blues licks books

[campfire strummer]

Hmmm, would it be too much of a posey-up-myself thing to say... listen out for blues riffs you love in tunes and transcribe them... then use the CAGED patterns to map them over several shapes and figure which shapes best suit it? No theory needed.

I find books are a bit of a hit an miss affair, as you learn one.. go nope that one sucked... onto the next... not so lame... next and so on..

Whereas you listen to one Albert King album and you're thinking ... oh I like that one 0:36 on Born Under A Bad Sign, 1:20 on Laundromat Blues ... etc. and you train your ears all time.

Just my (possibly unwanted) opinion.

It's a very good point but a basic vocab of licks will also help to transcribe. If I sat down as a begginer and heard a unison bend I wouldn't have a clue how to get that kind of sound, but if I'd learnt it from a book and then heard it in a recording, I'd be more inclined to spot it. I think sometimes people forget that ear training takes a very long time in most cases, so why make life such a chore? I would have given up a long time since if I had to learn all the scales and associated chords before I could play a quick blues lick.

[frankus]

Yeah .. I dunno.. I can't remember when I got bored of lessons and started trying to learn the guitar parts from the Beatles 45s on one of those portable record players... or trying to play them in class when everyone was meant to be plodding through the chords and discovering the teacher had transposed the tunes for a simpler set of chords that meant we didn't need to learn more than 7 chords but I would have been young and it would be more fun to do that than play lego.

Most bluesers learn from listening to other people and I think you get a lot more feel from listening to others than you will from any book.

I think ear training is going to take a long time, but what's more fun: constantly pausing a CD and finding a note until you've nailed a lick and then practice it... or sit for 3 hours playing fretboard warrior, then play a blues lick from a book? I think one teaches in many dimensions at once that you're bound to get something from it whereas the other focusses on one thing so much that you'll get bored inside 5 minutes. Just my take

[campfire strummer]

Most bluesers learn from listening to other people and I think you get a lot more feel from listening to others than you will from any book.

I think ear training is going to take a long time, but what's more fun: constantly pausing a CD and finding a note until you've nailed a lick and then practice it... or sit for 3 hours playing fretboard warrior, then play a blues lick from a book? I think one teaches in many dimensions at once that you're bound to get something from it whereas the other focusses on one thing so much that you'll get bored inside 5 minutes. Just my take

I'm not trying to say one is in anyway better than the other, but sometimes people have to walk before they can run. I'll readily admit that if you hear a lick and nail it, that's way more satisfying than learning from a book. I will also have to say, sitting and hitting the pause button to nail something is my idea of hell on earth. Horses for courses I guess.

[frankus]

I will also have to say, sitting and hitting the pause button to nail something is my idea of hell on earth. Horses for courses I guess.

I guess so. Personally I used an old record player and funnily transcription has never been as fun since. First Beatles and Hendrix then Led Zep... I dunno whether it's the media or the music as the stuff I was transcribing on CD was Satriani, Cyrka and Vai ... and it didn't seem as satisfying.