Guitar Workshop: Four-Note Blues

For our first Guitar Workshop of the year, I wanted to share something I came across on the internet over the Christmas holidays.

Sometimes these enterprising entrepreneurs can be a lot of hype, leading you on for a product about which you learn nothing, until you're knee-deep in the dog-and-pony show. Well, Griff Hamlin isn't one of those guys. You get access to this page straight away.

Here we are introduced to a blues lead solo that uses just four notes.

That's right. Just. Four. Notes.

For the key of A (per this example), they are on the second and first strings, the tenth and eighth frets. Now, you will have to bend the notes at one time or another, especially on the first string. And you can also move up and down the neck when you transpose keys. Eventually you will be tempted to expand. The next thing you know, you've discovered the pentatonic scale, four notes at a time.

This is a good exercise for the advanced beginner, someone who is getting acquainted with the neck above the first position (other than barre chords) for the first time. This guy's DVD lesson looks like a sweet deal for the price.

Still not convinced? Go to his special download page, and get the downloadable transcription, the audio jam track, and a complete audio track of the exercise.

After all that, you will definitely be ready to take on that pentatonic scale we mentioned earlier, and which we covered in February and March of 2010.