We analyse the different types of bassline patterns that you can use, starting by outlining the primary chord tones, and then moving onto step-wise basslines which outline the tones of the scale. 336 587-5794, All Content © 2020 Guitar Lessons with Andy Lemaire, Use Creative, Playful Practice for More Fun and Better Results, How to Position Your Hand for the F Chord, Breaking Down the Blues, pt 6: A Sample Solo, Breaking Down the Blues, pt. Finally, we will learn the minor blues in 6/8 time. There are a number of similarities between the minor blues progression and the major blues progression: There are also a few differences, which I’ll talk about below. View lesson. If they played it then we should learn how to play it too! In this lesson I am going to show you two different sounds that you can use in minor blues comping. Contact If you’re unsure of what I mean about this, go ahead and check out part 2 of this series for a broader description. A steady left hand groove combined with powerful right hand licks create a rhythmic blues piano sound. I’ll start by going over the form that is the most similar to the major blues progression. Of course, just playing over the 3 basic blues chords is just scratching the surface. Leave us your email below and we will send you a full sample lesson and a PDF download. UK & Europe: +44 808 196 2012 The real magic happens when you can use blues scale over more chord progressions.. The minor blues progression follows the standard 12 bar form but with minor 7th or minor 6th chords instead of the dominant 7th chords that you would associate with the traditional 12 bar blues. Here are some of the chord progressions we hear in the minor keys. (For the sake of brevity, I’ll only look at playing blues in the key of C). So to form a 7th chord, you need to include the following notes in your chord: Root + 3rd + 5th + Minor 7th. Adding a “blue note” to the regular Pentatonic Scale results in the Pentatonic Blues Scale. Here’s a chart showing this progression in … Then we will add some more flair to the bass line by adding in approach notes to give it a more "pro" sound. There are many ways you could do these chords, but here are some movable chords I like to use in this type of situation: You just need to position these chords so that their root notes (indicated by the circle with an R in it) are on the notes I diagrammed above. Glenwood Ave, Greensboro NC 27403 OK, let’s see now the most common chord progressions. Testimonials The following diagram includes other popular piano chord progressions in minor keys. Minor Two Five One: ii – V – i. You’ll find the two five one progression in almost every jazz song. Obviously it’s often found in blues songs, but you’ll see it at least occasionally in rock, funk, soul, and jazz as well. Thousands of Blues, Country, and Folk songs are built on this progression. Minor piano chord progressions work in essentially the same way, except they use the minor chords from positions ii, iii, and vi of a scale. Let’s look at the most basic standard 12-Bar Dominant Blues progression. What About More Advanced Blues Piano? Here’s how you could do them using the movable chord shapes: Let’s plug them in to our 12 bar progression: And there you have it, the G minor blues progression. The i, iv, and v chords will all be minor 7th chords, and are therefore indicated by lower case roman numerals. Why do we play these particular flat notes? You should be comfortable with the concepts of chord extensions, altered harmony, and rootless voicings. No barre chords needed. How to Play a Minor Blues – Tip #1: The Form. There are actually quite a few variations of the minor blues progression out there. A favorite progression of mine, and many jazz musicians, to solo over is what’s known as the minor jazz-blues progression, featured on such jazz classics as John Coltrane’s “Mr. 11 Common Chord Progressions. The following are 11 common chord progressions in the keys of C major and A minor, as well as the titles of hit songs which make use of them. Blues Guitar Chord Progressions. Playing 3 CQ. First, let’s look at the roman numerals of the 12 bar progression: The progression is exactly the same as form 1 except for the 9th and 10th bars, where we now have the VI chord going to V. Locating the VI chord is easy: its root note will just be a half step above V. Here’s a diagram showing where it would be if we were in the key of A minor: The VI chord will be a dominant 7th chord, just like V. If we are in the key of A minor, the VI chord would be an F7, making all our chords for the progression Am7 (i), Dm7 (iv), E7 (V), and F7 (VI). The Minor Blues is a great vehicle for improvisation and a very common chord progression that you want to be able to comp and solo on. Just like the traditional, dominant chord-based blues … Now let’s go over the Basic Jazz Blues. Yes, you’ll hear a lot of blues musicians just playing the basic 3 chords but if you really want to learn how to play blues piano I suggest you go much further. Minor key blues uses exactly the same 1 4 5 root relationship from earlier, but with minor chords instead of major/dominant 7th. For both form 1 and 2 of the A minor blues progression, you could use the A blues scale (meaning the A minor pentatonic scale, plus the blues note). 2. BLUES PROGRESSIONS The minor pentatonic scale can also be used over major chords like in a blues chord progression. The D minor 7 chord (Dm7) is the iv chord, Em7 is v, and E7 is V. As you can see, from a roman numeral standpoint the progression is the same as the major blues progression. This makes 12 bars in total – one for each chord. All Rights Reserved. An advanced guitarist taking more of a jazz approach to soloing over this progression might use a handful of modal scales, as well as some usage of the harmonic or melodic minor scale. A 12-bar progression is, just like the name says, a sequence consisting of 12 bars. For a review of the roman numerals system see the lesson on diatonic chords. The Minor Blues Progression is a variation of the standard 12 bar blues progression. We start by recapping on the basic theory and then jump straight in with some improvisation drills and exercises to get you familiar and comfortable with these useful scales. - One of the important things that chord progressions do is establish the tonality, or tonic, of a scale. The combination of notes from the minor pentatonic scale over the major chords is part of that bluesy sound. Now let’s go over another form of the minor blues progression. Blog Simply change the chord type of each chord to minor! We start by playing through with simple triad voicings, and then we extend the chords to include the 7th. This is the fourth part in my ‘Breaking Down the Blues’ series. In this first music lesson of ten, discover the sultry C minor blues scale for piano. In the 12-bar blues, each bar would have four beats or counts, and each chord would last one bar. The basic 12 bar blues progression can be played in any key and will use the I, IV, and V chords from that key. It’s very similar to form 1 in that it will still feature the i, iv and V chords. We will now apply the tritone substitution concept to the turnaround in bars 4-5 and 7-9: In bar four … We'll learn the 12 bar blues in several keys, and the chords you'll need to learn are the following. The blues scale can be used to solo over both progressions. This lesson will teach how to play easy 12 bar blues progressions with open chords. A lesson with Kent D. Smith . Mr. PC by John Coltrane (form 2 in C minor), Equinox by John Coltrane (form 2 in C# minor), Birk’s Works by Dizzy Gillespie (form 2 in F minor), Stolen Moments by Oliver Nelson (form 2 in C minor during the solos), Long Train Running by The Doobie Brothers (form 2 in G minor), Shine On You Crazy Diamond by Pink Floyd (form 2 in G minor only during the keyboard, sax and guitar solos), The Thrill is Gone by B.B. From the course: No Bull Guide To Jazz Piano™ (Beginner) The chart below shows both the chords to play and the pattern to play them in. Regardless of the approach or style that is being used, the blues scale would feature heavily in any guitarist’s scale choice, and it can sound great even if it’s the only scale used. Let’s get to them! Most of these variations are slight deviations from two common forms of the progression, both of which I’ll cover in this lesson. Teaching Philosophy To do so, you’ll just need to know the notes on the 6th and 5th strings of the guitar, and a few movable chord shapes. 12 Bar Blues Chord Progression Learn what notes to play with when creating original piano melodies. minor seventh note. But there many other interesting options. You could also try to play E7 instead of Em in the last bar. We will then look at enhancing the minor blues form with inversions, substitutions and rehamonisations. For the G minor blues progression, you could use the G blues scale. Modal scales are more exotic sounding than the pentatonic and blues scales. We discuss and explore combining these scales to access more interesting sounds on the piano. 5: The Major Pentatonic Scale. Rates & Scheduling Don’t you love the sound of that G and A cluster at the bottom of the chord? The V chord remains the same--MAJOR or DOMINANT 7. Let’s now take a look at common chord progressions in the key of E minor natural. This one is equally, if not more, common than form 1 of the progression. The V chord will be a dominant 7th chord, which is the same type of chord used for all the chords in the major blues progression. In the key of C the chords would be C major F major and G major. Both feature the I, IV and V chords (although the numerals are lower case in the minor blues progression). For example, an A minor blues progression would typically be: Am7, Dm7, Em7 (1,4,5). In comparison with the progression I had covered in part one (which I’ll now refer to as the major blues progression), the minor blues progression has a darker, smoother sound to it. US & Canada: +1 888 616 5371, © 2020 Copyright PianoGroove. They can also use the I chord and the V or vii chord to get from one chord to another. Something many people want to feel. The root note of iv will then be on the same fret but on the 5th string, and the root of v and V will be two frets higher than iv. You can think of this scale as a modification of the C Major Scale using the following scale degrees: 1, flat 3, 4, sharp 4, 5, and flat 7. The following piano key chord chart shows all the triads in E minor as well as four note extended chords. Piano Chords In The Key Of E Minor. We then take the application of scales a step further by introducing modal scales. The blues chord progression lasts 12 bars (thus the phrase “12-bar blues”) that move in a familiar pattern using those three chords. To do these chords specifically as Am7, Dm7, Em7 and E7, they would be like this: For an example of doing this in another key, lets put together the progression in G minor. What makes the chords "bluesy" is the use of 7th chords rather than the basic triads. Blues Piano Chords The harmony of Blues music is not usually sophisticated. Download Your Free Guitar Handbook Now: https://berkonl.in/2BnRms3 Earn Your Guitar Degree Online with Berklee: https://berkonl.in/2yHMR8k In this free online guitar tutorial, Berklee College of Music professor and Berklee Online course author Michael Williams explains minor blues progressions for the rhythm guitar in the style of BB King’s “The Thrill is Gone.” About Berklee Online: Berklee These scales are for obvious reasons perfect when playing blues on the piano. In the previous parts, I covered the 12 bar blues progression, the extended box pattern of the blues scale, and I demonstrated some blues licks. First, let’s find the root notes of our chords: Our root notes are G for I, C for iv, and D for v/V. Here are links to the previous parts: In part four, I’ll talk about the second most common chord progression in the blues: the minor blues progression. C Minor Blues Scale piano notation for blues piano improv What are the notes of the C Minor Blues Scale? Next, you drop your left hand pinkie down a half step and you have a F# half diminished chord. The D minor 7 chord (Dm7) is the iv chord, Em7 is v, and E7 is V. As you can see, from a roman numeral standpoint the progression is the same as the major blues progression. The notes of the C Minor Blues Scale are C Eb F F# G and Bb. We can also introduce passing chords to add harmonic interest to the 12 bar minor blues progression. I’ll also demonstrate how to put the progression together in a couple different keys, and go over some blues tunes that use this progression. Online Lessons The most common structure includes three chords and can look something like: I, IV, I, V, IV, I. If these areas are new to you, then check out these courses: Matt then introduced the minor pentatonic scale and the blues scale. Enhancing The Minor Blues Form We will then look at enhancing the minor blues form with inversions, substitutions and rehamonisations. 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