Story Behind the Song
In the Swept Clean lick tiny "grace" notes sound slightly before the beat, here as a double-stop--that is, you sound the Eb/Bb note pair and then hammer up to the E in the E/Bb double stop all in the space of a single quarter note. Note that all the grace notes are tied to their bigger brothers. Hold an 8th fret bar across strings 3 & 4 with the first finger throughout b IarI (C7) hammers.
This major blues lickhammering from the minor b3rd (Eb) to the major 3rd (E)is adapted rather than transposed to the IV (F7) bar by hammerin g up from the 2nd (D) to the minor b3rd (Eb). Hold a 7th fret bar across strings 3 & 4 with the first finger throughout the IV (F7) bar hammers.
As in the IV (F7) bars, this major blues lick is likewise adapted to the V (G7) bar rather than transposed, this time by hammering up from the 3rd (E) to the 4th (F)both double stops with the 7th (B) rather than the minor b7th as with I bars or 6th (A) as in IV bars. The 7th (B) harmonizes with V bars best, because the 7th (B) is the 3rd of the G7 (G/B/F) chord. Hold a 9th fret bar across strings 3 & 4 with the first finger throughout the V (G7) bar hammers.
Lyrics
The Soul of the Blues series teaches the "major" blues sound made famous by Delta bluesmen like Robert Johnson, but alive today in the music of B.B. King, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Jimi Hendrix and countless other greats. The major blues sound adds the third, si xth, seventh and ninth notes (that's E, A, B and D in the key of C) that are left out by blues players who only know the minor blues notes, that is C, Eb, F, Gb, G and Bb.
Historically, the blues originated from the ultimate downbeat situation, that is slaves who were trying play microtonal African notes on the American fretted guitar. The result was "dominant" chords--that is, chords that use a major third, or E, with a flat seventh, ninth and thirteenth, that's Bb, D and A. Minor blues melodies, skip these notes and just use the flat 3rd, flat 5th and flat 7th, or Eb, Gb, and Bb, skipping over the major notes or E, A, B and D.
When you combine major blues notes with minor blues notes, as players like Stevie Ray Vaughn do constantly, you no longer play off a scale, but instead adapt every lick to the harmony of the changing chords. Luckily you can accumulate this ability to follow "changes" one lesson at a time from the Soul of the Blues series.
In a nutshell, the major 3rd, 6th and 7th are part of the chords in I, IV and V-chord bars respectively, but these major notes are skipped by players who only know the minor blues scale. The Soul of the Blues series shows you when to play these major notes. For instance, you can slur from the minor to the ma jor third of whatever chord you are playing, such as slurring from the flat 3rd to the 3rd, or Eb to E, in the key of C. Slurs like slides, bends and trills can lighting the mood of an otherwise downbeat melody, a la B.B. King.
In IV chord bars (that i s, F7 bars of a C blues) you can transpose the major sound up a fourth, so that you slur from the flat 6th to the major 6th (that's Ab to A) instead of from the flat third to the 3rd. This is because the F7 has an A as its third. Likewise, in V chord bars (that's G7 bars) you can slur from the flat 7th to the major 7th, or Bb to B, because the third of G7 is B.
The major blues sound also uses the "higher" major tones above the octave in the 7th chords, namely the 9th and 13th tones of the C7 chord, or D and A. These major notes can combined with minor blues notes in I-chord bars without slurring. Luckily, these same Ds and As are also the 6th and third of the F7 chord as well as the 5th and 9th of the G7 chord, making Ds and As especially useful for melodies using the major blues sound. ¸
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