How to Play Minor Blues Guitar Chord Progressions

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In this free online guitar tutorial, Berklee College of Music professor and Berklee Online course author Michael Williams explains minor blues progressions for the rhythm guitar in the style of BB King's "The Thrill is Gone."

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About Michael Williams:
Michael Williams has been active as a blues and jazz guitarist around New England since 1987. He has performed extensively throughout the United States and Canada as a member of Grammy winner James Cotton's blues band, and with many other artists, including David "Fathead" Newman, Mighty Sam McClain, the Bruce Katz Band, Sugar Ray Norcia, Darrell Nulisch, Toni Lynn Washington, Michelle Willson, Jerry Portnoy, the Love Dogs, blues piano virtuoso David Maxwell, and his own band, Michael Williams and Friends.

Williams performed on James Cotton's CD, 35th Anniversary Jam, which won a W.C. Handy Award and received a Grammy nomination for the Best Traditional Blues Album in 2003. He performed on Bruce Katz's 2004 release, entitled A Deeper Blue, and his playing, songwriting, and arranging are featured on Michelle Willson's CD So Emotional, which earned a four-star review in Down Beat magazine. In 1999 Williams released a CD, entitled Late Night Walk (Blue Tempo Records), which features ten original compositions with guest artists David "Fathead" Newman on tenor sax, Sugar Ray Norcia on vocals, and Bruce Katz on Hammond B3 organ and piano.

Originally from Northern California, he has written jingles for radio and television, and performed on extended tours throughout Europe with jazz and theater groups.

Williams is an Associate Professor at Berklee College of Music in Boston, where he has taught since 1987. He specializes in teaching a mix of blues and jazz styles, and has traveled to Europe and South America on several occasions as a clinician and performer for the college.

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Closed Caption:

ok now I'm going to talk a little bit
about the rhythm guitar on a minor blues
tune like that i'm calling this too
thrilling but it's obviously a tip of
the hat to BB king's thrill is gone but
there are a number of songs written
pretty close to the same changes is this
baby did this tune originally in B minor
and he often plays it now the kid c
minor but I just move that down to the
key of a minor for the purposes of
demonstration and I thought it would
work well so what I'm going to do when
you're playing with the guitar on a tool
like this it's a great idea you know you
think about pacing yourself on the
rhythm and put first is playing behind
the vocals you're going to want to play
very simply and maybe very sparsely
leave lots of room for lyrics and all
then
so you're going to be hitting some long
tones very simple and i'm also using
this slide by the way I'm gonna talk
about playing in a minor 7 chord on the
top four string
but I could be playing a minor try it on
the top 3 by itself i can slide the top
three two minor for the top four
both work well and i interchange them i
think everybody does
we're going to be using those slides
some and you can kind of mix those in as
you choose now when you get to the four
chord you can slide or the top three
notes that sounds great doing the D
minor triad up there as well when you
play the four core down here that on
this route 5 d minor 7 chord you can
take the note a note F and slide those
two notes of it sounds great for our
beef Phil's around the four chord so
you're gonna hear me doing that
something as well so few approaches
first course going to play mostly long
notes and just sustain the cords out and
then the second course that i'm going to
play on on the on the video that follows
here is going to be a little busier a
little funkier like i might play behind
the soul which is something now before i
play want to also say one other thing
one thing that always works on a to like
this is to hit two and four so if you're
going to 1234 those short hits maybe
lighting 313 that kind of thing always
works well when you're planning to like
that so I always feel free to throw the
offbeat's in it like that
ok so up but i'm actually going to play
out to different parts other than that
no I'm going to play sustained chord and
then something a little funky okay all
right
yeah
now
yeah
yeah