Basic Blues Theory

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Blues Rhythm Basics

Blues has influenced the music industry more than any genre nowadays. You can hear its influence in almost every song you hear these days. Therefor, it is essential to have a good knowledge of it.

Triplet Feel

Blues is usually played in a swing feel, which means that each beat is divided into three equal eight notes and you only play the first and third eight note per beat.

Blues Form

Below is a standard 12 measure blues form. If you ever want to play blues with a friend, you'll need to understand this graphic, so that you can play the blues in any key you wish. As you may notice, the numbers below are written in roman numerals which is very common in music to describe a chord within a scale. In a major scale there are 7 notes and each chord created from these notes bears a roman numeral that represents it. 

I, ii, iii, IV, V, vi, vii

The upper case numbers represent major chords and the lower case numbers represent minor chords. For the blues, all that we will be using are the three major chords: I, IV, V

Blues Form

In the example below, the roman numerals were replaced by the name of the chords that will be played in each measure in the key of E major. In the key of E major, the chords are usually E, F#m, G#m, A, B, C#m, B#m(b5). As mentioned above, the only chords used for the blues are the major chords or upper case roman numerals, so in this case E, A and B.

E Blues Form

Electric Guitar Parts

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When playing guitar, it is important to know the parts on your guitar.

Electric Guitar Parts

Tuning Pegs: Used to tune the guitar.

Nut: Where your strings converge together.

Fret Wire: The metal pieces on the neck of the guitar. 

Fret: Between the fret wires, they are where you place your fingers to create sounds.

Markers: They help you remember where the notes are on the guitar, because notes are at different places on each strings.

Guitar Strap Holder: It is where you put your strap to play standing up.

Bridge: It is where you put your hand to palm mute your notes.

Pick Up: They are electro magnets that pick up the sound of your strings and send the signal to the amplifier

Pick Guard: It is there to protect the finish of your guitar, so that you don't scratch it.

Pick Up Selector: It is used to switch pick ups; it changes the sound of your guitar when plugged into an amplifier.

Volume Knob: It is used to change the amount of signal sent to the amplifier. If you have distortion in your sound, reducing the volume on your guitar will reduce the amount of distortion.

Tone Knob: It changes the brightness of your sound.

If you have any questions, please contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Reading Tablature

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Tablature, also called tabs, is the easiest way to read music for instruments like guitar, bass guitar, ukulele, mandolin, etc. It is easier than reading the treble clef, because it relates to the instruments better. Treble clef is easy to read on piano, because each note on the staff relates to a note on the piano. On the guitar on the other hand, each note on the staff relates to several of the same notes on different strings. Also, certain techniques on the guitar do not relate well on a staff.

Therefor, below is an example of a measure in tablature. 

If you have any questions, please contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Beginner Theory

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Music theory is important no matter which instrument you want to play. It is the back bone of the language of music. We use the piano to show theory, as it is the most visual instrument, but know that it is the same for every instrument.

Notes

The basics of music starts with the natural notes: A, B, C, D, E, F, G

If this seems easy, then try saying those letters without looking at them, but in the reverse order. It seems a silly thing to do, but it ends up being very useful, because when you play music, you will play those notes going up and down all the time. So, below is a keyboard to show you the notes and the distance between the notes. Notice that there are black keys between all the notes, except for B - C and E - F.

Piano Diagram #1

The next thing to know is what sharps (#) and Flats (b) are; to understand that you need to know what half tones are.  Half tones are the distance between any key to the next, so from a white key to a black key, or a black key to a white key, or two white keys next to the other, but without a black key in between. The distance of two half tones together are called a tone or full tone or whole tone.

Now, a sharp (#)is when you take a natural note, like C, and go half a tone higher, it becomes C#. If you take the same note and go half a tone lower it becomes Cb. So, every black key can be called by two different names depending on the situation. 

Piano Diagram #2

Rhythm

The most important thing in music is rhythm. Even though most people will focus more on the notes that they are playing, if you don't have rhythm, you don't have a song and you can't play with anyone. 

First thing to know is the name and value of each note and rest, because for each note there is a rest of equal value. 

Notes Pyramid

Rests Pyramid

You may have noticed that each note has a fraction written in brackets next to its name. It is simply because each note has a value relative to the other ones. So, depending on the time signature, notes will have a different value. A time signature is what tells you at the beginning of a music sheet what kind of rhythm the song will have. The example on the right shows a measure that has four quarter notes and the example below shows a measure with six eighth notes.

Measure #2

Measure #1

If you have any questions, you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com