WEEK 4: WHAT TO EXPECT

Week four is already here! And with it we have the start of a new format that runs throughout the rest of the programme.

From this point on, every week we’re going to take a famous, iconic blues song, deconstruct it, and pull out the key ideas that make it work.

The goal isn’t just to learn the song — it’s to take the techniques and ideas that make them so amazing, and use them to make you a better blues player.

This week we’re going to dive in to look at the beautiful slow blues song “Texas Flood”, made famous by Stevie Ray Vaughan.

So grab your guitar, grab your pick, and if you happen to own a cowboy hat, now is the time to add that into your setup too. 🤠

Mixing rhythm and lead

Up until now the focus of the programme has been heavily on rhythm — building up chord voicings, understanding the blues form and getting the rhythmic feel under your fingers.

That work will continue, but from this week we will also start looking more at the lead side of things too. What are the great blues players doing? How are they mixing major and minor pentatonics over a slow blues? How are they adding licks and movement to a chord progression?

In this way, you’ll understand how to put together a full performance that combines both the rhythm and the lead parts.

Texas Flood style study

Unlike the other song studies in this programme, for Texas Flood we’ll take a slightly looser approach. This is simply because on the original recording, there’s actually very little rhythm guitar on the track. Stevie Ray Vaughan doesn’t actually play any chords and mostly just throws licks over a bass line that outlines all of the harmony.

As such, we will use “Texas Flood” as a template for slow blues playing — how to bring chord voicings to life, how to add licks and chromatic movements between chords, and how to mix rhythm and lead together in the way you’d need to at a jam night or over a backing track.

We’ll also be pulling out some of the specific techniques that give SRV his sound, so you can start to bring that flavour into your own playing.

Style study summary video

From this week onwards, each week includes a style study video that brings the main concepts together in one place over the track.

If you’ve worked through all of the individual lessons, you don’t necessarily need to watch this one, as it’s largely a condensed version of what you’ve already covered.

However if you’re short on time and want to come away with the main concepts from the week, this is the one video to prioritise.

Resources and key lessons

Here are the key lessons for you to focus on this week if you’re busy:

• 3 Slow Blues Rhythm Techniques To Spice Up Your Chords
  

• Texas Flood Style Study (Summary)

• Chromatic Ideas & Approach Slides

Here is the Texas Flood backing track that we’ll be jamming over this week:

Texas Flood Backing Track

That backing track is in standard tuning, so it’s a G blues involving the chords of G7, C7 and D7. As a heads up for when you’re jamming over the track, the chord progression in Texas Flood is also slightly more involved than a regular 12 bar blues.

This is what the intro looks like:

I IV I/V I/IV

In each instance you see a “/” it indicates that multiple chords appear in a single bar. So in both bars three and four, you play two chords, rather than simply holding onto one chord as you would in a regular 12 bar progression.

After that, the main progression in the song runs as follows:

I IV I I

IV IV I I

V IV I/IV I/V

So the main 12 bar includes a quick change, and the turnaround breaks into more rapid chord movements rather than the simpler V → IV → I → V pattern you’d typically encounter.

If you’d like to practice the progression and put together a more full rhythm part, then in standard tuning the track is played in G, and I typically default to using these chord voicings:

However you can (and should) mix things up, and also think about playing the C7 and D7 using these voicings:

Finally, the practice plan for this week here:

Week 4 Blues College Practice Plan

The numbers at the top of each page are time suggestions. If you follow the suggestions on the left it adds up to 30 minutes, in the middle to 45 minutes, and on the right, to 60 minutes.

That’s it from me for now – have a brilliant week and I can’t wait to hear how you get on! 😁