The Touch System

As mentioned before, this is a whole playing style and a whole book could be written about it. The first musician to play this way was pickup designer Harry DeArmond in the 1940's, who used tapping as a way to demonstrate the sensitivity of his pickups. While each hand could play its own part, DeArmond held his right hand in the same orientation as conventional guitar technique. This meant the ability of that hand to tap scale-based melody ines was limited. He taught his approach to Gretch Guitars employee Jimmie Webster, who wrote an instruction book called "The Touch System for Amplified Spanish guitar." Webster made a record and travelled around demonstrating the method. Even though it inspired a few builders (Dave bunker, for example), the Touch System was limited by the lack of equal movements for the right hand and never caught on.