If you want to get started playing blues rhythm guitar, one of the best ways to begin is by learning some basic blues chords.
The blues is not a structurally complex genre. Most blues songs are based around a simple 12 bar chord progression. And this progression is typically constructed using just three fairly simple chords.
Of course this is not always the case. There are a whole range of blues musicians who deviate from the standard 12 bar blues form and use complex chords in their rhythm playing.
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The great news however, is that if you want to make a start playing blues rhythm guitar, you can go a long way by just learning a handful of basic blues chords.
For whilst it is fun to learn new chords, in my opinion it is more important – and ultimately more rewarding – to develop a deeper understanding of why you are playing these chords, how you can use them in context, and how you can build on them to play more complex chords in the future.
Of course, if you just want to learn the basic blues chords listed here and nothing more, you can do that as well. Having said that though, whilst some of the theory might at first be difficult to understand, it will do a lot to improve your guitar playing and musicianship. So do try and stick with it, and I promise that it will be worth it!
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Before we dive into the specifics, I think it is important to first define exactly what I mean by ‘basic blues chords’.
Hopefully the ‘basic’ part of this definition is fairly straightforward. If you have played guitar chords prior to reading this article, then you will have no doubt encountered chords of varying complexity. Some chords form easy patterns on your fretboard.
They don’t require much dexterity or strength from your fretting hand. And it is easy to move into and out of these chord shapes.
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Conversely, others present much more of a challenge. They demand more strength from your fretting hand, involve big stretches, and are difficult to form quickly.
In this article, I will be looking at chords that fit the former description. For the most part the chords outlined here don’t pose too much of a problem for your fretting hand. As such, you will be able to learn and play them fairly quickly and easily.
When it comes to defining ‘blues chords’, things become a little more difficult. This is because to accurately define blues chords you need to understand what makes them different to ‘regular’ chords. And here it is important to understand a little chord theory.
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Each of these articles will help to give you a deeper understanding of how chords are formed. This will make the next section of this article much easier to understand.
And whilst you don’t need to know this information to get started using basic blues chords in your playing, it will help you to understand what you are playing. In turn this will make you both a better guitar player and musician.
As you might expect, there are a whole range of different chords used in blues music. Yet there are certain types of chords which blues musicians use much more frequently. And of these, dominant 7th chords are the most common.
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A dominant 7th chord is one that contains both major and minor intervals. Specifically, it contains all of the same notes and intervals as a pure major chord, but it also features the addition of a flat or minor 7th (more on this below). The chord formula of a dominant 7th chord is as follows:
This mixing of the minor and major intervals creates a slightly tense and unresolved sound in the chord. It is a sound that we now associate with the blues, because in many ways, dominant 7th chords have come to define the sound of the genre.
They have been used almost since the inception of the blues, and they feature in many of the most famous blues songs of all time.
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If you want to get started playing blues rhythm guitar then, learning all of the basic dominant 7th chords is the best place to start.
And the great news here is that the shapes of these dominant 7th chords are very similar to those of the major chords with which you might be familiar.
There are dominant 7th versions of all of the chords with which you might be familiar. There is an A7 chord, an E7 chord, and an G7 chord etc. And these chords appear all over the neck of your guitar.
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Here though we are going to look at dominant 7th chords in what is called the ‘open position’ on your guitar. If you have not heard this term before – it simply refers to the position on your guitar where you construct chords using open strings.
Many of the ‘regular’ major chords with which you may be familiar – like A, E and G – amongst others – make use of open strings.
It is a good idea to learn these open position chords when you first get started with rhythm playing. Not only do they have a full and resonant sound, but they are easier to play than barre chords, which require more strength and dexterity from your fingers.
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The dominant 7th chords I have outlined below also make use of your open strings. Not only this, but they are similar in construction to the open position major chords with which you might be familiar.
This is because they contain the same 3 notes that appear in a pure major chord. The only difference is that they also contain an additional note (the flat 7th or minor 7th).
As such, I will be talking about these new blues chords in relation to the open position major chords with which you might be familiar. This will help you to learn these blues chords more quickly. The changes in the fingerings are minimal and so you don’t need to learn a whole number of new and different chord shapes.
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All of these chords are written out with a ‘7’ directly after the letter. And this is the way in which they appear in sheet music and songs. It is worth remembering this, because there are other types of ‘7’ chords also used in the blues. And so appreciating the methods used to notate a dominant 7th chord will save you some confusion later on!
As you can see from the diagram above, in the case of many of these blues chords there is just one note (or finger) which separates them from regular major chords. This is true, even though the blues chords contain more intervals than their major chord counterparts.
This is because they make use of the open strings on your guitar. When you remove one of your fingers from an open position chord, the open string adds a new note to the chord. So learning these basic blues chords in the open position allows you to play more harmonically complex chords without having to learn demanding chord fingerings.
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If you are totally new to the world of blues chords and rhythm guitar, I would recommend pausing at this point. Take some time to commit the chords listed above to memory. Get comfortable with their shapes, and memorise them by name.
Once you have done that, just have fun experimenting with them. Play the chords with different strumming patterns, and practice moving between them in different ways. This will help you to consolidate the shapes of the chords, and also develop your rhythm guitar skills.
Once you have done that, the next step is to apply these chords in a more realistic playing context. Specifically, I would recommend using them to play the 12 bar blues.
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If you already know what the 12 bar blues is and how to play it, then you’re all set! You can take the chords listed above and use them to play the 12 bar blues. However, if you don’t know what the 12 bar blues is, or if you don’t feel totally comfortable playing it, then don’t worry.
Here I will run through the 12 bar blues progression in depth, and cover the essential theory you need to understand what the 12 bar blues progression is and how you can play it.
The 12 bar blues is the most commonly occurring chord progression in the blues.Blues musicians have used it since the beginning of the 20th century, and it features in many of the most famous blues songs of all time.
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In technical terms, the 12 bar blues is a chord progression that lasts for 12 bars, or measures. These 12 bars are then typically repeated throughout the course of the song.
The 12 bar blues progression is normally made up of 3 chords. Specifically it is based around theI, IV and V chords of any given key.
To understand what the I, IV and V chords are and how they relate to the chords listed above, we again need to delve into a little theory:
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