If you learn a few open position 7th chords, you can play the blues. One note will be the root note of the chord we are on in the progression and the other note will be varied or shuffled between the 5 and 6 notes of the chord to give us an e5 and e6 power. An absolutely essential skill if you want to play the blues. While blues rhythm guitar suffices with a standard 12 bar blues shuffle, a cool shuffle riff is often more fun to play and interesting listen to. In the minor variation of the 12bar blues, minor 7th chords are substituted for the i7 and iv7 chords. Instead of playing just power chords or dominant 7th chords, we will learn a blues riff that you can use to play through the standard 12bar blues progres. If we take the first and last phrases, we come up with a basic 8bar form that is shown in fig. Youll hear this sequence in s of songs, either in this pure form or with a couple of simple variations. How to play 12 bar blues shuffle rhythm guitar in the key of e. The 12 bar blues is by far the most popular form for the blues. Bass lessons basic 12 bar blues in a the walking bass bass tab blues basic 12 bar blues in a the walking bass by. Using the 12 bar blues shuffle chunka chunka style for 3. The vast majority of contemporary blues music is based on what.
Basic 12 bar blues rhythms guitarlessons365 free guitar. The blues shuffle riff is a popular sound and often used by guitar players like tbone walker going to chicago, tbone shuffle and stevie ray vaughan cold shot, pride and joy, travis walk. In this lesson, well place the blues shuffle learned in the previous lesson into the 12 bar blues form. Play the 12 bar blues for absolute super beginner guitar. Try to put this into practice, maybe playing a simple 12bar blues using 7th chords and this shuffle strumming. The minor pentatonic scale is a fantastic scale to jam over a 12bar blues with, but by adding a few more notes you can infuse your blues with the slick sounds of virtuoso bluesmeisters such as joe bonamassa, robben ford and more. Register on the site still free get pdf downloads for many lesson, your. Today ill show you 8 different ways to play a 12 bar blues shuffle. Each of these songs follows the 12bar blues pattern. Blues is not only an exciting, popular and guitar friendly style of music, but a very influential style as well. In order to make sure everyone is on the same page, take a look at the 12bar form in fig. Here is the 12 bar form well be using if you want a chart in front of you to practice. Looking at various variations to the regular 12 bar blues shuffle is the first step to send you down that path.
Blues shuffle rhythm for beginners guitar lesson with tab. Jul 04, 2019 today ill show you 8 different ways to play a 12 bar blues shuffle. Ever since my band, voyage from the porch, broke up back in 1990, ive been a solo performer. Click here to download a printable pdf of this lessons notation. Once you learn to play the 12 bar blues on the guitar, you can play such classic blues pieces as hound dog, stormy monday, kansas city, st.
Oct 16, 2012 a simple shuffled drum groove with a triplet based drum fill on bar 12. The circle of fifths how to actually use it duration. Blues guitar lesson with tab twelve bar blues shuffle in e. If youre reading this and saying, me, then this lesson is for you. Learning the 12 bar blues progressions or blues march as it is sometimes called should be one of the first things you learn as an aspiring blues musician. Learn the 12 bar blues progression blues guitar institute. The 12 bar blues progression is the framework that so much of the blues is built upon. The characteristic signature of the shuffle is a longshort rhythmic pattern that cycles through an entire passage of music. You will need a lot of practice to play like bb king, but playing basic blues progressions are easy. Next, try to play it in other keys not covered above. Before you we learn how to play a basic blues turnaround we must understand the 12 bar blues format. You can also practice all your blues chords and progressions in the uberchord app click for. This 12 bar blues lesson for beginners is divided in two parts, this is part 1.
Start with your 1st finger in the 2nd fret fourth string. Orville johnson demonstrates a basic blues shuffle. Learn the blues shuffle and variations played by blues greats like jimmy reed and stevie ray vaughan. Basic 12 bar blues rhythms beginner guitar lesson youtube. Now well play the same 12 bar, but this time use these open chords. In the end, you dont want to be able to only improvise guitar solos, but also develop the ability to improvise in your rhythm guitar playing. For those of you who know a few chords but would like to jam with others this is a good place to start. Blues shuffle rhythm for beginners guitar lesson with. The minor pentatonic scale is a fantastic scale to jam over a 12 bar blues with, but by adding a few more notes you can infuse your blues with the slick sounds of virtuoso blues meisters such as joe bonamassa, robben ford and more. There are three basic approaches to blues rhythm guitar.
Chords, patterns and fills for major and minor blues. In this blues guitar lesson we are going to take your rhythm blues guitar skills to the next level. In the other examples i just wrote out the alternatives to bar 1,2 and 9. Classic 12 bar blues shuffle rhythms stage 9 guitar lesson guitar for. Blues shuffles sound really cool and the basic ones are not that hard to play. Chunky c this just so happens to be done in the key of a but you can play this in any key you like by following the same pattern for the chosen key.
Get words and music to chicagostyle shuffle rainy city blues. The 12 bar blues progression is one of the most used in popular music, so even if your not a big fan of the blues it is a good idea to try and understand what a 12 bar blues progression is. Each of these songs follows the 12 bar blues pattern. Blues shuffling patterns and progressions in different keys. In this lesson, were going to cover something very foundational to the blues, the standard 12bar blues progression. Credit goes to delta blues icon robert johnson for adapting this boogiewoogie piano figure to the guitar check out his sweet home chicago, and disciples like elmore james dust my. Basic 12 bar blues rhythms free guitar lessons by carl brown. Sep 28, 2011 the very basic form is to take the first and last four measures of a 12 bar blues and combine them. This is probably the mostused riff in blues and rock music. We have an official 12 bar blues tab made by ug professional guitarists.
If you are playing the blues on your own, using this kind of bass line can also break things up a bit. Feb, 2014 12 bar blues is just a cycle of a riff that can be placed anywhere on the fretboard and you can determine where you play by knowing the root note of the first chord. The truth is that the masters of blues guitar arent born with this talent. Play the 12 bar blues for absolute super beginner guitar lesson. Bass lessons basic 12 bar blues for bass guitar easy. It includes the first chords you should know and some substitutions that you can try.
If we take the first and last phrases, we come up with a basic 8 bar form that is shown in fig. If you havent mastered the blues shuffle or the 12 bar form, make sure to see the previous lessons in the blues course. This simplicity makes this structure perfect to embellish the chords and riffs we play. How to play blues rhythm guitar like the blues masters. The basic blues is very simple to learn, and is common ground for guitarists it can be used as the basis for guitarists to play music together, even if theyve never met before. The video contains the performance and the slow version with tab on screen. A really important skill in playing blues is being able to play your 12 bar blues rhythm shuffle in any key.
Although this diagram illustrates the chords in a 12bar blues. The 12bar blues is by far the most popular form for the blues. This is because 12 bar blues is based around this root, root, 4th, root, 5th, 4th, root, this is repeated over again, a good way to practice finger placement is to get a couple of friends or a drum machine and to improvise over. The turnaround occurs in the last two measures of a 12 bar progression and is often a critical element of the progression, so a solid understanding of the 12 bar format is needed. After a while, the basic blues shuffles may tend to sound the same over and over again. Blues turnarounds you can move the basic pattern around to play in any key. We could replace the 12 bar blues chords with jazz chords or compose rock riffs.
Classic 12 bar blues shuffle rhythms stage 9 guitar lesson. A simple shuffled drum groove with a triplet based drum fill on bar 12. Blues shuffling patterns and progressions in different keys one of the most fundamental steps in learning to play blues guitar is understanding the shuffle. This can be played at various tempos and is something you could play or improvise around at a blues jam night. How to transform your basic blues riffs one of the features that makes the blues so fun to play is that the basic structure of a standard blues progression the socalled twelve bar isnt all that complex. Taught by orville johnson in beginner acoustic with orville series length. They just knew how to attain that level in their guitar. A 12bar blues is one of the most universally understood chord progressions. One of the most fundamental steps in learning to play blues guitar is understanding the shuffle.
Blues turnarounds guitar alliance guitar lessons guitar. Once you learn to play the 12bar blues on the guitar, you can play such classic blues pieces as hound dog, stormy monday, kansas city, st. In order to make sure everyone is on the same page, take a look at the 12 bar form in fig. Four dominant blues chords that you can use in the 12 bar blues. A for 4 measures d for 2 measures a for 2 measures e for 2 measures a for 2. Learn blues guitar from eric madis with an intermediate guitar lesson for basic blues shuffle. Youll learn how to play a 12 bar blues chord progression in the key of e. Here is the blues in a backing track for you to practice with. Mar 12, 2017 how to play two basic blues shuffle patterns in a on guitar with power chords. Practise the basic minor pentatonic scale first black dots are root notes. The basic blues shuffle rhythm lets take a shuffle rhythm in 128 time but, instead of playing full chords, we are going to use two note power chords. How to play two basic blues shuffle patterns in a on guitar with power chords.
It becomes part of the foundation of everything else that follows. Try to put this into practice, maybe playing a simple 12 bar blues using 7th chords and this shuffle strumming. Learning a 12bar blues is one of the fundamentals of beginning to play guitar. Throughout this series, weve solely focused on learning the standard 12bar blues progression and using power chords and dominant seventh chords to play through that progression. This lesson outlines how to play a 12 bar blues in the key of a. Im assuming a little bit of basic knowledge and ability on the guitar. Its influence pops up in all styles of contemporary rhythm guitar, both in terms of its chord and form structure and in terms of its voicing. Learn acoustic or electric with this beginner lesson for basic blues shuffle. Welcome to the fourth lesson of the blues guitar quickstart series. It is not only the basic structure for blues, but is also used extensively in rock, country, jazz and pop music. Jan 21, 20 jammin blues artist, carlos romero and hal walker break down the 12bar blues into the most basic form in order to give it away to you. Jan 07, 2019 even a guitar newbie can learn and play basic blues at an early stage. Were going to keep things simple by using only power chords to focus on getting this progression down and engrained in your brain.
Were going to show you the chords and scales you need to navigate the 12bar form, as well as some cool licks and turnarounds, so that the next time youre at a jam session and your turn comes, youll be ready to tear it up. Listen to a variation on the texas blues shuffle this is an example of a texas blues shuffle as stevie ray vaughan would play it making your rhythm playing sound more interesting. Just wait till you hear this kid from florida wail. Apr 24, 2017 learning a 12 bar blues is one of the fundamentals of beginning to play guitar. Examining the 12bar blues pattern if youve ever spent any time around a serious blues musician or music aficionado, youve probably heard the phrase 12 bar blues tossed about. In this lesson designed for beginning to novice guitar players we will learn how to play a blues shuffle rhythm in the key of a.
Bb king, eric clapton, and john mayer will be proud. Jammin blues artist, carlos romero and hal walker break down the 12bar blues into the most basic form in order to give it away to you. Aug 23, 2018 what guitar player hasnt even taken part in a blues jam. After this lesson, the best thing you could do is to listen to a bunch of blues that use the 12 bar shuffle riff thingy and see if you can work out which picking is being used. Easy guitar tutorial 12 bar blues in ethe 12 bar blues is a very common pattern and an important one for guitar players to learn. Playing and improvising acoustic blues doug young acoustic blues workshop notes q 96 our goal is to be able to play a simple, but effective solo blues guitar piece, hopefully with some improvisation.
Even a guitar newbie can learn and play basic blues at an early stage. In the first example i wrote out the entire 12 bar blues. As well as functioning as a bass line, it can also be used as a kind of lead guitar line in a rockabilly style. Well first cover the chords that make up this progression e7, a7, b7.
In example 1 below, a 12 bar blues progression is shown in the key of g, using open position dominant 7th chords, the type of chord typically associated with a bluesy sound. Few things scream guitar as loud as playing the blues. A quick lesson on how to play a basic blues rhythm pattern on guitar, including. Once you can play a closed using barre chords 12 bar blues shuffle rhythm you will be able to play. How to play 12 bar blues guitar lesson in the key of e with turnaround. In this lesson, eric introduces himself and his phase 2 lesson series.
This lesson outlines how to play a 12bar blues in the key of a. A bar is a musical phrase, a way of measuring the music against its rhythm, and blues songs are structured in a. Basic 12 bar blues in a the walking bass bass tabs bass. Welcome to the second video of the blues guitar quickstart series. He also teaches a basic blues shuffle in the style of jimmy reed. Were going to keep things simple by using only power chords to focus on getting. A bar is a musical phrase, a way of measuring the music against its rhythm, and blues songs are structured in a 12bar format.
Learning a 12 bar blues is one of the fundamentals of beginning to play guitar. Follow along with this super easy guitar tutorial to learn the chord progression that started it all. For now you should work on getting the shuffle just as i have shown it in the above example, but be aware that in the future you might play around with this idea a bit. Basic 12 bar blues in a the walking bass bass tabs. Once you can play a closed using barre chords 12 bar blues shuffle rhythm you will be able to play it in any key when you have finished this lesson and done a little practice. Learn how to play a 12 bar blues free guitar lesson. This incredibly easy rhythm piece will have you sounding like a blues great in no time. Should you need to know how to read tabs click here read me all tabs are standard tuning. A great way to make your rhythm guitar playing sound more interesting is to add riffs. The standard 12bar blues progression has three chords in it the 1 chord, the. The very basic form is to take the first and last four measures of a 12bar blues and combine them. Were going to keep things simple by using only power chords to focus on. Mar 9, 2018 12 bar blues shuffle charted out for the ukulele.