Blues
The African-American musical tradition, built on a twelve-bar form and blue notes, which underlies most popular guitar playing.
The blues is less a repertoire than the grammar that rock, jazz, soul and country all borrowed from, and its guitar vocabulary is the one most players learn first. Its harmony is simple, built on three chords and the flattened notes that give it its name, but its expression depends on bend, vibrato and phrasing that cannot be notated exactly. Because it can be played solo on an acoustic or with a full band, it is the most durable vehicle a guitarist has.
Example: A twelve-bar progression in A with dominant seventh chords, bends on the third and a shuffle feel is a blues.
See also
Related
- PageBlues scale
- PageBlue note
- PageTwelve-bar blues
- PageAmericana
- PageBebop
- PageBluegrass
- PageAaron Dessner
- PageAce Frehley