Trying to learn jump blues comping like Junior Watson, Holmstrom, etc.

[Bluesharp]

I’m a pretty okay guitarist and I’m trying to get better. I feel like I really rely on a few chord shapes but I’m struggling to figure out any of this stuff. I can listen to the songs all day but I can’t really pick out tons of the chords because I don’t know the shapes. So I recognize what chord it would be in the progression, but struggle about position, extensions, etc.

I am not really sure where to go to expand upon this and it’s super niche. Should I buy a chord book like the Baker book, or even the Arpeggio and Scales Books by Latarski and just learn a million shapes?

here’s some videos of me playing:

as you can possibly hear I have the idea of it and in the more Chicago based stuff I do I feel pretty comfortable as I’ve learned a lot of the stuff and can pick it out. But I want to go from “sounds close enough” to actually doing some of it.

[Bop Head]

I listened to the original of the Little Walter tune and it is the recording of a full group with drum and double bass. It seems like you in your one-man-band constellation are only trying to imitate the guitar part so there is a lot missing from the groove.

I would learn basic guitar shell chords first: For dominant seventh chords either root note on low E string, seventh on D string and third on G string (e.g. F7 1x12xx, Bb7 6x67xx) or root on A string, third on D string and seventh on G string (e.g. C7 x323xx). Now alternate between the root and the third/seventh double stop imitating the whole of the band groove especially the drums. (There is a minor IV chord in there as well, you can use a Bbmin6 voicing for that: 6x56xx.)

This is something I developed when I was busking a lot and it works very well. (I comp my singing in a similar way for rock/pop songs as well and BTW if you play like that at a session you can show a good drummer and bassist what you want them to play like that.)

It is important that you practice that without the harp and singing first until it is so much in the pocket that you do not have to think about it and the groove rolls naturally along.

Jump blues comes from big band music. The things the folks you mention in the headline are playing are imitating big band horn sections. So the first thing I would do is to listen a lot to those big band and jump blues names mentioned in the jump blues wiki article. We have the luxury that almost all this music is on Youtube and streaming platforms so it is very easy to immerse yourself with it

Regarding the music of Junior Watson and Rick Holmstrom (which I both did not know) etc.: Again the luxury of the internet, lots of videos where you can see what they are doing and lots where they are even explaining it.

The Baker book never hurts, but if you want to imitate horn section rifffs you will need to learn drop 2 voicings. Baker is rather about classic jazz rhythm guitar four to the bar.

[ruger9]

Here's a great YouTube channel to check out, this guy does everything from Charlie Christian to T-Bone to rockabilly.

Damian Bacci - YouTube

Other than that, go to Truefire and check out their video courses, I'm sure they have one on "west coast blues" or "jump blues" or whatever you want to call it.

Junior Watson Masterclass

[alltunes]

Delete this thread and ignore this website before you ruin your playing. Just kidding sort of.

Not quite sure what you are asking.

How to jazz up the blues progression?

Here is a very quick and basic YT on how to sort of approximate some horn type lines.

[David B]

Tommy Harkenrider (US) and Chris Corcoran (UK) are the guys to check out for lessons on jump blues / swing blues.

Harkenrider has video downloads as well as guided video classes on a bunch of useful topics. Corcoran teaches a monthly workshop in central London as well as teaching on Zoom and he has some instructional clips on YouTube.

Tommy Harkenrider Blues & Roots

[Kirk Garrett]

Delete this thread and ignore this website before you ruin your playing. Just kidding sort of.

Not quite sure what you are asking.

How to jazz up the blues progression?

Here is a very quick and basic YT on how to sort of approximate some horn type lines.

This is cool. Thanks for posting.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[AllanAllen]

You sound good, I would recommend you keep doing what you've been doing to get here and go further.

But since we are posting youtube clips... might as well learn from the best.

[MarkRhodes]

Tommy Harkenrider (US) and Chris Corcoran (UK) are the guys to check out for lessons on jump blues / swing blues.

Harkenrider has video downloads as well as guided video classes on a bunch of useful topics. Corcoran teaches a monthly workshop in central London as well as teaching on Zoom and he has some instructional clips on YouTube.

Tommy Harkenrider Blues & Roots

+1 on Tommy Harkenrider.

[MarkRhodes]

You sound good, I would recommend you keep doing what you've been doing to get here and go further.

But since we are posting youtube clips... might as well learn from the best.

Tommy Harkenrider has said that Charlie Baty got a lot of what he knew from the first Mickey Baker book.

[AllanAllen]

Tommy Harkenrider has said that Charlie Baty got a lot of what he knew from the first Mickey Baker book.

Oh yeah, OP should have the mickey baker book too.