Recommendations for an intermediate Blues Guitar Book.

markj · January 2021

Any recommendations for a good Blues tab book that won’t bore me. A lot of the books I’ve had in the past have been very basic and the tunes are terrible. So,any recommendations very welcome.

Lewy · March 2021

If you're an intermediate player, I think you'd get much more from approaching things from the other direction - download a copy of Transcribe! and start transcribing the playing that you like. You'll learn much more from it and you never have to spend a second working on material you don’t love.

duotone · March 2021

https://www.justinguitar.com/products?type=books

I still love the “vintage songbook” by Justin Guitar, good mix of songs & focus on the important riffs that make the song. Probably not enough blues for you though? Have a look through his different books as he lists ALL the songs contained, to see if anything takes your fancy.

Failing that if you don’t mind using a computer/iPad etc. Then Truefire has a large range of blues related lessons: https://truefire.com/search/?q=Intermediate%20blues

MagicPigDetective · March 2021

Blues Guitar Soloing by Keith Wyatt. I'm working way my through it, it starts basic but soon gets challenging/difficult, the exercises and backing tracks are good. Gives plenty of attention to techniques and different soloing styles. It's helping me improve my phrasing too.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Musicians-Institute-Guitar-Soloing-Master/dp/0793571294

BluesLover · March 2021

Have a look at books with CDs by Kenny Sultan.

ArchtopDave · March 2021

You could consider "Improvising Blues Guitar" by John Wheatcroft, which covers a whole array of different blues artists' styles. To quote part of the Introduction " Each of the eleven chapters in this book includes four complete solo studies, each written in the style of a famous artist.."

Otherwise, as mentioned above, there's Truefire.

BlueStrat · March 2021

The Blues You Can Use series by John Ganapes is pretty good, there are a couple of guys who play through the exercises on youtube so you can see if its something you’d like ahead of buying

BlueStrat · March 2021

This is the guy i meant - Ota Pinkner’s play thoughs of the BYCU exercises are very good

https://youtu.be/HBE8nSXUVjY

markj · March 2021

BlueStrat said:

This is the guy i meant - Ota Pinkner’s play thoughs of the BYCU exercises are very good

https://youtu.be/HBE8nSXUVjY

Thanks for all these suggestions will take a good look over the bank holiday weekend.

Greatape · May 2021

Robben Ford's 'Rhythm Blues'. Definitely.

Get ireal pro - plenty of blues tunes with chord charts.

Map out the triads off the third and off the fifth. Use those as both rhythm guitar and soloing material. Three note voicings on strings 1,2 & 3 and 2,3 and 4. Listen to how players like Robben (and pianists) might substitute a series of triads for the dom7. E g. For Bb7 sub D dim, Eb, Ab, Eb, D dim. (Hammer on the root in D dim)

Learn common static harmony substitutions e.g. Em7b5 for C9. What you use and how depends on what else is going on...

Use your ears - identify structures in blues records and how they differ from a typical 12-bar. Go old school and try and copy licks/phrasing. Timing, pocket, attack...realise how Clapton can't hold a candle to Otis Rush.

Have fun

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Recommendations for an intermediate Blues Guitar Book.

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