Free Blues Guitar Lessons

Blues is based on the use of so-called “blue notes”. This kind of music was originally a vocal call-and-response sung by workers in fields but musical instruments such as the guitar, banjo and piano were gradually introduced as the influence of the music grew.

The blues has had an enormous influence on the popular music of the United States and other countries influenced by its culture. Hip-hop, rhythm and blues, rock and roll, jazz and bluegrass are some of the musical genres that can trace their origins to the blues.

Music historians suggest that the original blues lyrics probably consisted of one line with four repeats. This form has been transformed to the standard blues form of today that consists of a line with one repeat, followed by a concluding statement.

The most common form of blues is made up of twelve bars with three chords – the I-IV-V progression – backing the melody line. The I is the first note of the scale, the IV is the fourth, and the V is the fifth. In the key of E major, the notes are E F G A B C D. This means if you are playing twelve bar blues in the key of E, the chords you use will be E, A and B.

So your twelve bars will be four bars of E, two bars of A, two bars of E, one bar of B, one bar of A, two bars of E.

E E E E

A A E E

B A E E

Blues melodies are based on the “blues scale”. There is much discussion amongst guitar players and authors of books on blues guitar lessons about what the blues scale consists of and if such a thing exists. Whether you want to use that label or not, a scale for blues playing is seven notes with the 3rd, 5th and 7th notes flatted. Rather than join in the debate about numbers of notes, here is tab for a blues scale in E. Playing it will help you to understand how to play blues music.

E————————-0-3-

B———————0-3—–

G—————0-2-3———

D———–0-2—————

A—–0-1-2——————-

E-0-3————————-

Here is a video lesson on twelve bar blues in the key of E. Note that the chords used are all seventh chords.