Modern Blues

Admit it.

When you hear the term Blues scale your fingers automatically go to the traditional Blues scale box.

A Blues scale click to enlarge

Now there's nothing wrong with that.

It's an absolutely essential pattern to know and there's a ton of great phrases to be found inside that good ol' shape.

On the other hand...

This pattern may tempt you to keep on playing traditionally oriented licks and phrases.

21st century Blues shape

To get a more modern, 21st century bluesy sound Joe often uses the following 3 note per string shape:

A Blues scale - 3 notes per string

See how the whole scale is completed on the lowest string pair consisting of the E and A string?

Then the same pattern simply starts again up an octave - this time on the D and G string.

Repeat once more and you have a 3 octave Blues scale!

Isn't it interesting how the same notes can sound different, simply because of another fingering?

O.k., we've covered the basic shape.

But it's still “only” the Blues scale.
Simply playing the scale up and down isn't that interesting and gets boring rather quickly.

So, let's check out some real world examples of what kind of devices Joe uses to come up with modern Blues licks and phrases!

Oh, and by the way...