8-Bar Blues Chord Progression in B-flat

NOTE: The chord charts for this video can be viewed at http://www.learnblueslicks.com. You will also find a nice solo to play over these chord changes. **
Hey Blues Fans!
I heard an 8-bar blues progression the other day and I liked it so much that I thought Id make a lesson out of it. Its not your typical I-IV-V chord progression; it has a much jazzier feel. All the chords are only three notes and they are all played on the bottom four strings. I like to finger pick or hybrid pick all the chords - use whichever technique is more comfortable for you. You can even strum the chords, but make sure to deaden the A-string on the Bb7, G7, and F7.
I posted both the chord charts and the tablature on the website, so you should have no problems learning the chords. The video will give you some good tips on the fingering and picking techniques. You should have this thing mastered quickly.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• 8-bar blues
• chord progression
• blues guitar lesson

[cfh12804]

could someone help me. i have no ideas about keys. how do you know what key you are playing in.

[haywyre62]

Very crudely, learn the notes on the low E string. Whichever note that pentatoic scale starts on is the key that it's in. Again, that's a very crude way of figuring out the key, but for typical 12-bar blues, it ususally works.

[stramed]

can you do them with a pick

[haywyre62]

Yes. But I like plucking with fingers so I can play the bass note separately.

[fourtoi]

Good instruction. I get it. But ..............if you could play it in a MUSICAL context ,off the top, it would help to have a melodic / sounds like a tune, goal to aim for.

[haywyre62]

Point well taken. Putting things in musical context is important, and i wish I could provide backing tracks. However, there's a couple things that make it difficult: 1) It's hard to create unique backing tracks. I don't have the tools or the time to do so; 2) Commercial tracks are a violation of YouTube copyright restrictions. YouTube has the ability to recognize copyrighted music and remove the video. If anybody out there knows of a good method to make royalty free backing tracks, I'm all ears.

[Kaalec]

@haywyre62 Garage Band from Apple. You can load in all kinds of free tracks and build your own song.

[rileydd08]

ur voice makes me suicidal

[slashsgibsonlespaul]

jus play the first 6 notes of a major scale and remember it goes major, minor, minor, major, major, and minor oh and then major 7 flat 5

so there's E, F, F#, G, G#, A, Bb,B, C, C#, D, D#.

and then for your minor keys its jus from the 6th note so its minor then major 7 flat 5 and so on :P

[GooberPee]

Wonderful piece! Wonderful lesson!

Technical note: The instructor repeatedly refers to the Bb chord as simply a "B" chord. Not sure if this was intentional or not. Could confuse a newbie.

[dacop13]

Great stuff! Nice progression to mess around with. I tried some picking and rhythm patterns...sound great...thanks!

[jejst]

muy

guenop!!!