Fingerstyle Blues Guitar: Book 2: An In-Depth Study of the 12-Bar Blues in the Key of E Major Paperback – September 30, 2025

Imagine ripping a blues solo on stage with your band – the drummer and bassist providing a comfortable soundscape on which your tasty guitar lines can float. Now imagine that you’re alone on your front porch with only an acoustic guitar – wouldn’t you like to jam on the blues all by yourself? Well, ladies and gentlemen, you CAN! There is a long tradition of fingerstyle blues harkening back to the early 20th century with players like Robert Johnson. Although much fingerstyle blues music is mixed with vocals, solo instrumental tunes can be so much fun!Whereas Fingerstyle Blues Guitar: Book 1 was designed to quickly get you playing and improvising a solo instrumental 12-bar blues, Book 2 digs deeper into higher level (technically and theoretically difficult) concepts that will elevate your playing to new levels. You will learn to play using new scales, turnarounds, rhythms, time signatures, key signatures, and more!I have organized the book so that the concepts and exercises progress logically, thoroughly, and with a smooth difficulty progression. I take care to explain how to immediately apply each concept to your playing. This book is suitable for intermediate to advanced players who have worked through the material of Fingerstyle Blues Guitar: Book 1. Throughout the book, you will work to gain freedom within the structure of the 12-bar blues. You will:Learn to maintain the 12-bar form (the structure),Build the technical facility so that your fingers can play the notes that you want to play, andAcquire the knowledge of what notes you could or should play.*****We will focus on playing the blues over a monotonic bassline. This approach provides maximum melodic freedom with minimal effort. I think that you should eventually explore “Travis style” or alternating basslines in your blues playing (see Chapter 16), but not before spending some serious time with monotonic basslines.So, I’m not here to teach you every authentic Robert Johnson lick and every subgenre of fingerstyle blues. You won’t learn and memorize a bunch of new tunes. However, I will clearly lay out how to create a solo fingerstyle guitar performance in which you improvise over the 12-bar blues structure. You will master ONE platform through which you can channel endless creativity.Highlights from the Index:Chapter 8: More Notes – Expanded Sonic Palate8A) E Dorian Scale8B) Targeting Chord Tones8C) Minor 3rd to Major 3rd Rolls8D) Lyrical Choruses Including All New Notes and ApproachesChapter 9: TurnaroundsChapter 10: Triplet Rhythms and 12/8 TimeChapter 11: Unaccompanied MelodiesChapter 12: Quick IV Chord in Bar 2Chapter 13: Building a Performance with Multiple ChorusesChapter 14: Areas for Independent Study14A) Learn Actual Blues Melodies14B) Up the Fretboard14C) Double Stops14D) Natural Harmonics14E) Open String Rakes14F) The Major Pentatonic Scale14G) The Major Blues and Mixolydian ScalesChapter 15: Other Keys and Alternate TuningsChapter 16: Alternating / Travis Style BasslinesAppendix A: Essential General Music TheoryAppendix B: Music Theory Specific to Fingerstyle Blues Read more