onewilyfool Posted February 21, 2011 Share Posted February 21, 2011 LOL....I now know blues songs in 5 keys.....A, C, D, E, G......I know Bb is a great blues keys, and used when playing with horns and such, but I will just capo, if that becomes a problem. So B, Bb, F, are keys I don't know or even want to....lol.....but was just practicing last night, and it dawned on me, that I've covered most of the blues bases. That being said.......even though most blues songs are basically three chords, there is NO END to the depth of the blues, be it word phrasing and cadence, rhythm, leads or what ever. You can just go deeper and deeper into the blues. One of my old guitar playing buddies, says that all american music, jazz, rock & Roll, R&B, etc.....all owes it's origins to the blues....and I tend to agree....just a thought for the day...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vincentw Posted February 21, 2011 Share Posted February 21, 2011 "Crossroads" mythology could be interpreted as a metaphor for such beginnings. Where's the devil-horns emoticon? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McDuff Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 All music is such a complex thing. It is not necessarily complex mechanically but it is something emotional, something powerful, something spiritual. I think that the blues tap into that part of music very readily and that is why it is such a deep genre even if it is simple enough to grasp the basics of it quickly. Perhaps I am overly romanticizing the idea of this thread though. I am rather tired at the moment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L5Larry Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 Wily, Wily, Wily, you've gone and done it now. Pandora's box has been opened. Please talk among yourselves....... I can't wait to read the responses to this! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onewilyfool Posted February 22, 2011 Author Share Posted February 22, 2011 Wily, Wily, Wily, you've gone and done it now. Pandora's box has been opened. Please talk among yourselves....... I can't wait to read the responses to this! Larry...I was just sharing that I somehow had learned blues songs in 5 keys....not wanting to stir things up....lol.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stein Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 that makes sense now, i get it. somewhere back in history when the saxaphone came in, it was tuned to b flat, the guitarist refused to play in b flat, and thus jazz was created. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mojorule Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 LOL....I now know blues songs in 5 keys.....A, C, D, E, G......I know Bb is a great blues keys, and used when playing with horns and such, but I will just capo, if that becomes a problem. So B, Bb, F, are keys I don't know or even want to....lol.....but was just practicing last night, and it dawned on me, that I've covered most of the blues bases. That being said.......even though most blues songs are basically three chords, there is NO END to the depth of the blues, be it word phrasing and cadence, rhythm, leads or what ever. You can just go deeper and deeper into the blues. One of my old guitar playing buddies, says that all american music, jazz, rock & Roll, R&B, etc.....all owes it's origins to the blues....and I tend to agree....just a thought for the day...... You're talking solo playing in open positions when it comes to the capo, aren't you Wily? Perhaps the question is redundant, given that this is the acoustic forum, but I'll ask it anyway... I'm just thinking about the fact that the scales work in any key, though I'm sure we all need to practise to remember to play position 1 at the seventh, sixth or first fret instead of at the fifth, tenth or twelfth, and so on and so forth. Also thinking that barrés or Chuck Berry bass-string fingerings work for rhythm work in any key unless you're wanting really complex open chord variations. Just to get my bearings in what could be a mammoth as well as brilliant thread... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zombywoof Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 B flat - Johnnie Johnson's favorite key so by default Chuck Berry's. Chord progressions and fingerings are part of the language of the blues but it is the right hand that really defined someone's style and set this player apart from that. Just listen to Blind Blake's amazing thumb work or others who could get three lines running at the same time - melody, harmony, and bass. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
retrorod Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 I,ve got the 'keys to the blues' as well as the 'Keys to the Highway'..... in A Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
devellis Posted February 23, 2011 Share Posted February 23, 2011 There are many flavors of blues, to be sure. There's the chordal and slide-heavy delta stuff, the raggy Piedmont fingerpicking stuff, the Jazzy New Orleans stuff, the piano-based music hall stuff, the medicine show hokum stuff, and on and on. There's a common thread that can be heard in all of them but each spun off its own derivative (like jazz coming from New Orleans blues, rock roll from delta blues, folk from Piedmont blues, and so on). What a wonderful, diverse, fertile and distinctly American musical form the blues is. And you can learn a simple tune in a relatively brief time or spend the rest fo your life trying to get Blind Blake's rhythms just right. There's no end to the possibilities. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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