When learning any genre of music, it makes sense to master as much of the repertoire as possible. This will prepare you for the songs that are likely to be called on jam nights with other players. Jazz musicians are all over this concept. Show up to a jam session and you're likely to encounter players who have memorized dozens of standards, such as "Autumn Leaves," "Misty," and "All the Things You Are." When these tunes are called out, you'd better be ready to play them.
Blues musicians have it slightly easier since the 12-bar blues form is so ubiquitous. Often bandleaders might just call out the key and count it off. In this lesson, we'll focus on a country standard, "Folsom Prison Blues." As implied by the title, the form is basically a 12-bar blues, but we'll add a country twist.
Johnny Cash - Folsom Prison Blues (Live)
Johnny Cash's At Folsom Prison is one of the most iconic live albums ever. Although Cash originally recorded the album's title song in 1955, this version from Cash's 1968 visit to the California maximum-security facility has become the definitive one. Luther Perkins' twangy solo has become a standard, too.
Here's an example of a basic 12-bar blues:
In Cash's version, you'll notice that the only difference is that you're staying on the V chord in measure 10, rather than going down to the IV.
In Ex. 1, I've written a simple rhythm guitar riff the way someone like Roy Clark might play the song. Hold each chord shape and then pick the strings required using the picking pattern displayed. The key here is not simply remembering where to put your fingers, but the sound of the progression.
Ex. 1
The next phrase (Ex. 2) focuses on outlining a melody with diatonic thirds based around each chord change. In measure one, I'm visualizing an "A" CAGED shape at the 7th fret and connecting the double-stop on the 3rd and 2nd strings up to the double-stop found in the "E" shape at the 12th fret.
Ex. 2
Thirds are an essential part of country lead guitar. Below, I've visually outlined how the double-stops in the first measure fit between the "A" and "E" CAGED shapes. Of course, all CAGED shapes can be transposed to other keys, so make sure you put the work in!
Ex. 3 uses notes of a hybrid scale, where we add the b3 to a major pentatonic shape. In E, that would be E–F#–G–G#–B–C#, or 1–2–3–b3–5–6. I've played a simple country cliché over the E chord, and then moved this same lick up to each chord to outline the changes. This approach of dealing with each chord as its own musical event creates a more authentic country sound than taking one scale and playing it over a selection of chords.
Ex. 3
Ex. 4 expands on the previous idea: Here we play the same basic cliché lick from the previous example, but now add some melodic embellishment in alternating measures. The lick in measures one and two fits around a "C" shape barre chord, while the licks over the A and B7 chord fit around an "E" shape barre chord. It's important to get a grip on this idea, as it will allow you to play licks quickly in any key.
Ex. 4
Ex. 5 features the same licks as in the previous example but switches up where you play them. So, instead of starting with the "C" shape, as in the previous example, Ex. 5 launches into the lick around the "E" shape at the 12th fret.
When the chord changes to A, this time we play the lick based around the "C" shape, but higher up the neck to outline an A major chord in the 9th position. (Contrast this to the previous example, where we used the "C" shape to outline E major in the 4th position.) When it's time to outline B7, we shift the same "C" shape idea up two frets.
Ex. 5
A full solo covering multiple positions, Ex. 6 is almost exclusively built on the notes of the hybrid scale we mentioned earlier. Measure one plays around an "A" shape before using some diatonic sixth intervals to shift down the neck in measure two.
Measure three continues the E chord, but now in the "C" shape, which transitions down to the open "E" position in measure four. Measures five starts in the open "A" position; we then work our way up to the "E" shape barre chord at the 5th fret in measure six.
Measures seven and eight outline an E chord in the "C" shape, again shifting down to the "E" position in the next measure. When the B7 chord hits, I play a repeating motif around the "A" shape that resolves to the "E" position in the 10th measure.
Ex. 6
There's no denying this example will take time to get up to speed, but don't give up, as it's more than possible. The real focus here should be how fluidly you can use these CAGED positions. In fact, when this starts making sense, you should be able to play each of these licks on any chord.
"'If I fall and somehow my career ends on that particular day, then so be it," Joe Bonamassa says of his new hobby, bicycling. "If it's over, it's over. You've got to enjoy your life."
Photo by Steve Trager
For his stylistically diverse new album, the fiery guitar hero steps back from his gear obsession and focuses on a deep pool of influences and styles.
Twenty years ago, Joe Bonamassa was a struggling musician living in New York City. He survived on a diet of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and ramen noodles that he procured from the corner bodega at Columbus Avenue and 83rd Street. Like many dreamers waiting for their day in the sun, Joe also played "Win for Life" every week. It was, in his words, "literally my ticket out of this hideous business." While the lottery tickets never brought in the millions, Joe's smokin' guitar playing on a quartet of albums from 2002 to 2006—So, It's Like That, Blues Deluxe, Had to Cry Today, and You & Me—did get the win, transforming Joe into a guitar megastar.
Since achieving fame and fortune, Joe has spent most of his time in his various residences across the country. He's got Nerdville in sunny California and Nerdville East in Nashville. Both are almost-literal museums that house Joe's arguably unmatched collection of vintage guitars and amps. You will be very hard pressed to come across a finer collection. Yet in 2019, Joe found himself drawn back to New York City.
Joe Bonamassa - "Time Clocks" - Official Music Video
"It's a mid-life crisis. I always wanted to go back to where I lived 20 years ago, but not have to worry about hustling down sessions and gigs to make the rent every month," he says. "For as cool and exciting of a time as it was, it was also a very stressful time. I had this thing in my mind where I just wanted to be able to enjoy New York City and not have the stress of, 'Oh shit, it's either a subway ticket or ramen noodles tonight.'"
In February 2021, Joe went to Germano Studios in Manhattan's NoHo neighborhood to record Time Clocks, aka "The New York Album." Because of the pandemic, this recording session was like no other Joe had been involved with. Kevin "the Caveman" Shirley, Joe's longtime producer, was stuck in Australia due to strict COVID travel restrictions. The two have had a long working relationship and they've been inseparable for most of Joe's career. Shirley produced the guitarist's fifth studio album, You & Me, and has since produced over 30 of Joe's subsequent projects. So, when it came time to record Time Clocks—travel restrictions be damned—they found a way to work together. "We recorded it virtually with Zoom and some other technology where my producer in Australia could get the actual tracks from the session in real time or with about a second latency," says Joe. "It was totally fine. It was an odd record to make because of what we were doing, but it was also an odd time. So, why should anything be normal anymore?"
"I just wanted to be able to enjoy New York City and not have the stress of, 'Oh shit, it's either a subway ticket or ramen noodles tonight.'"
Even with the differences in time zones (Sydney, Australia, is 16 hours ahead of New York City), they found a way to make it work. "We would get there about noon. Kevin's an early riser so he would get to his studio, which is by his house in Sydney, by about 2 a.m. So, we would go from about noon to 6 or 7 at night, and he would go from 2 to 9 a.m., and then take naps."
Time Clocks is full of unexpected twists. It was recorded live as a trio with drummer Anton Fig and bassist Steve Mackey, and then other parts were layered in. The album has a diversity of sounds that belie Joe's blues categorization. "Notches" opens with an Ali Farka Touré-inspired 12-string riff, "Time Clocks" has a country-esque, Americana vibe, and "Curtain Call" is an homage to Led Zeppelin. "My ADD transcends into my musical life. It's a very different record for me. It's not a blues record, for sure. I just try to make records that don't bore me all the way through—we've got this groove covered, we've got that groove covered, let's put a sorbet in, something out of left field," says Joe.
TIDBIT: Bonamassa's longtime producer, Kevin Shirley, had his hands on the wheel again, but remotely. He produced from Sydney, Australia, while the band recorded live on the floor in New York City.
"Some people think that all I do is play blues. I don't just play blues. I play whatever. We've all been in this game for a long time where we can adapt to any musical situation. It's fun. Every once in a while, I'll go sit in with friends. I just sat in with Nir Felder [at NYC's famed 55 Bar]. If I sit in with Nir, I'll be like, 'When these chord changes get too fucking adult for me, I'm bailing.' You just know your strengths and your weaknesses."
For the Time Clocks sessions, Joe used a much leaner gear selection than you might expect, especially given his cavernous collection. "In New York City, you go with what you got. There were only three amps. I had a [JB signature] high-powered Twin sent from our inventory that's still in the spare bedroom in the apartment. I ended up using two Deluxes. I had one Deluxe Reverb and one brown Deluxe," says Joe. We wonder if Joe was referring to a reissue Deluxe Reverb that might have happened to be at the studio, or one of his rare closet classics. He immediately snaps, "Think about that critically and ask yourself again, 'Who are you talking to?'" Point taken, Joe!
Joe Bonamassa’s Gear on Time Clocks
“I’m not going to live my life in indentured servitude to the fucking guitar.”
Guitars
Gibson Les Paul
Gibson ES-335
Fender Stratocaster
Fender Telecaster
Martin acoustic guitar
Strings
Ernie Ball Burly Slinkys (.011–.052; .011–.056 on down-tuned guitars)
Amps
Fender black-panel Deluxe Reverb
Fender brown-panel Deluxe
'59 Fender Twin-Amp JB Edition
Effects
Klon Centaur
Dunlop Joe Bonamassa Signature Wah
"When I was a kid, I had a black [panel] Deluxe Reverb. I think this is probably one of the ones that I had for 25 years," he clarifies. "The black and brown circuits are totally different, so you get that kind of sweet/salt mix. The brown Deluxe does the real thick midrange stuff and the black does the low and the high. That's kind of always been my M.O. It's never just one amp. You're mid-stacking with amps that don't necessarily do the same thing. The bigger, thicker tones you hear on the solo, that's the high-powered Twin. The more jangly stuff was the Deluxes."
"'When these chord changes get too adult for me, I'm bailing.' You just know your strengths and your weaknesses."
Joe also only used a handful of guitars on Time Clocks. "I don't keep a lot of guitars here," he says. "All I had was a Les Paul, a Strat, a 335, a Rickenbacker 12-string, an old bass from the movie Spinal Tap, the one that Nigel kept telling Rob Reiner not to touch—I actually own that one. But it was less than six guitars. I also used a Martin acoustic. All the acoustic stuff was done with one acoustic.
A recent snapshot of Bonamassa's pedalboard.
"In Nashville, I have all my road guitars, but to be honest with you, over the years I've never gotten into this thing where you bring 50 guitars and use five. I did that a long time ago. It's nothing but a photo op. Most of the time I bring a Whitman's Sampler of what I think would work. The days of humping in 50 guitars and setting up six racks of them and going, 'Look what I got'—that's a young man's game. That's for somebody in their 30s."
"I've been playing guitar and cranking amps for 40 years. Do you know the two things that prompt me to run away? Loud music and crowds. It's a paradox, I know."
Joe's newfound minimalism goes hand in hand with living in a New York City apartment, where even playing with an amp on 1 will get you the "broomstick on a ceiling" retaliation. "I've been playing guitar and cranking amps for 40 years. Do you know the two things that prompt me to run away? Loud music and crowds. It's a paradox, I know," he says. "So, when I'm at home and I'm enjoying a very quiet Sunday afternoon, I have zero, absolutely zero, desire to crank an amp. And I have zero-plus-5-percent desire to sometimes even practice on a given day. It gives you a break. It's important to be good at your job on a given day. It's important to also step away and give yourself some perspective, so you're not so consumed by it."
Rig Rundown - Joe Bonamassa [2018]
Every aspiring guitarist—no matter the genre—longs for their day in the spotlight. They too want to be a guitar god and inspire thousands of players and listeners, just like Joe. But what does it feel like on the other side—when you actually win?
The guitarist onstage with his frequent on-tour sparring partner in recent years, bass giant Michael Rhodes.
Photo by Debi Del Grande
"Then a whole 'nother set of circumstances come into play," he says. "It's managing time, managing your energy. It's also trying to keep in perspective what is it that you really do, because sometimes life comes at you twice as fast as it used to. All my energy is dedicated to the fans that keep me in business and come time and time again. That is 100 percent my biggest priority. When distractions and other things come into play that tend to take energy away from what you're supposed to be doing, that's the challenge. I realize I'm a very fortunate person, but I don't make any apologies for it, because, to be honest with you, that's what everybody strives for. Why should I apologize for working hard? I always tell people it's easy to dismiss, hard to replicate. If it was easy, as some claim, then it would be as easy as starting a TikTok. If it was that easy, then anybody could do it. But to be honest with you, anybody can do it. You've got to have the intestinal fortitude and the drive, and the ability to stick it out through thick and thin."
Bonamassa cradles his famed 1959 Les Paul Standard, Lazarus. The guitar was recreated for a limited-edition issue via Epiphone this year.
Older and wiser at 44, Joe, who started performing onstage at age 12, has now found time to explore other things in life besides guitar. He indulges in Law and Order marathons, is on an excruciatingly strict diet with Diet Coke as his only vice, and has found a new passion in cycling. He'll just as likely post details of his Central Park bike excursions on Instagram as he would another guitar-safari vintage find. Even with the potential danger of a career-ending fall, Joe, much like the late Allan Holdsworth—who was also an avid cyclist—is willing to chance it. "If I fall and somehow my career ends on that particular day, then so be it," he says. "I'm not going to live my life in indentured servitude to the fucking guitar. If it's over, it's over. You've got to enjoy your life."
Joe Bonamassa & Tina Guo - "Woke Up Dreaming" - Live At Carnegie Hall
Joe Bonamassa is labeled a blues guitarist, but anyone that's heard him knows that he brings a huge diversity of stylistic elements to the genre. In this breathtaking, hyper-speed duo, Joe's right hand is like an unstoppable machine that keeps the intensity of the performance alive for over 6 minutes.
Playing in the pocket is the most important thing in music. Just think about how we talk about great music: It's "grooving" or "swinging" or "rocking." Nobody ever says, "I really enjoyed their use of inverted suspended triads," or "their application of large-interval pentatonic sequences was fascinating." So, whether you're playing live or recording, time is everyone's responsibility, and you must develop your ability to play in the pocket.
So, what is bad time? It's when people rush and speed up the tempo or drag and slow the tempo down in an unmusical way. If your quarter-note pulse is uneven, you can't lock in with what the band is doing because the time keeps moving. If somebody's fills are all wonky and don't land right, that usually means they are not subdividing and are just stuffing notes into the measure haphazardly. These players don't realize what is happening. Don't be one of these players. To develop your own pocket, you will need two things: your guitar and a metronome. A better groove, and a better ability to subdivide the beat, will lead to better phrasing and more control of what you want to play.
The first three examples are designed to eliminate your reliance on the first beat of the measure. Practicing with the metronome on all four beats of the measure is a very common way to practice scales and chord progressions. Remember that in most styles of music, the snare drum is on beats 2 and 4 of the measure. Practice with your metronome as if it's a snare, where the click is on 2 and 4. (A note about tempo markings: Usually the tempo is listed at a quarter-note level, but with the metronome on beats 2 and 4, it's marked as a half-note. So, if the half-note tempo is listed as 120 bpm, the quarter-note tempo would be twice that, or 240 bpm.)
Ex. 1 is a G7 arpeggio played in 3rd position, with half-note tempos of 100, 125, and 150 bpm. The recording of this example has a count off with the clicks on 2 and 4. If these tempos are initially too fast, start with a slower tempo where you can play the example cleanly, putting each note directly in between the clicks of the metronome. You can even start with just a single note at a comfortable tempo, getting used to what it sounds and feels like to put a note directly in between the metronome clicks.
Ex. 1
Ex. 2 is the A minor pentatonic scale (A–C–D–E–G) in 5th position, played first in half-notes and then again in whole-notes. This example is designed to help you switch gears between different rhythms.
Ex. 2
Ex. 3 is the C major scale (C–D–E–F–G–A–B) in 7th position played in half-notes and whole-notes, but at faster tempo. If you practice different types of scales and arpeggios in this way, you'll discover spots where you may rush or drag the notes.
Ex. 3
Technique issues like switching strings or playing a single note on a string (instead of two or three) might affect your time feel. You will also have a better sense of where beat 1 is without having to hear it from the metronome.
The best way to keep your quarter-notes in the pocket is to subdivide the beat while you’re playing, but especially when you’re not playing. Subdividing is the best way to keep yourself honest about where the time is. Ex. 4 is a subdivision tour de force. It’s also humbling or irritating depending on your perspective. Set the metronome to 40 bpm and play one note per click, then two notes per click, then three notes, four notes, etc. until you reach the limit of your picking technique. It’s been a few years since I’ve worked on this exercise myself, so I’m maxing out at eight notes per click, but was able to get up to 10 notes at one point. Work on each subdivision by itself before tackling the whole thing. You’ll probably find that you’re able to subdivide more accurately even before you master this exercise.
Ex. 4
The last three phrasing exercises are intended to eliminate your need to play on the first beat of the measure. Played over a 12-bar blues in A, each example uses a different rhythm or phrasing structure where you will need to count a lot of empty space to play these rhythms correctly. Ex. 5 is deceptively simple, where you play only on beats two, three, and four of each measure. It takes more concentration than you would think, so be careful that you don't fall back into playing your usual stuff.
Ex. 5
Ex. 6 will develop your ability to play over the bar line, which is simply not starting or ending your phrases directly on beat 1. There's a lot of space to count, starting each small phrase on the "and" of beat 3, and finishing on the "and" of beat 1 in the next measure.
Ex. 6
Ex. 7 aims to expand your phrasing, creating longer lines by playing a two-bar phrase almost entirely in eighth-notes. The challenge to this exercise is beginning on the "and" of one in the first measure and ending on the "and" of four in the second measure. In each of these examples, practice each rhythm by itself on a single pitch with a metronome, focusing on counting the spaces and playing that specific rhythm. Then, try adding different chord tones or scales when that rhythm becomes internalized.
Ex. 7
After working on these examples, play over a track and focus on one concept at a time to see if you really have it under your fingers and in your ears. Always remember to keep things simple to begin with. There's plenty of time to make things complicated later on. Cheers!
