Why do most blues musicians only play three chords?

[Litterick]

I think the problem is that blues musicians play most often on pentatonic and blues scale.... it can be boring at times.

It is what it is. The players like it. The fans like it.

[DawgBone]

It is what it is. The players like it. The fans like it.

There are always passing and color tones that can be added. I think most of the guys who complain that pentatonics are boring fail to mix the major and minor together. To blend them seamlessly is not so easy. Also, as with anything musical, we are most limited by our imagination. Bends, reverse bends, slides, etc can always be applied. It seems to be consuming the better part of my life searching for mastery.

[kris]

A few years ago I went to a Mike Stern concert.He played his complicated melodic lines and fast themes very well.
At the end of his performance, he played and sang a simple three-chord blues. The audience appreciated it with great applause.

[DawgBone]

A few years ago I went to a Mike Stern concert.He played his complicated melodic lines and fast themes very well.
At the end of his performance, he played and sang a simple three-chord blues. The audience appreciated it with great applause.

Just my personal opinion that one of the toughest types of blues to really make pop off right is a 3 chord 12/8 slow blues. It's becoming a lost art and a lot of guys have that "it's boring" opinion of it, mainly because they are boring guitarists!

[brent.h]

Just my personal opinion that one of the toughest types of blues to really make pop off right is a 3 chord 12/8 slow blues. It's becoming a lost art and a lot of guys have that "it's boring" opinion of it, mainly because they are boring guitarists!

Any kind of blues (AAB or whatever form) done right is actually aurally arresting because of the sheer amount of friction in the music (as I mentioned earlier).

There's that anecdote of Bix Beiderbecke slapping a bunch of money down onto a table at a club to get Bessie Smith to keep singing thru the evening even though she was done. Bix must have heard something so unique that it mesmerised him. After I read this anecdote, I started checking out these 1920s female blues singers. Sometimes, I would end up just listening to the same record for 3 hours straight... It's amazing how the singers pushed and pulled against the pulse and rubbed all the microtones like the tempo and key didn't matter. Blues guitarists should check out these singers because they show us all how it's supposed to be done.

[AllanAllen]

Dismissing the blues is arrogance really. Sure there are hacks, but there are hack jazz guitarists too. Actually the hacks of one genre are most likely to dismiss another genre. Playing jazz doesn't make you better than anyone else.

brent.h excellent breakdown, you get it. Blues is a vocal tradition, not a series of pentatonic licks.

[kris]

Dismissing the blues is arrogance really. Sure there are hacks, but there are hack jazz guitarists too. Actually the hacks of one genre are most likely to dismiss another genre. Playing jazz doesn't make you better than anyone else.

brent.h excellent breakdown, you get it. Blues is a vocal tradition, not a series of pentatonic licks.

Ok.However, I think that in order to play jazz you need to put in a lot more work and have a rich theoretical knowledge.
I had no problem playing blues at the age of 16... I just felt the blues and it didn"t require much theoretical knowledge.
If I hadn't fallen in love with jazz music, I would only be playing three chords to this day.

[Christian Miller]

It’s easier to fake blues. You need quite a bit of theory knowledge to play fake jazz.

But real blues players are often like scholars of the music, who played what and when.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[kris]

It’s easier to fake blues. You need quite a bit of theory knowledge to play fake jazz.

But real blues players are often like scholars of the music, who played what and when.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I have blues musician friends who play very stylishly and don"t know notes and chords with a major seventh.

[kris]

I like Roben Ford-he has a lot of knowledge.He plays beautifully and very stylishly, smuggling in jazz phrases...:-)

[Hammertone]

...And the original written and performed by J.B. Lenoir:

Hooray for J.B. Lenoir and his excellent taste in electrified archtops (Gagliano-branded Höfner Model 462 w/Dearmond 1000)!

[Christian Miller]

I have blues musician friends who play very stylishly and don"t know notes and chords with a major seventh.

By scholar I mean - they know the music and the history and they can play you that stuff. I don’t mean they’d pass harmony 101 at Berklee.

But then there are jazz musicians who don’t really know theory and play very stylishly.

Fewer these days, but I still meet them. The horn players usually hark back to the Getz/Pepper tradition. Most often the guitarists come out of the Manouche thing, not always though.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Mick-7]

I have blues musician friends who play very stylishly and don"t know notes and chords with a major seventh.

I don't hear many major 7th chords in blues music, too pretty.

[DawgBone]

Dismissing the blues is arrogance really. Sure there are hacks, but there are hack jazz guitarists too. Actually the hacks of one genre are most likely to dismiss another genre. Playing jazz doesn't make you better than anyone else.

brent.h excellent breakdown, you get it. Blues is a vocal tradition, not a series of pentatonic licks.

That's one thing a lot of guitarists forget; it's vocal music first and foremost. If the vocal is bad I won't be staying long to listen. I can't begin to tell you how many guys I've hired whose first words were "blues is easy". Every single one of those guys fell on their face by the third song. No respect.

[ragman1]

Blues is not easy. Not all that glistens is gold and not everything that sounds like blues is blues.

Including what I do.

[John A.]

Blues is not easy. Not all that glistens is gold and not everything that sounds like blues is blues.

Including what I do.

And grits ain’t groceries, eggs and poultry, and Mona Lisa was a man.

[John A.]

First, I think it has to be said that "blues" is really many different genres, with considerable diversity of song forms, rhythms, feels, instrumentation, harmony, technique, sophistication etc. Some people play one style, some play many.

You can’t really say “most” blues musicians do some particular thing or play only 3 chord or something like that. Within certain subsets, maybe, but not in the larger sense of blues.

That said there’s something deep about the basic 3-chord 12-bar form. It’s a reduction of composition to its most basic structure - a journey from here to there and back. It allows musicians to focus almost entirely on how they play rather than what they play.

[kris]

Yesterday I played blues in Cmin 12 hours...easy 12 bars form.This is a brilliant form.
I practically practiced all the scales I know from playing jazz.

[pauln]

The Blues progression is compression;
chord changes form a fractal structure.
1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
4 4 4 4 - 4 4 4 4 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
5 5 5 5 - 4 4 4 4 - 1 1 4 4 - 1 1 5 5
Chord changes grouped by duration:
1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
4 4 4 4 - 4 4 4 4
1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
5 5 5 5
4 4 4 4
1 1
4 4
1 1
5 5
Rate of chord changes faster, duration of particular chords shorter:
16 -> 8 -> 4 -> 2 but potentially onward (...1 -> 1/2 -> 1/4...), the turnaround can support this sequence up to unplayability.

The sequence of subsequent compression, of folding, or fractal resolution of the form is the basis of the emotional mood, depth, and feel of the Blues. There are dozens of variations of the 12 bar Blues that all do this compression in various ways. It is the turnaround (increasing compression) where the real impact occurs, where the statement is made, where the artist pulls from himself the juice to get his message across.

You will have noticed that a lot of great Blues players hold their mojo back until they approach the turnaround... treating it as a peak, the parts before just development to approach the peak.

That self reflective feeling of the Blues sound... a lot of that comes from instinctively being attuned to this dynamic compression of the Blues form. Its mechanism and effect is kind of similar to the pressure you hear in chord function, but in the Blues this compression of the form reinforces the push of the chord changes in an emergent way by the changes coming faster, - you intuitively feel the change rate accelerating on approaching the turnaround - an emotional framework within which to sound one's ideas.

[kris]

why 12 hours? why scales? not criticising you, just curious...

myself, i would choose to focus for 20mins on 1 out of these 4 things:



myself, i have tried the scale approach before. it just doesn't teach me anything new or get me nearer to sounding more blues..

I played everything I learned in 50 years and it took me 12 hours.
To tell you the truth, I went a bit overboard with this playing or rather exercise.
Dorian,whole tone scales,melodic minor,arpegios 2 and 3 octaves,blues scales,penatonic combinations...etc
I also played exercises from Pat Martino/linear express.../, and pentatonic exercises from F. Gambale...
I put the main emphasis on playing 8s, 16s and triplets...
Best
Kris

[wintermoon]

Hooray for J.B. Lenoir and his excellent taste in electrified archtops (Gagliano-branded Höfner Model 462 w/Dearmond 1000)!

Who cares about the guitar.
That suit!

[Lionelsax]

Why water is wet ?
Why two chords on a one row diatonic accordion ?
Why only two chords in Frère Jacques ?
Why men are not pregnant ?

[kris]

Why water is wet ?
Why two chords on a one row diatonic accordion ?
Why only two chords in Frère Jacques ?
Why men are not pregnant ?

Why do you play three instruments?

[Lionelsax]

Why do you play three instruments?

Saxophones
Guitars
Basses
Harmonicas
Keyboards
Flute
Recorder
Melodica
Violin
Double bass
Cornet
Ukulele

And these are just the instruments I own.

I also play some drums, some percussions.

My main instrument is now the double bass.

So, I don't know.

Maybe I could play any kind of instrument, and stop playing the ones I used to play "well".

[DawgBone]

The Blues progression is compression;
chord changes form a fractal structure.
1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
4 4 4 4 - 4 4 4 4 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
5 5 5 5 - 4 4 4 4 - 1 1 4 4 - 1 1 5 5
Chord changes grouped by duration:
1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
4 4 4 4 - 4 4 4 4
1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1
5 5 5 5
4 4 4 4
1 1
4 4
1 1
5 5
Rate of chord changes faster, duration of particular chords shorter:
16 -> 8 -> 4 -> 2 but potentially onward (...1 -> 1/2 -> 1/4...), the turnaround can support this sequence up to unplayability.

The sequence of subsequent compression, of folding, or fractal resolution of the form is the basis of the emotional mood, depth, and feel of the Blues. There are dozens of variations of the 12 bar Blues that all do this compression in various ways. It is the turnaround (increasing compression) where the real impact occurs, where the statement is made, where the artist pulls from himself the juice to get his message across.

You will have noticed that a lot of great Blues players hold their mojo back until they approach the turnaround... treating it as a peak, the parts before just development to approach the peak.

That self reflective feeling of the Blues sound... a lot of that comes from instinctively being attuned to this dynamic compression of the Blues form. Its mechanism and effect is kind of similar to the pressure you hear in chord function, but in the Blues this compression of the form reinforces the push of the chord changes in an emergent way by the changes coming faster, - you intuitively feel the change rate accelerating on approaching the turnaround - an emotional framework within which to sound one's ideas.