What Is Authentic Blues Guitar Anyway?
There are lots of recipes to be found and no shortage of people telling us just how well they can play, but the real proof is in the eating, as always.
Did you ever listened to a pro guitarist play perfectly but you still got bored rather quickly? It happens if the guitarist has no feeling for it, but where do we find this indefinable soul for blues music, that's the question.
There's is a fundamental ingredient often absent, and if we could find it, we can play like the old masters.
Learn Real Blues Guitar From The Way the Old Guys Did It
There's is a fundamental ingredient often absent, and if we could find it, we can play like the old masters. My own preference was for ragtime blues guitar when I was younger, mostly because it was complicated and I enjoyed the challenge. Stubbornly I admit that I just wanted to impress people with my 'amazing' talent, so this vital element, this particular feeling, was not there.
After not playing for something like 5 years or so, I happened to be working around Chicago and someone I knew played me one or two nice sounding blues songs, and told me that they came from Clapton's new CD.
Now, I don't think a lot of Clapton at all, and yes I know he's supposed to be a great master (his style is pretty average if compared to Tommy Emmanuel, for instance), but the album sparked something in my head and I began playing again - thanks Mr C.
Now, I don't think a lot of Clapton at all, and yes I know he's supposed to be a great master (his style is pretty average if compared to Tommy Emmanuel, for instance), but the album sparked something in my head and I began playing again - thanks Mr C.
I then found that I'd been leaving out something very fundamental - feeling and style. In the past, I just filled any space with a note, or rather several! For me, complex was great and fast playing was best - I was wrong.
So the quest was on - how to discover this thing and how to put it into my music? Good
question. Son House who hung with Robert Johnson for a while, said it well - 'Some people play some kinda shuffle in the key of E and say it's the blues this, or the blues that.
A Blues Lesson From Mr Son House
So the quest was on - how to discover this thing and how to put it into my music? Good
question. Son House who hung with Robert Johnson for a while, said it well - 'Some people play some kinda shuffle in the key of E and say it's the blues this, or the blues that.
Well it's not!' Well, that's about how it is, and that's something to go on. During the sixties folk-blues revival, it seemed as though every guitarist was learning those blues riffs and calling it the blues.
Let's put it another way - if you listen to someone playing the blues, do you feel that it's true? Are you touched in some way, or do you just think 'that's clever'?