The blues is many things—a collection of styles, an approach to the guitar, a certain musical feeling, a common 12-bar structure, and more. The work of blues guitarists, from pioneers like Robert Johnson and Etta Baker to contemporary performers like Jontavious Willis, inspires music fans and acoustic guitarists alike. Here you’ll learn key concepts, songs, and techniques for playing the blues.
A comprehensive guitar method, songbook, and narrative anthology by Steve James, available to champions of this site or to purchase at store.AcousticGuitar.com.
The sound of Leonard Copeland’s guitar has remained iconic, and this piece by Steve James reflects that.
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You can find the blues everywhere. Its characteristic 12-bar form and blue notes permeate jazz, rock, country, soul… you name it.
Henry Worrall scored his biggest hit with this tune, a bright melody in triple meter, played in open-G tuning.
Learn the styles of 12 all-time great pre- and postwar guitarists, from Elizabeth Cotten to Charley Patton to Alvin Youngblood Hart.
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Accordion music of the early 20th century might seem an odd source of inspiration for a fingerstyle guitarist, but not for the San Francisco Bay Area musician Craig Ventresco, with his vast musical knowledge of that bygone era. I have long admired Ventresco’s arrangement of “An Operatic Rag,” a 1910…
This is one of Mississippi John Hurt's signature songs, and contains the innuendo-rich lyric "lovin' spoonful."
The duo of Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe McCoy recorded the song in 1929, and it became best known through the recomposed electric version that the rock band Led Zeppelin released in 1971.
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In the following exercises, you’ll find some great phrases and chord patterns that make extensive use of the dead-thumb approach.
Memphis Minnie’s guitar playing has gone mostly underappreciated through the decades, but for many blues-inspired fingerpickers she is a crucial link in the chain of Delta blues through to Chicago blues.
Learn how to play the prototype for the 12-bar blues as we know it today.
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Get your guitar tuned to open G and explore Son House's style - a visceral mix of string popping and bottleneck slide.
The lower string is bent slightly throughout, for a crying sound. Worry less about nailing the notes than capturing the overall effect here.
Apply the techniques players like Mississippi John Hurt, Reverend Gary Davis, and John Fahey are known for to a 12-bar blues.
Get your guitar into open G tuning and learn to play bottleneck slide in the style of this influential blues guitarist.
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Tampa Red intertwines the bass and treble voices, employing a dance-like approach. Get your guitar tuned to open-D and explore Tampa's bottleneck slide style.
Capturing the haunting, emotive quality of Skip James' music is a challenge. Learn to get into open-D-minor tuning and explore his evocative music.
In the instrumental intro as well as in the verses, Cotten plays the melody to this popular song over an alternating bass pattern. Practice slowly, measure by measure.
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Explore Booker ("Bukka") White’s playing in open-G and open-D minor and work your way up to his quick tempos and powerful driving rhythm.
Hart leans heavily on single-chord grooves with monotonic bass patterns. Learn some of these licks and how to capture the feel of Hart's acoustic blues.
Excerpted from Arranging Folk and Blues Songs “Careless Love” is a classic blues tune from the early-20th-century New Orleans jazz songbook. New Orleans’ trumpeter Buddy Bolden’s band, one of the pioneering groups in Dixieland style jazz, was known for its version of the song. The song has since been recorded…
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Thumping out a steady bass drone with your thumb lets you spin bluesy, single-note licks over the top with your fingers as an improvised alternative to the folkier-sounding alternating-bass style.
Let's take a look at a few arpeggio-based licks you can use when soloing.
With its simple chord shapes and steady rhythm, blues can provide the perfect way to improve your right-hand coordination and your ability to improvise in a fingerstyle context.
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Learn to combine the bass and treble voices in your fingerpicked blues to add complexity.
