Can "tasteful blues" be learned? Spartacus says yes!
2) FREE Webcam Guitar Lessons - no sign up - no obligation
Contact Paul for your free lessons: thecaliforniaguitarslinger@gmail.com
Fortunately blues is an exact science and it is the greatest exercise for
learning to speak the "language of music" that has ever been invented. Blues
guitar lessons from a bona fide maestro, is the perfect way to find
out how to express yourself using music as a language.
One unique aspect of blues is that one can go back and forth from happy
(when playing the major third) to sad (when playing the minor third).
There are very few musical situations where this can take place and
none so free and dynamic as when exploited by blues guitar. Guitar
is an especially expressive blues instrument because you can bend
inbetween the notes to play minitones or "notes in between the notes".
There are ten minitones in between a whole step, so there are plenty
of additional notes to work with that one could not recreate on the piano.
The seventh chord includes the tritone sound, known during the
Renaissance as the "Devil’s Interval". In those days composers knew
not to musically linger on it, or they could get burned at the stake, The
seventh chord or "dominant 7th" chord only takes place on the 5 chord,
which is the perfect situation to quickly resolve back to the 1 before losing the
Kings favor due to too much "devilish tension". In the guitar battle of good and
evil in the movie "Crossroads", when Steve Vai played the last chord of what
he thought was his winning jam, he ended with a tritone, which lingered on with
it’s go nowhere ominous sound as the devil laughed. That movie was
very hip and the idea of selling your soul to the devil at the
crossroads in order to get the secret of blues music is based on the
Robert Johnson legend.
One of the main secrets of blues guitar, and the lesson to
learn is that the standard blues uses the tri-tone sound on every
chord in order to keep the tension and interest going over a repeating
and naturally supportive musical structure similar to the yearly calendar.
As soon as you think the blues is going to resolve, that next 7th chord
offers the invitation to keep moving and playing over the ocean of musical
causality. The "secret" referred to with the Robert Johnson legend is to
play slide with an "open tuning". There is a bigger ultimate secret of blues
that I save for webcam students only.... I am here for you for free until
you are on the way, so no excuses blues cats....
The blues system is like this: Take the 1 chord and the 4 chord and turn
them into 7th chords by adding a min.7th to them. Of course, the
naturally occurring 7th chord on the 5th is included in the progression. This
way, the music is always looking to RESOLVE, which leaves the rhythm track
foundation in a state of continious flux. That flux is perfect for including tons
of great scales including all the notes and "mini-tones". (there are 60 of those)
The blues scale, which is a minor pentatonic with a flat 5 or "blues note" added,
is the beginning point. From there, after taking some more blues lessons,
the mixolydian altered 9th is added. Then we get to the sweet spot, the relative
minor. Going back and forth from the blues scale down three frets to the relative
minor is a primary function of blues lead. In standard tuning this relates to my
inventions the "E form" and the G "form", There are only 2 forms to learn EVER......
Don't let unisons blow your mind and waste time memorizing complex
scale patterns unless you want to be a "professional student" because you want to.
If one plays long enough, guitarists will ultimately revert back to what works with
the human hand, and the positions and understanding that is in perfect harmony with
how the instrument was designed. Living by memory is no way to live, so only memorize fundamentals until you are ready to indulge in specifics. One good comprehension is
worth a 1000 memorizations....
B.B. King loved relative minor and it’s usually relative minor when people
make comments like, "Tasteful lead." The blues scale, minor pentatonic and
the mixolydian altered 9th create more of an aggressive rock and roll sound,
whereas the relative minor is a nurturing tonality meant to console and give
a happier feeling. Just as pro blues lead guitarists go back and forth from
mixolydian altered 9th to relative minor, they are also aware of going back
and forth stressing the major third and then the minor third at exactly the
right time in the 12 bar blues calendaric structure.
As the progression begins on the 1 chord major or happy rules. Then as the
4 chord comes up in the 5th bar, the focus goes minor or sad. On the 7th bar it's
back to :-) until the 9th bar where minor :-( is stressed until the 11th bar, which
goes happy M3 :-) before throwing the minor third (Debbie Downer) back in on
the 12th bar in order to lead back to the 1 chord where again the mood is to be happy
with the major third again. Here the 1 chord is like when January comes and you
begin the new year happy and the story starts all over again. The 12th bar or
"blues progrogression month of December" ends with the new years eve ball dropping,
which is the turnaround. lol
Please picture an electrical outlet. Positive is happy or M3rd - negative is said or m3rd. Imagine the positive and negative charge fluctuating back and forth over the ground or 7th chord and now you're getting closer to the inner sanctum understanding of how intensely tasteful blues soloing works. It works like nature does, especially like electricity does…
These tonal structures are implied even when not stressed, by the way, so it’s very
important to have that structure deeply embedded in your mind just as well as you now
have the the 12 months of the year, so you can pick and choose when and how to
make your blues lead guitar really tasteful, even if you are playing with no
accompaniment. THE ACCOMPANIMENT IS IN YOUR MIND.......psyche! lol
Blues guitar lessons include learning about life and finding a way
to deeply express feelings in a unique and universally understood way.
It is understood universally because people get feelings from certain
sound vibrations and intervals. There are physical laws at work which
are easy to conquer when you open yourself to learning. For example,
there are 12 notes in music, just like 12 months in a year. You
can repeat the notes again as you go to the same 12 notes in a higher pitch,
just like we repeat the months again going into the next year into the future,
Or we can play the same 12 notes in a lower register just like we look at
last year's calendar. The structure of 12 notes REMAINS THE SAME and
fits with the basic structure of our lives in terms of time.
Another example of life integrating into music and back is that to be in a
key means that you are choosing 7 out of the 12 notes, so then we
are dealing with seven tones just like seven days in the week . Another
natural example for comprehension is that exploiting the 7 key notes is
similar to using the seven basic colors.
You only need to know what musical day it is NOT the date within the
year. Get it? Monday is depressing, Friday go out etc. week after week mostly
not caring about the exact date. There is an order to nature and also to blues
guitar. Learn the perfect natural order to the 12 bar blues, just like you have
learned the perfect order of the days in the week, and you will
always sound expressive and tasteful when applying various types of
phrasing and using decitones as common tones. This understanding saves
you years of wasted time when applied to your studies with a bona fide maestro.
Sequential fixed phrasing, for example, is when you play the same
series of notes over and over again while the changing chords
automatically alter the role of what you are playing. It is like a musical
landscape changing as the blues train goes by with you on it. :-)
This is how a blues guitar player can let the music do the work.
Sometimes staying on the same note while patiently waiting for the
chords to give THAT SAME NOTE different meanings, then adding
some unique effect while making a face gives the impression that you are
doing all the work when actually you are still playing the same note
and letting the music do the work.
This kind of knowledge awards the most fun because even though you
never know exactly what is going to happen as you free yourself to take
chances and improvise, if you use what you learned from your blues
guitar lessons, then whatever you play it will sound like you meant to do it
even if you didn't. lol It’s due to in large part to "demitone common tones".
2) FREE Webcam Guitar Lessons - no sign up - no obligation
Contact Paul for your free lessons: thecaliforniaguitarslinger@gmail.com
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