Open G Tuning: How Keith Richards Built the Rolling Stones Sound

By Glimmer Wire

The guitar parts on “Honky Tonk Women”, “Brown Sugar” and “Start Me Up” have something in common: open G. Keith Richards made a guitar with one string missing and the rest tuned to a G major chord central to his sound. This guide covers what open G is, where it came from, how Keith uses it, which Stones songs use it, and how to tune to it.

What is open G tuning?

In an open tuning, the guitar’s open strings sound a chord before you fret anything. In open G the six strings, low to high, are D–G–D–G–B–D. That’s only three different notes (G, B and D) spread over several octaves. To get there from standard tuning (E–A–D–G–B–E), you lower three strings by a whole step: the 6th from E to D, the 5th from A to G and the 1st from E to D. The middle three strings stay where they are. Charlie Starr’s Guitar World lesson shows the setup.

Keith’s version goes one step further. He takes the low 6th string off, so his guitar is tuned G–D–G–B–D on five strings and the root of the chord is at the bottom. Lay one finger across all five strings at any fret and you have a major chord: fret 5 is C, fret 7 is D. On a six-string, the open low D is the fifth of the G chord. Keith explained in his 1983 Guitar Player interview that he removed it to put the root at the bottom.

The five-string guitar shares its note names with a banjo’s usual open G tuning, but it isn’t the same string layout. A banjo’s short fifth string is a high drone. Deering’s guide for guitar players gives G–D–G–B–D; the small, high string makes the resemblance less literal than it looks on paper.

The blues roots of open G, and the disputed origin story

Who handed Keith open G? Ry Cooder is a large part of his own answer. In his 1992 Guitar Player interview, Keith recalled studying Fred McDowell and Blind Willie McTell material in open E and open D before Cooder arrived with open G. He also credited Don Everly as a great rhythm guitarist who used open tunings. The story has room for both blues and country.

Cooder’s side is less cosy. An Esquire profile describes his account of showing the Stones his guitar ideas, then finding them in “Honky Tonk Women”. That is an account of disputed borrowing, rather than proof that one player invented the tuning or wrote the finished Stones song.

“Honky Tonk Women” is an early landmark in the Stones’ open-G sound. ABKCO dates the original single to July 1969, and Fender names it among the tuning’s examples.

How Keith uses open G: drones, two fingers and space

For Keith, open G became a rhythm tuning. In his Guitar World interview, he says he wanted to use open tunings for rhythm guitar rather than simply following their familiar slide use.

• The drone. Because the open strings already make a chord, he can leave some of them ringing while he moves other notes. The ringing strings give the changing shapes a common thread. Keith describes the effect in his 1983 Guitar Player interview.
• The one-finger chord and the “IV” shape. A flat finger barred across the strings gives a major chord. Add two fingers on the middle strings, one and two frets higher, and it becomes an IV-based shape over the same bass: barre fret 5 for C, add the fingers, and you get Fadd9 over C. Rocking between those shapes is a familiar Keith move, explained in Guitar World’s riff guide.
• Space. Keith says the missing low string makes room for other instruments. He told Guitar Player in 2023: “That’s the sound of a Stones record: a five-string with a six-string on top, and Ronnie.” He offered “Dreamy Skies”, with Ronnie Wood’s Dobro, as an example of the blend.

His joking summary is that the style needs five strings, three notes, two fingers and one rude word. The punchline appears in the 1992 interview; what to do with those few ingredients is another question. Open G is the guitar’s tuning, not necessarily the song’s key. A capo or fretted chord can take an open-G guitar into other keys.

Signature songs, and the versions that matter

The accompanying open-G song explorer keeps studio and live parts separate, and includes singles and reissue tracks alongside original album tracks. It brings together band accounts, published guitar guides and lesson reports. It’s a guide to the documented reports, rather than a complete count of everything the Stones recorded in open G.

Some of the most familiar examples have straightforward published support. Fender’s guide names “Honky Tonk Women”, “Brown Sugar”, “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking”, “All Down the Line”, “Tumbling Dice” and “Start Me Up”. Keith himself identified a five-string open-G ’57 Telecaster for “Little T&A” in the 1983 interview. “Dreamy Skies” brings the story up to Hackney Diamonds: Keith used it to explain the five-string Tele and Dobro blend in 2023.

Other entries need a closer look. Guitar World’s riff guide calls “Gimme Shelter” open G, while MusicRadar’s lesson teaches open E. MusicRadar’s open-G lesson also names “Beast of Burden”, while the Open G Tuning lesson blog says it is in standard tuning. A lesson can offer a way to play a song without settling what happened on the studio take.

“Jumpin’ Jack Flash” is the clearest reason to keep versions apart. Keith described the recorded acoustic guitar as a Gibson Hummingbird in open D or open E with a capo, with another acoustic in Nashville tuning over the top, in his 2005 Guitar World interview. An open-G arrangement should not silently replace that account of the record.

Micawber and the other five-string guitars

The guitar most tied to open G is Micawber, the Fender Telecaster Keith dates to 1953. It has a sibling, a ’54 Tele called Malcolm. Keith told Guitar World that “the Telecaster really lent itself well to a dry, rhythm, five-string drone thing”.

Not every open-G track is a Tele. Guitar World’s riff guide thinks “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” was probably played on his black Les Paul Custom; the identification remains tentative. For “Little T&A”, Keith named the five-string ’57 Tele. In 2023 he said his five-string Tele was on about half of Hackney Diamonds, alongside a mixture of other guitars.

How to tune to open G

No special guitar needed. The MusicRadar lesson keeps all six strings:

1. Start in tune in standard (E–A–D–G–B–E).
2. Lower the 5th string (A) a whole step to G. It should match the open 3rd string, one octave lower.
3. Lower the 1st string (E) a whole step to D. It should match the open 4th string, one octave higher.
4. Deal with the 6th string. For six-string open G, lower it to D, an octave below the 4th string. To try the five-string sound without removing it, keep the low string muted. Keith takes it off.
5. Check the chord. Strum the open strings and you should hear G major. Barre the 5th fret for C and the 7th for D.

Won’t retune? The 4th, 3rd and 2nd strings are identical in both tunings, so staying on them gets you part of the sound. Premier Guitar suggests that approach for players staying in standard tuning.

Other players who use open G

Fender points to Led Zeppelin’s “That’s the Way”, “Bron-y-aur Stomp” and “Dancing Days”. Joni Mitchell’s official website lists D–G–D–G–B–D for “Marcie” and “Nathan LaFraneer” in its tuning-pattern guide. The same notes give players very different places to go.

FAQ

Is “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” in open G? Keith’s account of the recorded acoustic guitar is open D or open E with a capo, plus a Nashville-strung acoustic. That studio account and an open-G arrangement are different things.

Is “Gimme Shelter” in open G? Sources disagree: Guitar World’s riff guide says open G, while MusicRadar’s lesson teaches open E. These reports do not settle the studio tuning.

Which early Stones songs show the open-G sound? “Honky Tonk Women”, the July 1969 single, followed by “Brown Sugar” and “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” on Sticky Fingers (1971), are useful starting points.

Did Keith invent open G? No. His own account credits Cooder and Everly as influences. His five-string approach puts a G at the bottom and makes the tuning a basis for rhythm riffs.