Circles (Joe Satriani song)
Encyclopedia
"Circles" is a song by the American guitarist
Joe Satriani
, featured on his 1987 album Surfing with the Alien
. This song is often cited as one of the fans' favorite songs from the album.
The piece starts with a mellow melody featuring undershot harmonics played in double stop
. At 1:00 the song quickly shift to a rock solo
featuring a phrasing
using tapping
, legato
s and blues
licks
.
Guitarist
A guitarist is a musician who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselves on the guitar while singing.- Versatility :The guitarist controls an extremely...
Joe Satriani
Joe Satriani
Joseph "Joe" Satriani is an American instrumental rock guitarist and multi-instrumentalist, with multiple Grammy Award nominations...
, featured on his 1987 album Surfing with the Alien
Surfing with the Alien
Surfing with the Alien is the second album by instrumental rock guitarist Joe Satriani, released in 1987. Surfing with the Alien contributed greatly to establishing Satriani's reputation as a respected rock guitarist....
. This song is often cited as one of the fans' favorite songs from the album.
The piece starts with a mellow melody featuring undershot harmonics played in double stop
Double stop
A double stop, in music terminology, is the act of playing two notes simultaneously on a melodic percussion instrument or stringed instrument...
. At 1:00 the song quickly shift to a rock solo
Guitar solo
In popular music, a guitar solo is a melodic passage, section, or entire piece of music written for an electric guitar or an acoustic guitar. Guitar solos, which often contain varying degrees of improvisation, are used in many styles of popular music such as blues, jazz, rock and metal styles such...
featuring a phrasing
Phrase (music)
In music and music theory, phrase and phrasing are concepts and practices related to grouping consecutive melodic notes, both in their composition and performance...
using tapping
Tapping
Tapping is a guitar playing technique, where a string is fretted and set into vibration as part of a single motion of being pushed onto the fretboard, as opposed to the standard technique being fretted with one hand and picked with the other...
, legato
Legato
In musical notation the Italian word legato indicates that musical notes are played or sung smoothly and connected. That is, in transitioning from note to note, there should be no intervening silence...
s and blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
licks
Lick (music)
In popular music genres such as rock or jazz music, a lick is "a stock pattern or phrase" consisting of a short series of notes that is used in solos and melodic lines...
.