Blues You Can Use Book of Guitar Chords (Blues Guitar Instruction)

Rating:
Summary: Way more than I expected
Review: I thought this was just another chord encyclopedia. I was very pleasantly surprised to find that this thing is much, much more. It starts with a fairly thorough explanation of the theory of chord construction - how chords are built by stacking 3rds on top of each other, how the type of thirds used determine the type of chord, etc. Then you get the chord encyclopedia, which of course focuses on the types of chords most often used in blues playing. Each type (triad, seventh, ninth, thirteenth etc.) has a corresponding section in the theory part of the book, so if you're interested in that you can get a really good understanding of this stuff. If you're not interested, it still makes a good chord encyclopedia. All the inversions of each type of chord are covered, and the explanations are easy to understand, i.e. here's the first inversion with the root in the bass, the second with the third in the bass, the third with the 5th in the bass, etc.

After that there are the exercises. These are really the best part. Any book can show you a bunch of chords, but this one shows you how to use them in all sorts of blues progressions. There's a whole lot of these progressions, in a wide variety of styles. A great deal of effort was put into making this a real learning experience - the exercises deal with having you practice the various types of chords, then gets into using passing chords, and even how chords resolve and how you can temporarily change the key of a song, etc. etc. etc. And of course these concepts are all demonstrated via blues progressions you can actually play.

I hate to sound like I'm gushing, but hey, I expected just another chord encyclopedia, and got something much more. A real compendium of theory, chords, and best of all, how to use them. A thorough, detailed, and extensive (35 pages) section on how to use them. If you're interested in blues rhythm playing, this book will give you a lifetime of stuff to work with.

One note, if you're just starting, you might want to get the Blues You Can Use book and work through that first. This thing more or less assumes you're familiar with blues rhythm playing, and want to take it to the next level.