40 power pentatonic licks!

Richard Barrett is on a mission to make you a better blues player – with full audio examples and backing tracks

OVER THE LAST two columns, I’ve demonstrated a handful of what I consider to be essential “blues approved” licks that work well both as embellishments to rhythm parts or as phrases within a solo. Our

ERIC JOHNSON IS without doubt one of the greatest guitarists of all time, and, as I’ve stated, he has been a huge influence for me from the very first moment I heard him, way back in 1986. One of the

TODAY I'D LIKE to talk about downpicking — picking or strumming consecutive downstrokes — and why it can be so musically effective. This is something I learned from studying the riff-writing style of

ONE OF MY biggest musical influences is the king of blues power, Albert King. There are so many things that define his unique approach to playing, and I think about these things every time I pick up m

LAST MONTH, I introduced an approach to playing through a 12-bar blues shuffle in the key of E with some of my favorite licks to play over the IV (four) chord, A7, and the V (five) chord, B7. This mon