![blues chords and their notes blues chords and their notes](https://fachordscdn-16d90.kxcdn.com/static/chords/images/c/7/c-7-pos-1.png)
Most guitarists start learning the blues by playing a shuffle. Here's the guitar chord chart for the 12 bar blues chords in E. When you have a hard time getting into a swing feel, it might work to sing 'chunka chunka chunka chunka. To demonstrate the swing, listen to this basic drum groove (click the speaker icons), first played in a normal way (straight feel) and then with a swing feel: The swing feel is a very important thing to master when you learn blues guitar and it is something you can't read in tablature.Ī swing feel has uneven eights (1/8 notes), but this probably doesn't tell you a lot. Try to play the chords on your guitar, each bar has 4 beats, take any rhythm or strumming you like, as long as you play it with a swing feel. The chord in the last bar is called a turnaround, it marks the transition back to the beginning of the chord progression when you are playing loops. The chords between brackets on bar 2 and 12 are not necessary to play, but make this basic progression a little more interesting. This is the most basic and the most often used blues chord progression. I'll put them in the chord progression and I'll omit those that are repeated: Most chords in blues music are dominant 7 chords. Let's replace the Roman numbers with notes: Here are the notes of the E Mixolydian scale (a common blues scale, more about it later):Įach note in this blues scale correspondents with a Roman numeral. Let's take for example a blues in the tonality of E. The Roman numbers in the scheme above refer to a degree in a tonality. Let's have a look at the basic chord progression of the blues: Like the name says, the 12-bar blues has 12 bars with in its most basic form 3 chords. Today (since the 1930s), the 12-bar blues is more or less the most played chord progression in the blues. He, amongst others, had a great influence on the standardization of the 12 bar blues. ) name Robert Johnson as one of their biggest influences and call him one of the greatest blues guitar players that ever lived. A lot of bands and musicians (Jimi Hendrix, The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, The White Stripes, Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin. Robert Johnson (1911-1938), one of the most famous Delta blues players, has had an enormous influence in the history of blues guitar.
Blues chords and their notes how to#
In this tutorial we'll have a look at those basics of how to play blues guitar.īlues developed in the United States in the beginning of the 20th century and has a mixture of European and West & Central African elements. Blues and the guitar go well together, guitar is one of the most often used blues instruments and as a guitarist it's important to speak at least the basics of the blues language.