Here’s a lesson for players who know the basic chords and want to get started playing blues on the electric guitar. Jim Weider takes it from the top, and shows the easy way to get into playing authentic licks, riffs, rhythms and hot solos.

You’ll learn how to use slides, string bends, hammer-ons and a variety of vibrato styles for an authentic blues feel, along with rhythm grooves, bass lines and other accompaniment techniques. Learning the pentatonic (5 note) blues scale is the key to blues improvisation, and Jim teaches you how to find the notes you’ll need in different positions up and down the guitar fretboard. Before long you’ll be playing leads and soloing with the best of them.

Jim teaches the elements of this powerful American style through the classic licks and solos of some of its key players. You’ll learn, in detail, how to play tunes such as Albert King’s “Going Down,” Elmore James’ “Elmo’s Blues,” Freddie King’s “Hideaway” and Jim’s own “Sugar Cane Blues.” He demonstrates the style of the great B. B. King, showing how he gets his distinctive sound, and covers how to get expression on the guitar with the use of volume and tone controls, pickups, pick attack and other essential information. Each tune covers a different aspect of electric blues playing and provides you with a great solo for practicing the techniques you’ve learned.

The Honky Tonk Gurus, Jim’s recording and touring band, supply plenty of great back-up and help Jim demonstrate how a song should sound when played in performance. This lesson will help novice players become real electric blues musicians in no time!
Customer Review: Definitely an intermediate dvd
This dvd is definitely not for beginners. You need a reasonable knowledge of the fingerboard and pentatonic scales. If you are a beginner, you’d probably be better off starting with some of Happy Traum’s blues dvd’s. Weider does cover some of the basic blues stuff that every blues player needs but you’d need to be a very determined beginner to do much with the rest. I thought it was excellent, loved the songs he uses. It was all pretty much at my level with some fun challenges. It will help me be a better blues player. On the con side, the material could have been better organized and Weider could have done a better job tying what he was playing at the moment to the tab. All in all, a good teaching dvd.
Customer Review: Great electric blues instruction
Jim Weider covers some classic tunes (Going Down, Hideaway), classic licks, and his own composition to provide a pleasant and lucid lesson on how to play electric blues guitar. Jim has a friendly manner and the excellent screen shots make it easy to see what he’s doing. There is also space for the student to play along while Jim and band play back-up. The tab is excellent, thorough, and accurate.

The video covers both rhythm and soloing techniques and pentatonic scales up and down the fretboard. For example, Jim covers the rhythm part to Going Down (done with power chords) and then uses the E pentatonic scale in different positions to show how licks are done in these different positions on the neck. Naturally, he shows you how to play famous blues licks that every electric blues player should know.

Homespuntapes is well known for its quality instructional videos and this is no exception. This is a creative tape with a fine instructor that has good visuals and a good tab book. This is not a beginner’s instruction video. If you know how to play rhythm and know your pentatonic scales on the electric guitar you should get a lot of mileage out of Weider’s instruction. “BUY NOW”

Let’s say you practice five hours a day on your guitar. What happens when you become a father with children around your feet. Can you still be a guitarist and practice?

As a father and a guitarist I have some advice. The story on how a mother can continue playing guitar has to be written by an expert on that subject.

I guess the problem is that many guitarists think that if they can’t practice the way they are used to they might as well quit.

What happens with you as a guitar player when you become a father with small children?

1. You will still have time to play guitar but not when you expect it.

I have many times wondered why people that practice a lot on their guitars as they become parents suddenly stops completely to play guitar and become desillusioned with this part of their lives.

It’s like a person who wants to train on a gym two hours a day. If this doesn’t work he quits completely. Why?

To make ten push ups a day is better than doing nothing. I takes maybe ten seconds to make this exercise and it will have positive results. The most important thing is that you are still trying to work with your body and the time will probably come when you can increase the amount of training.

Of course the same principle applies to guitar playing. Change the way you play but don’t quit. I’m sure your children don’t want that.

2. Time to play guitar will come in small portions.

As you don’t always know when you have time to play on your guitar you have to have your guitar or guitars extremely accessible. Have the guitar on your bed or somewhere else very close at hand. Maybe you have to buy a cheaper guitar in order to feel comfortable with this arrangement.

Personally I have an very expensive classical guitar but I mostly play on my less expensive guitars as I have them nearby all the time.

3. You might be interrupted in the middle of your guitar playing at any time.

I suggest that you give yourself a reasonable amount of homework to practice on your guitar. Try to learn this homework by heart as soon as possible so you don’t need pieces of paper around as you practice. I guess you know that small children like the taste of paper..

If you give yourself just one task to perform as your guitar lesson homework you will even with small amounts of time to practice spread all over the day see yourself progressing. The important thing is to focus on this task long enough to see results and long enough for the skills to become part of your playing.

4. You will have to concentrate on more things than your guitar playing.

If you have a long term goal with your playing you will always be able to look back on what you are doing as a guitar player and can see yourself progressing. I suggest that you put your long term guitar playing goals on a place out of reach for your children but within reach of your eyes.

5. You must feel that your guitar playing is of benefit for your wife and your children.

Is it selfish to play guitar when you have children? Let me give you an example from my own childhood:

My dad was a musician playing violin, cello and guitar in our home. He was working as a guitar teacher and I heard him play classical guitar pieces, cello pieces and violin pieces everyday.

I can still remember some of those melodies and they invoke a feeling of peace and memories of childhood in my heart. I have a special relation to those pieces of music and they have certainly enriched my life.

In other words, you will need to have a repertoire of nice melodies to play for your children. Focus on learning melodies to play and try to find opportunities to play them for your wife and children.

Having a family has certainly enriched my life and made me a better musician and guitar player.

About the Author

Peter Edvinsson is a musician, composer and music teacher. Visit his site Capotasto Music and download your free sheet music and learn to play guitar resources at http://www.capotastomusic.com