Music Composition DUMmIES

12-bar blues

The most common type of blues is the 12-bar blues, which is often constructed

like this:

IIII

IV IV I I

V IV I V/I (turnaround)

The turnaroundis the part of the song where you either end the song on the I

chord, or play the V chord instead and return to the beginning of the song for

another verse.

If you’re playing the 12-bar blues in a minor key, you could write it like so:

iIV i v

IV IV i VI

ii v i v/i (turnaround)

Another way you could write the 12-bar blues in a minor key is as follows:

iiii

iv iv i i

V iv i V/i

8-bar blues

The 8-bar blues is very similar to the 12-bar blues — it’s just got shorter

verses. One possible construction of the 8-bar blues is as follows:

IIV I VI

ii V I V/I (turnaround)

16-bar blues

The 16-bar blues — which is, of course, four bars longer per verse than the

12-bar blues — follows the chord patterns of the 12-bar blues, with the 9th

and 10th measures (bars) often repeated three times, like so:

IIII

IV IV I I

VIV V IV

V IV I V/I (turnaround)

152 Part III: Harmony and Structure