[MUSIC PLAYING]
Let's talk about the blues.
The 12 bar blues crosses over into all genres.
It's something that we all have in common as musicians jazz, rock.
And we're going to look at a very basic form of the 12 bar blues which
is one, four, five.
So it's only three chords.
We're going to play it using barre chords and open chords in the key of G.
So there is a formula.
We start with the one chord and we play that for four bars.
So I'm going to play G for four bars and I'm going to count.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
One, two, three, four, two, two, three, four, three, two, three, four, four,
two, three, four.
And I'm going to go to the four course for two bars.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four.
And back to the one chord for two bars.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four.
Then we're going to play the five chord for two bars.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four.
And then the one chord for two bars.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four.
So that's the 12 bar blues in its most basic form, four bars of one,
two bars of four, two bars of one, two bars of five, and two bars of one.
Now I'm going to play the 12 bar blues with barre chords.
So we'll play G with the root on the third fret of the low E string.
We'll play C with the root on the third fret of the A string
and we'll play D with the root on the fifth fret of the A string.
Again, four bars of the one chord.
One, two, three, four.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
The blues is the foundation of rock, the blues is the foundation of jazz.
Everything comes from the blues.
There's variations that you'll learn at some point.
But the basic structure is what we just went over now.
It's 12 bars long.
Sometimes people break it into three sets
of four bars, three sections of four bars.
So the one chord, the first four bars of the one chord.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
Measure three
[GUITAR PLAYING]
The second four bars consists of two bars of the four chord
and two bars of the one chord.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
The last four bars are two bars of the five chord
and two bars of the one chord.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
So that's your basic 12 bar form.
Sometimes people add and subtract chords but the 12 bars stay the same.
So for example, if we look at our first four bars,
sometimes instead of playing the one chord for four bars straight,
people will play the four chord on bar two and then go back to the one chord.
So the order is one, four, one, one.
So it's one.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
Four.
One.
The middle part stays the same, four, four, one, one.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
And the last four bars sometimes people go five, four, one, five.
So that's where they add the most chords in.
So it goes five, four, one, five.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
Five, four, one, five.
So the blues with variations sounds like this.
So it's one, four, one, one, one, four, four, one, one, five, four, one, five.
[GUITAR PLAYING]
So practice this and memorize it.
It's really important to memorize it because it's something
that you can pretty much play with anyone.
It's the one tune that sort of binds everybody together.
You know blues?
Yeah lets play blues.
OK sounds great.
So learn it and have fun with it.