The Guitar Magazine – July 2019

U

sing notes from the A minor

pentatonic scale below, in this

lesson, we’re going to look at some

12-bar blues rhythms and combine

some simple lead lines with the rhythmic

patterns that we have learnt over the last

few lessons.

First, we should cast our minds back to

lesson two and refresh on the second shuffle

pattern that we learnt, which you can find

in full at Guitar.com.

We’ll be taking this shuffle pattern and

adding some simple embellishments from

the minor pentatonic scale to incorporate

lead-guitar playing.

This will not instantly make you sound

like a blues hero, but it will start to get

your fingers moving and serve as a fantastic

starting point for your lead-guitar skills to

develop. The examples over the page make

up the pattern in full. I’ll break this down

into four-bar segments so we can look at

what is going on each step of the way:

In the first bar, we’re sticking to our

shuffle rhythm to get our groove locked in.

This is played as it was in the lesson which

covered blues shuffles: “1 a 2 a 3 a 4 a”.

In the second bar, we stick with the same

rhythmic feel, but the last two notes are

now substituted by a D and C note – the

7th and 5th fret on the third (G) string.

This is the first embellishment. It locks

into the rhythm of the piece, but adds a

melodic touch.

The third bar retains a similar feel to

the first bar, except the final two notes.

On the “4 a”, go from the 7th fret of the

fourth (D) string up to the 5th fret of the

third (G) string.

The final bar ends with a descending

four-note run, starting on the 5th fret of the

ESSENTIAL BLUES LESSONS

PART SIX

COMBINING BASIC RHYTHM AND LEAD

WORDS LEIGH FUGE

In the previous instalment of our

guide to the basics of blues-guitar

playing, we discussed the minor

pentatonic scale in its first shape.

This scale will be used to start

forming our lead-guitar lines

EXAMPLE 1

THE A MINOR PENTATONIC SCALE

ESSENTIAL BLUES LESSONS

GUITAR MAGAZINE 137