Guitar Lesson: An Acoustic Blues in E
When we think of blues guitar, it’s often a blues from the delta in the key of E that comes to mind, the bending and whining high notes punctuated by the constant driving bass rhythm of the picking thumb.
When we think of blues guitar, it’s often a blues from the delta in the key of E that comes to mind, the bending and whining high notes punctuated by the constant driving bass rhythm of the picking thumb.
This exercise is based on a jazz standard written in 1939 by Oscar Hammerstein and Jerome Kern called “All The Things You Are.” I’ve singled out the chord changes, without melody, and stocked them with various melodic arpeggio patterns using all the CAGED chord shapes.
To start off this short study of the use of dropped D tuning in acoustic blues guitar picking, I play a short interpretation of Blind Willie McTell’s.
I start this session with a short excerpt of a blues played in A in the style of Robert Johnson. This song is played using a monotonic bass technique and the sound is muted heavily with the palm of the picking hand after each strike.
The newbie acoustic blues guitarist is faced with several choices when deciding to learn how to pick the blues in the old style.
As the first in a series of guitar instructional videos I’ll be presenting at Guitar International, I thought I’d start out with a video with about the classic Big Bill Broonzy song ‘Hey Hey’, in which I attempt to copy that swinging Chicago acoustic blues sound that he developed.
The use of pre-composed licks as an essential step in learning to play jazz, and especially jazz guitar, seems to be a foregone conclusion.
As guitarists, we have all benefited from moveable chord shapes and scale patterns. The fact that a single scale pattern, for instance, will retain its structure over a completely new collection of notes by simply sliding up or down the fretboard can be extremely useful, as well as practical in numerous playing situations. In fact, many guitarists make use of a wide variety of such patterns while improvising melodies without even thinking about what notes they’re playing.
Improvisation is an interesting subject for many guitar players. From my experiences as a teacher and from playing with other guitarists I’ve noticed that the majority of Rock/Metal players prefer to avoid improvising when recording/performing.
The acoustic guitar body, or “sound box,” is where the sound is perfected, enriched and enhanced. It is also the piece of guitar construction that helps suit a player’s size, sound desires, and playability.
Do you love the guitar and all things guitar related? 