Resonator Blues

a little slide, a little funk

Aug 01, 2026

That ain’t workin’

The first time I ever saw a resonator guitar was on the cover of Dire Straits’ album Brothers in Arms (1985). As a result of that record’s popularity, my friends and I referred to the instrument as a weird Dire Straits guitar throughout high school.

A Dobro by any other name

I eventually learned most people call them Dobros. Dobro is the brand name of the instrument’s best known manufacturer. The guitars are named for their sonically resonant design.

A resonator is basically a flat-top acoustic guitar with a metal face. They date back to the early twentieth century, when electric amplifiers were still science fiction.

The resonator’s added mass gave its sound an added punch, carrying those old Delta blues riffs all the way to the back of the speakeasy. WikiPedia has a good history.

Stranded at the drive-in

A couple nights ago, canceled plans provided me with some unexpected free time. I turned lemons into lemonade.

Spinning in my chair, I looked around the room for inspiration. The bottle stopped on a bottleneck slide, and my dobro. I picked them up and started riffing.

What’s in a tuning?

Slide guitar players, especially blues players, often tune their guitars to open tunings. That means the guitar is tuned so it plays a proper chord when strummed without any fretboard fingering required.

I didn’t tune the resonator at first. It sounded good when I picked it up, so I went with it. Soon I had a groovy blues riff ready to record.

Before rolling tape I had to at least check my tuning. That’s when I realized my chord was a little unorthodox. The guitar was strung somewhere between an open D and open G tuning, D, A, D, G, B, D. I used D as my root, so the chord translates to a D6sus4

A funky flow

The rhythm track is a cool syncopated vibe. The bass track functions as a nice counterpoint to the guitar. Together, they have a sort of call-and-response groove.

I kept the percussion simple. Once again I used an udu as the kick drum. I also had fun with this clever shaker/tambourine combination.