The down home country blues grooves pioneered by legendary pre-war blues artists will live on forever, both in their original form and as the foundation for more contemporary blues grooves. These six free guitar lessons from Richard van Bergen’s Down Home Boogie & Blues Guidebook will take you on a learning journey through a versatile collection of swamp pop, boogie-woogie, rhythm & blues, and early Chicago blues grooves.
Quarter Triplets
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Quarter triplets á la John Lee Hooker will break up the groove and give you rhythmic tension.
Connecting Positions
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We can connect several blues positions in a boogie groove to add some variation.
Don’t Lose Your Pride – Performance
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This next one is the basic groove of my composition “Don’t Lose Your Pride”, which I recorded on my first solo album Rootbag. It’s an example of a slow, swampy boogie groove. First I’ll show you the basic groove, followed by the melody played simultaneously with the vocals. This is very common in pre-war blues and also used extensively by Jimi Hendrix.
John Lee Groove in G
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In natural tuning, the key of G is often used in singer-songwriter and country music. It’s not necessarily a favourite for old-school boogie & blues grooves. Of course, you can play the grooves you’re familiar with in E and capo to the third fret. In the next groove, I’ll show you how you can play a John Lee Hooker type boogie in G without the capo or tuning to open G first.
When He Comes – Performance
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These kind of grooves are so timeless and powerful that they can easily be adapted to more modern styles like rock or funk. This next one is an example of that. It’s the basic groove of my composition, “When He Comes”, which I recorded on my first solo album. The drums and bass lay down a funky, New Orleans/Meters style groove. That boogie-based guitar groove fits it like a glove!
Walk On In – Performance
Download the tab, notation and jam track for this boogie & blues lesson on TrueFire.
The next example is the basic groove of the title track of my second album, “Walk On In”. It’s an example of a boogie played in open G. Its basic pattern is played on the lower part of the guitar, without using the B and high E string.
Dig these free guitar lessons? Check out the full course for more: Down Home Boogie & Blues Guidebook