Playing Blues

[BlabberBoy]

I've read through a tutorial on Cyberfret about Blues Chord Progressions, and it's great, but when I play, I don't get a blues sound... I tried palm muting, but that pretty much eliminated all sound from the first three strings...

How can I get a true blues sound?

[PRS]

For me to try to play the blues doesn't work. But it does work when I put my emotions in my playing. But try to try playing slower ( if you are trying to play fast ) . Best advice I can give is to not think about playing blues just play without thinking about it.

[Slash]

hi blabberboy..

are you trying to play the blues chord progression and attempting to play *blues*?
Its all in the licks man.... Look around and you'll find tons of open and closed posn. blues licks that fit in the scales and progressions that you have learnt.

l8r
Nikhil

[BluesPulp]

PRS has it right.
Ya just can't play the blues. Ya gotta feel dem blues.
Blues comes from the soul, deep inner feelings.
Next time ya try to play the blues, before you begin, spend some time thinking about a terrible time in your life.
Did you break up with a girl/boy friend?
Was your dog run over by a truck?
You flunk some classes and got kick off the football team.
Make something up.
But get that feeling of hurt, misery, let down.
Dwell on that bad feeling, then pick up the guitar, but don't you play it. Let your feelings do the playing.

I've been playing different styles of blues most of my life cuz my life is a wreck.

Gots no wife. Gots no job. Gots nothing but my faithful ol' dog.
And he's a growlin' at me when I comes around.
Gots no home, I gots no food. Everyone thinks I be up to no good.
So I blow my harp to that Mississippi blues sound.

Caleb Johnson, 1924. That Mississippi Blues Sound.

[Sandman_96707]

I like the blues. Conveys alot of pain but it's not all angry like metal.

Don'ts
----------
palm muting
too much distortion
playing too fast

Do
--------
What comes naturally
bends and mild tremolo sounds every here and there goes nicely.
If your amp has reverb, use it.

When you do licks, I suggest doing it around the 8th-12th frets.

[smfulla]

yeh man, it's all in the emotions
but.... that is only in the way you play it
you need to know a tiny bit of theory before you can get that low, sad sound pouring out of your guitar
learn the basic minor pentatonic scale, or the blues scale
then work out a chord progression and just muck around the scale.
Blues itself is in the lead guitar and in the vocals, well thats where the most emotion can be let out (why B.B. King sings, and plays lead guitar).
Neway, just remember blues is personal, so don't try to copy ne1's style

[Fingers]

Come on guys, I admit that the best blues is played when you feel what you're playing.
But do you really think that in order to play the blues your wife has to leave you? There's more to blues than just feeling sad.

Any emotion can be put into the blues - joy, wanting a woman, anger ...

The point "play with emotion" is true for any kind of music, not just the blues.

But ... there must be a way of faking it well, too. Do you really think BB King really feels sad every evening when he performs one of his sad songs?

And in order to put emotion into music, you have to learn a bit about the technical side of playing and that seems to be the problem here. If you can't get any sound from the bottom three strings when palm muting, you're resting your hand too heavily on the strings. Just lightly touch the strings with the side of your hand. Experiment with the pressure.

[smfulla]

palm muting's not in the pressure, its in the placement. The closer to the neck you place your hand, the more muted its going to be, the closer to the bridge you place your hand, the less muted its going to be

[Fingers]

"Palm muting is not in the pressure, it's in the placement".

Wrong. You are right, placement plays a role, too, but so does pressure.

"The closer to the neck you place your hand, the more muted it's going to be".

Absolutely true, but even close to the neck, you should be able to mute and still get a sound. The fact that the guy tries to mute and gets no sound implies that
a) maybe he's muting too far away from the bridge
b) at least equally possible: he's applying too much pressure