whats the main charecteristics of blues so that after hearing i can say that its a blues song??? Blues, you just feel it.
You've gotta pay your dues to know the blues. mostly all blues songs are based around the 12bar scale. Google and read about W C Handy, he is father of blues, the inventor if you will. Blues started on the piano but few pursue that modality. A lot of blues follows the 12-bar harmonic structure
| I | | | | IV | | I | | V | IV | I | V ||
But certainly not all! There are also common 8 and 16 bar blues progressions.
Rhythmically blues is often written in 12/8 time - but feels like an uneven 4/4 time - this is ofen called 'swing' time - where the middle note of each triplet figure is removed.
The blues scale is often a minor scale, yet played over a major harmonic structure created a major/minor dichotomy. The "blue" notes are a lowered, or minor third and a lowered seventh.
Lyrically, the blues is about healing. Healing from hard times.
No matter how anyone explains it, you won't 'get it' til you listen to it. You won't 'understand it' until you need healing. Mainly the standard blues riffs.
Blues solos.
people singin' about they woman doin' them wrong, etc. I would have to say it's the turnaround. Although not all blues tunes have a turnaround most do. It's the tag at the end of a chorus.
da,dada, da, dada, da,bum, bum ,bum and back to the one chord. If that made any sence. Most important it's the feel did the tune grab your insides and SQUEEZE did you feel it in your GUT. As my handle says "intwotheblues" it's the feel that keeps me coming back..Hint If you want to be a great guitar player...know the Blues... I do were great friends!! Conchobor gave a pretty good explanation.
I just wanted to clarify a couple of the other answers. Blues is not based on a 12 bar SCALE. Many, however, are based on a twelve bar pattern of I IV V chords. W.C. Handy did NOT invent blues. Many characteristics of the blues come directly from African (particularly West African) musical traditions. The blues W.C. Handy is credited with, such as St. Louis Blues, have little in common with what most people would consider blues. Furthermore, while Handy was waiting in a train station late one night, he heard a man playing a guitar with a pocket knife and singing a song about where "The Southern crosses the Yellow Dog" (two small railroads). When he asked the man what type of music he was playing, the man responded "blues". Handy, seeing an opportunity to make a few bucks, took the term and applied ot to songs of his own.
How can you tell it's blues? One of the most distinctive characteristics of the blues is an inherent "tension". Between the music and the words, from one line to the next, between the voice and the instrument, etc. You will learn to "feel" this tension without even being aware of it after you listen to enough blues.
GOOD LUCK :) There are different types of blues.
If the song fits that type, then it's that type of blues.
Example: 12-bar blues. "My baby left me."
Chicago blues: "Smokestack Lightnin'"
British blues: anything by Peter Green Check out my Blues.
http://brainyskeeta.imeem.com/playlist/Y... when the glitter and flash of rock isnt there,
and the moan and groan of country with the backyard twang isnt there and it simply tells of life and hard times and it can be idealized with likely it is blues, jazz can fall into this category also, but it has alot more good mood to it, rather than life or bad times.
it is like saying srv and zz top was rock rather than texas blues or modern blues.
jesus just left chicago is a really good piece to me and who else can right a song about sleeping bags, sunglasses, ford cars, towns they liked and then some, sex as in tube snake boogey, pearl necklace and everything else and actually make it presentable, whether known what it is, they make it presentable now dont they.
it is the feeling, the words, the music, if it is half slow, of decent spirit and it moves you inside likely it is blues.
russia has had a blues revolution also they have remade it and do very well with it, most is in russian, but it has a good sound and fits there life and times well, so it by all means is blues. <blues.ru>
good luck b ut it is hard to explain in simple terms, but if you feel sad and let the emotions feed your playing on an instrument likely it will feed blues out for hearing it.
not the high of alcohol or drugs simply what is inside and makes contact with others when sang or played it can be rooted in blues, so modern rock still has roots of blues and without blues there would be no rock or metal, we would still be hearing blue grass about foggy mountain breakdown,
and wrecks of trains, ok which still roots to blues then doesnt it :) ok if it makes you feel like you are living in the south with nothing but a guitar and a bottle of whiskey it's probably a blues song.. |
