-style phrasing, chord tone driven melodies and a blazing string skipped arpeggio.
Up until now, this stunning solo has gone unnoticed due to being so quiet in the mix. To remedy the situation, Brett agreed to deep dive what he played for Guitar World.
“What you hear on the album is the first take, the only take we did,” Brett explains. “It’s a little haphazard in structure, but that’s the spontaneity of the moment. The fast section in the middle is an old faithful lick I used to simulate sweep picking arpeggios, but I did it with string skipping.”
Brett provides further insights into his solo: “I was, and still am, a completely ear-driven player, and I was trying to follow the chord progression F - Eb - Bb/D. Everything I’m playing is trying to follow those chords.
“You’ll hear a sliding ascending line in the solo featuring my old black Strat with a 21-fret neck. I bent up to the high F from the 21st fret and broke the first string! Since the Strat bridge couldn’t be pulled up it stayed in tune, so I played the rest of the solo with one less string!”
F major arpeggio - the fundamental shape
This outlines the basic string skipping F Major arpeggio (F A C) that Brett utilised for part of his solo on You're The Voice. Using the fourth (D), third (G) and first (high E) strings, it's a shape favoured by various players (including Paul Gilbert and Nuno Bettencourt) to replicate the sound of one note per string sweep picked arpeggios.
A useful approach to familiarize yourself with the shape is to play the first note on each string first before adding the higher notes on the third and first strings.
Brett utilizes hybrid picking as shown under the tab (m = second finger pluck), along with hammer-ons and pull-offs.
Example 1 - F major arpeggio phrasing (4:35 in the video)
This is what Brett demonstrates in the video, improvising around the F major arpeggio in a similar way to what he played during his You're the Voice solo. Hybrid picking makes crossing from the third string to the first string efficient and smooth. Pay close attention to the way the different rhythmic subdivisions and legato phrasing give this example a feeling of acceleration and excitement.
Brett Garsed in action
John Farnham - You're The Voice
At 3:45 Brett's guitar solo begins. Masked by the big production and wall of euphoric vocals, he builds his phrases with masterful melodic moves with that stunning F major arpeggio happening at 4:09. The huge C# to F bend (21st fret to a virtual 25th fret!) which broke his first string occurs at 4:24.
In his GW video, Brett demonstrates this bend (without breaking a string!) using his fourth finger with other fingers behind to strengthen it. To make this even more daunting to play, Brett uses 0.011 gauge strings in standard tuning. Gulp.
Brett Garsed - Breathe
Breathe featured on Brett's Big Sky album from 2002. Throughout the performance, Brett demonstrates masterful melodic phrasing, tasty string bends, bluesy licks and impressive speed bursts.
Brett Garsed - Slam Bam
Here's Brett in an funk fusion workout, written for him by Jason Sidwell as part of a soloing series in Guitar Techniques from 2016. Brett twists, darts and blasts through this funk groover with an array of slippery legato and hybrid picked moves using bluesy licks, altered scales and tension/release note choices. Slamming indeed!
