50 Jazz Blues Licks is an exclusive series of video guitar lessons by David Hamburger covering the jazz blues styles of historically great guitarists like Geoge Benson, Kenny Burrell, Joe Pass, and many others. A new lick will be released each week, so be sure to subscribe and check back often!
Everyone knows that the artwork on the 50s and 60s Blue Note LPs was every bit as cool as the music inside, but in lieu of the usual mood-setting Frank Wolff photography, the cover of Kenny Burrell’s Blue Lights album featured a line drawing by designer Reid Miles’ friend Andy, who was short on work at the time. That’d be Andy Warhol – you may be familiar with his later work? Blue Lights was not unlike other jam session records of the period that featured minimal arrangements, a small handful of luminary soloists, and tracks that filled anywhere from a third to the entirety of an LP side. Often critically derided even at the time as mere “blowing dates” and as such virtually antithetical to the general Blue Note practice of tight, well-rehearsed arrangements of original material played by a recurring stable of musicians, Burrell nevertheless made several such records for the label, including All Night Long, All Day Long, and of course, Blue Lights Volume II, issued in tandem with the title at hand. “Yes Baby” is a slow blues, and Kenny’s lick here implies a double-time feel.
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Video Guitar Lesson
If you like these guitar lessons, be sure to also check out Frank Vignola’s Jazz Up Your Blues, which showcases essential jazz blues vocabulary and techniques, Mark Stefani’s Jazzed Blues Assembly Lines, which takes you on a sonic learning tour through the funky rhythm and blues stylings and fretboard concepts of top jazz blues players, and of course all of David Hamburger’s courses.