“Blues Theory 101” – Major, Minor, and Hybrid Approaches to Soloing Over a 12-Bar Blues Progression

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Video Cliffs:

0:00 – Intro

3:57 – The “Minor Approach”

7:38 – The “Major Approach”

12:00 – The “Hybrid Approach”

19:22 – Final Words

Relevant Lessons:

Extra Stuff for Full Access Members! In addition to everything else that is included with a Full Access Membership, many lessons include “Full Access Extras”.

Full Access Member “Video Backing Tracks” for this lesson: 5 additional video backing tracks so you can practice jamming over a I – IV – V progression

Each video contains full fretboard diagrams with the “home box” circled so you have a reference point

There is 1 minor pentatonic/minor blues, 1 major pentatonic/major blues, 1 Dorian “scale combining”, 1 Mixolydian “scale combining”, and 1 “Hybrid” video where the major and minor 3rd of each chord “lights up” as the chords change

Each video is around 9 1/2 minutes long

“Blues Theory” vs. “Diatonic Theory”

Diatonic theory is like math – there is always a clearly defined answer for everything. For instance, if you wanted to know what key you were in if the rhythm section was playing G major – C major – D major.

You would first look at the notes of each chord:

G major: G B D

G B D C major: C E G

C E G D major: D F# A

You would then look to see which scale these notes come from. You would recognize that all of the notes are natural, but there is 1 sharp. This gives you your answer – G major. G major is the scale that has 1 sharp in its’ key signature.

G Major Scale: G A B C D E F#

That is diatonic music theory. The answer is clearly defined just like the answer to a math problem.

Blues theory isn’t so cut and dry though. Sure there are certain scales that can be used and combined with one another, but the actual reasoning behind why something “works” can be somewhat subjective.

Blues theory is more of an art form which combines major and minor tonalities together in a way that “works” simply because it just sounds good!

Here in this lesson, I’m going to talk about approaching a 12-bar blues progression in a minor context, a major context, and a “hybrid” context which combines both major and minor.

You can use this 12-bar blues backing track in A to practice these concepts over.

12-Bar Blues in A:

A “12-Bar Blues” is simply 12 bars of music (each bar gets a 4-count), which contains the I, IV, and V chords of the key. Once you play the backing track, you will instantly recognize the signature sound. That is the 12-bar blues for ya!

When the rhythm section plays the I-IV-V chord progression, the chords could be major chords, minor chords, “moving” lines (think “Rock n’ Roll” by Led Zeppelin), or dominant chords.

In the video, I use all dominant chords for my rhythm section as I demonstrate each soloing example.

So the progression that I solo over using major, minor, and hybrid approaches contains these three chords:

I – A7

– A7 IV – D7

– D7 V – E7

Let’s take a look at 3 different soloing approaches that you might take.

Soloing Over a I-IV-V, 12-Bar Blues Progression Using the “Minor Approach”

For the purposes of this lesson, we will just be using one key-scale over the entire progression rather than switching scales every time there is a chord change.

Since the “I chord” is an A7, we will look towards a scale that has the root of ‘A’.

The first place to look is the A minor pentatonic scale:

Of course, you could always add in the “blue note” as well:

You could play this scale over the entire 12-bar blues progression in A, and it would sound great! Try it out over the backing track above.

Now if you wanted to add in some “color tones”, a nice bluesy-sounding scale to use would be the Dorian scale (for the purposes of this lesson, let’s just forget about the word ‘mode‘).

The Dorian scale has the minor pentatonic scale contained within but just adds a few more notes.

A Dorian (still keeping the “blue note” there):

Again, you could apply this one single scalar framework over the entire 12-bar blues progression in A, and it would sound great!

Soloing Over a I-IV-V, 12-Bar Blues Progression Using the “Major Approach”

Now we will take a “major soloing approach” over the same exact 12-bar blues progression.

Let’s start out with the A major pentatonic scale:

You notice that it’s the exact same pattern as that of the A minor pentatonic, only it’s shifted down 3-frets. That is because when locating the “pentatonic position #1” for a major key, you locate the scale root, which is ‘A’ with your pinky rather than your first finger. That’s how you find your position #1 for a major context.

Again, you can go ahead and add in the “blue note” to create the A major blues scale:

Give it a shot over the backing track. Notice how you can still apply this “one scale over all chords” concept. Only now things have a different overall sound/feeling to it. That’s because you are now soloing in a major context.

You can also add in some extra color tones if you’d like. You could try to use the A major scale, but usually in blues the Mixolydian scale seems to work better. Again, it combines perfectly with the A major pentatonic/blues scale.

A Mixolydian (still keeping the “blue note” there):

Give it a shot over the backing track!

Soloing Over a I-IV-V, 12-Bar Blues Progression Using the “Hybrid Approach”

This is where the real art of blues soloing happens. If you want to really hear it in action, definitely listen to the masters – Clapton, Page, Stevie Ray Vaughan, etc.

You can jump back and forth between the major pentatonic and minor pentatonic (and the added color tones), but this would require you to have to simultaneously think of 2 scalar frameworks at the same time. Maybe some peoples’ brains work like that, but that is way too confusing for me personally.

What I like to do is to simply pick one context to start with – either major or minor – and make that my primary scalar framework. I usually like to start with minor:

From there, I simply just take note of where the 3rds of each chord are – both the major and minor 3rds.

So for the “I chord”, which is A (doesn’t matter if it’s major, minor, or dominant…it’s just an ‘A’ chord for the purposes of “blues theory”), here is where you would locate the minor and major thirds within this pattern:

Minor 3rd of the I chord:

Major 3rd of the I chord:

These come from the A minor and A major barre chord shapes:

A minor:

A major:

So as you were soloing over the progression, you would primarily use the scalar framework that you chose to start out with (either the major or minor framework). However, you would try to incorporate both the major 3rd and minor 3rd as the the “I chord” was occurring.

You would then apply the same concept over the “IV chord”.

Minor 3rd of the IV chord:

Major 3rd of the IV chord:

Again, these come from the D minor and D major barre chords found in this area:

D minor:

D major:

The same would apply to the “V chord” as well.

Minor 3rd of the V chord:

Major 3rd of the V chord:

Again, these come from the E minor and E major barre chord shapes found here.

E minor:

E major:

To me, this is really the big “secret” of how to combine major and minor tonalities together in the blues.

To reiterate:

Step 1: Pick either major or minor as your primary scalar framework

Step 2: While soloing within your primary scalar framework, try to target both the minor 3rds and major 3rds of each underlying chord

Step 3: ????

Step 4: Profit

Phew, that was a lot!