User:Ivanvector/Blues guitar playing

History

The start of Blues

Before Africans were brought over to the United States as slaves, they had a very spiritual way of singing. When the African-Americans were freed, they began to explore they're freedom. A few began to invent a style that involved a very simple guitar style, which rapidly became bigger and more popular. Blues could be about anything. A woman, something they enjoy doing, or just, how they're feeling. Many guitarists such as T. Bone Walker and Robert Johnson rapidly gained popularity, and by 1920, blues became one of the most listened to musical genres ever.

The fall of blues

Unfortuneately, the popularity did not last. An early 1930's group began to play blues solos on a trumpet. This new genre (later titled Jazz) rapidly overtook blues, and blues guitarists went out of business. Jazz was popular because it was new, unique, and more "exciting".

The resurface of blues

Blues came back in the 50's and 60's with the invention of Blues-Rock. Blues-rock combined old blues solos with newer popular rock elements. Some early Blues-Rock Guitarists were Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton.

Blues today

Today blues has lost much of it's reputation, even though it was the roots that eventually sprouted Alternative rock, Every aspect of Metal, A good deal of Punk Rock, and even rap to a certain degree. Many popular bands started out as blues bands, including Black Sabbath and Dragonforce.

Simple Rythym technique

I / IV / V Chord Progression

The most basic (and most widely used) chord progression is the I/IV/V (1/4/5) progression. The way this works is you look at the root note. For example, E. Than you count up the 1st, fourth, and fifth notes in the E major scale. So that would be E, A, and B. For A it would be A, D, E. So on and so forth.

12 bar blues layout

12 bar blues is, as the name suggests, a 12 bar-long blues pattern. There are many different forms of this, however, the one said here is by far the most used. The first for bars are usually played with the root (first) note in the progression. Then the next two bars are played with the fourth note in the progression, and the next two are played at the root again. The 9th bar is the fifth note, the tenth bar is back to fourth, the 11th is back to root, and the 12th bar is back up to the fifth again. Then it repeats. I know that all may have sounded kind of confusing, but this visual should some it all up for you.

| 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 4 | 4 | 1 | 1 |
| 5 | 4 | 1 | 4 |

So let's do an example with E

| E | E | E | E |
| A | A | E | E |
| B | A | E | B |

Now with A...

| A | A | A | A |
| D | D | A | A |
| E | D | A | E |

I think you get the idea now.

Blues beat

This part is kind of hard to explain. Count to 6 (silently or out loud). In simple blues progressions, you would be hitting a note when you say 1, 3. 4. and 6 (not playing on 2 or 5). I really don't know a better way to say it.

Rythym notation

Ok, usually, when your playing a 12-bar progression, you wouldn't just play chords or power chords. There is a very comonly used Method that I shall demonstrate. This is the tab for how the notes would go in open E.

e---------------------
B---------------------
G---------------------
D---------------------
A-----2----2--4----2--
E-----0----0--0----0--

In open A...

e-------------------
B-------------------
G-------------------
D-----2----2--4----2
A-----0----0--0----0
E-------------------

You should get the idea.

Putting it all together

Here is a tab of one simple 12 bar blues round in E. Hopefully, you can understand it better.
Starts off with basic strumming pattern on E for 4 measures
e--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
B--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
G--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
D--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A---2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2
E---0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0

Changes to A for two measures
e----------------------------------------------------------------------------
B----------------------------------------------------------------------------
G----------------------------------------------------------------------------
D-----2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--
A-----0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--
E----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Back to E
e----------------------------------------------------------------------------
B----------------------------------------------------------------------------
G----------------------------------------------------------------------------
D----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A-----2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--2----2--4----2--
E-----0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--

Now for B
e--------------------------------------
B--------------------------------------
G--------------------------------------
D-----4----4--6----4--
A-----2----2--2----2--
E--------------------------------------

A
e--------------------------------------
B--------------------------------------
G--------------------------------------
D-----2----2--4----2--
A-----0----0--0----0--
E--------------------------------------

E
e--------------------------------------
B--------------------------------------
G--------------------------------------
D--------------------------------------
A-----2----2--4----2--
E-----0----0--0----0--

NOTE: On the last bar, a different strumming pattern is generally used
e-----------------------------------------
B-----------------------------------------
G-----------------------------------------
D-----4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4
A-----2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2
E-----------------------------------------

Soloing

Penatonic Soloing

Have you ever seen someone just pluck a blues solo that they made up two millaseconds ago? Have you ever wanted to do that? Then keep reading!

We all know out basic penatonic scales. Now play a penatonic scale, except add the note 1 fret above the third note and the note 1 fret below the 10th note. Congradulations! You just played a "Blues Penatonic Scale"! To make up a solo all you basically do is pluck random notes from that scale. However, there are some guidelines. Theese include:

(1). Keep a blues rythym.
(2). Play the Blues Penatonic in Whatever key the rythym part is playing in
(3). If the rythym is playing E, use the E penatonic, and start and end on an E (It doesn't matter which one).

Slide Guitar

Background Info

Slide guitar was first used professionally by T. Bone Walker, but he got the idea from seeing a street musician sliding a knife up and down the strings of a guitar. Slide guitar today is used with a thin steel or plexiglass cylinder that is placed on a left finger of the musicians choice, and is slid up and down the strings

Technique

To find out more about slide technique, go to this wikipedia page on slide guitar.

Final Words

Blues is something that is not best taught, but is best to lo learn the basics and progressed through naturally. So now that you know the basics, go practice, meet up with other musucians, and explore.