Blues Guitar Improvisation

Posted by admin on September 13, 2009

Emotional Content
There is nothing like a blues guitar improvisation to express our innermost feelings of what it’s like to be disadvantaged in some way. Whether it’s your partner (the wife or girlfriend giving you a hard time), your finances (down on your luck) or just the day to day grind that makes life a struggle.

A blues guitar solo can mean many things to many people and can reflect the many emotions of “bluesy-ness” rather like folk music reflects many aspects of ordinary life. However, is blues improvisation only about the struggle of man against the bad deal handed out to him by life’s bad luck or is it a mood that we like to indulge in sometimes – a kind of low key contemplation as we sip on our drink.

How Many Notes?
If there is one note that most represents the blues it is the flattened fifth of the blues scale which sounds both perfectly appropriate and sticks out like a sore thumb. It’s the note that most players seem to head for when constructing their solo, and without it, it just wouldn’t be the blues.

This could prompt the question, how many notes does it take to create a blues solo? Well, I guess we should include the tonic (the first note of the scale). This could be followed by the flattened third and fourth degrees which gives us four notes in total.

In the key of A the notes would be A, C, D and Eb. The full blues scale is A, C, D, Eb, E and G with the A again at the top of course.

Why Use So Few Notes?
For those who are learning to improvise on the blues scale the more notes there are, the more difficult it can be to create a phrase out of thin air. Also, rhythm plays a role in a blues phrase and gaps between notes are important too.

Notes and strong rhythmic phrases with plenty of room between for each phrase to say something is a great way to approach blues guitar improvisation.

I was once told by a very experienced and successful musician that, you can create a good solo on just one note! I think if a player had the ability and courage to do such a thing, the temptation to include an extra note would become overwhelming!

What Guitar Does Eric Clapton Play?

Posted by admin on September 2, 2009

The guitar is the Eric Clapton Fender Stratocaster, black with maple neck. Perhaps the most significant difference between this Strat and the regular model is the active mid-boost. This enables a quick switch between rhythm and lead while keeping the the same quality of tone.

Of course, this can also be achieved by using an effects pedal but the tone from the pickups are usually altered with a pedal, whereas by using the active mid-boost on the guitar, the quality of tone is retained.

Another feature of this guitar is its blocked tremolo. Many guitarists prefer the tuning stability and sustain that blocking the tremolo systems gives -this model comes with a blocked tremolo.

Naturally, the quality of the 3 vintage noiseless pickups and the Fender machine heads are second to none – or the cream of the crop you might say!

This guitar definitely provides the strat player with an instrument that excels in the mid-tonal range – ideal for blues – and as a soloing instrument that can go from vocal accompaniment to lead at the flick of a 5-way switch. No more running across the stage to get to the pedal board in time!

Here’s how to block your own guitar’s tremolo

What Guitar Does B.B. King Play?

Posted by admin on September 1, 2009

Along with a great player often comes a great guitar – usually made famous by the player himself and B. B. King is a good example of this player-guitar relationship.

The answer to the question, what guitar does B.B. King play, is the BB King Lucille model that comes in both the Gibson and Epiphone versions.

At first glance this guitar looks like the Gibson 345 model but it is actually based on the Gibson 355.

Some of the interesting features include the micro-tune fine tuning tailpiece, the vari-tone selector switch, the stereo output and, the most significant feature of all – no F-holes!

The guitar is still a hollow body with the standard woodblock that  runs under the pickups and gives these models sustain and helps prevent feedback. In the old days I used to put rolled-up paper inside the F-holes to stop feedback on my 335, but B. B. King when he designed this guitar was a step ahead.

The stereo output would be great for recording and stage use, especially if using more than one amplifier.

The best way to discover the sound of this instrument is to listen to the man himself play it, but anyone who plays one of these semi-acoustic guitars, from the “es” range, will almost know how it sounds just by looking at it!

The guitar shown is the BB King Lucille Epiphone model and available from here at a really great price.

Blues Slide Guitar

Posted by admin on August 14, 2009

Image via Wikipedia

The slide guitar is a term used to describe the action, whereas the bottleneck guitar is a term used to describe the item used to create the slide.
These are often used interchangeably and also may refer to style other than blues – for example country and Hawaiian music also uses the slide technique but not the bottleneck (usually!).

A bottleneck is a traditional glass slide but other materials are used such as brass, steel and ceramic to make slides – each material lends its own characteristics to the tone.

Resonator – Dobro
One of the most popular types of guitar for blues bottleneck is the resonator which has a relatively high action by default which makes playing bottleneck easier. Resonator guitars produce their sound from a metal cone inside the guitar’s body and the term dobro belongs to the company who first made the resonator guitar.

Ordinary acoustics and electric guitars can also be used but it is best to raise the action slightly so that the strings don’t hit the frets when the slide is pressed downwards.

In Between The Frets
The slide can create a more subtle sound when it comes to note “in between” that is notes between the frets which is able to mimic the human voice. The electric guitar is able to do this, to a degree, by bending and pre-bending strings with the use of the volume control to remove the initial percussive sound from the beginning of the note. However, it is very difficult to emulate the sound of a slide.

Many players use both a slide and regular stopped notes with their fingers, using the three remaining fingers to make some of the lower runs etc.

The slide or bottleneck sounds best on the higher sounding strings but more difficult to get a good sound from the low wound strings.

Chords On One Fret
The bottleneck is most effective when it is possible to make a chord on one fret, that is the reason why music in this style usually requires the guitar to be tuned to open tuning  – that is, when you play the open strings a chord is sounded.

Therefore, many songs or pieces require a specific tuning, D & G tuning among the most popular.

Blues Guitar Lessons

Posted by admin on July 31, 2009

Image by State Library and Archives of Florida via Flickr

Having a few blues guitar lessons can speed up the process of learning to play blues and save a lot of time.

12 Bars of Rhythm
The first place to start, if you haven’t learnt this already, is playing a 12 bar rhythm. To many, playing rhythm guitar is for people who are unable to play lead and improvise, however, being able to play rhythm well and know when the chords should change without having to count, is a great asset.

Knowing what you want to achieve from your lessons is important. There are so many styles of blues playing and just as many ways to go about learning them, so make sure that the teacher or course that you are taking is going to provide you with the style you want to learn.

Blues Improvisation
Is not just about playing fast licks and impressing people, but is steeped in a social setting of near poverty and going without. This may suggest that you have to be black and have suffered in order to be able to play those phrases in the way they are meant to be played – but listening to the great blues guitarists and other musicians – particularly singers is very helpful in developing a sense of blues feel.

Keep it simple
There is a secret to learning quickly and also playing fast and that is: learn a little at a time and practise slowly. Both of these are at odds with what our natural desires want us to do.

Most of us, after reading the introduction, flick through a book looking for the good bits and try to play those bits up to speed much too soon.

None of this is improvising, which like jazz, plays an important role in learning blues.

A Framework
Of course, blues is normally played within a framework of twelve bars and can be subdivided into three, four bar sections or phrases. This is a starting point for lead improvisation and the three phrases that can be described as

1. a statement,
2. an answering phrase and lastly,
3. a summing-up of what has gone before ending in a turnaround.

The old saying that what goes in comes out applies to blues and most other styles of music so do lots of listening, work through material slowly and thoroughly and remember that there is a difference between practising and performing – practice is what you do slowly and performing is what you do at full speed.

Guitar lessons do cost money, especially if they are one to one, but well worth the money if you know what you want to achieve and have a goal that is achievable.

About

Posted by admin on July 29, 2009

Bluesguitar-intro.co.uk is dedicated to providing quality information on the subject of Blues Guitar.

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