MEMPHIS BLUES GUITAR

Guitar Workshop

Taught by John Miller

Memphis has long been a landing place for musicians from the surrounding rural areas in Tennessee, Arkansas and Mississippi, and in the 1920s and 1930s, it was a wide open town with plenty of opportunities for musicians to perform their music and make a living. As a result of Memphis hub status, it developed a strong blues scene in the 1920s and 1930s, with a host of outstanding singers and players. Many of these musicians had successful careers as recording artists, but a surprisingly large number of similarly gifted musicians went unrecorded or only got the opportunity to record a few titles. This DVD lesson offers instruction in the music of many of the finest guitarists to record out of Memphis in the 1920s and 1930s.

Included on this DVD are transcriptions and teaching of performances from the spectacular and hugely influential Memphis Minnie, transplanted Mississippians Furry Lewis, Robert Wilkins and Frank Stokes and more obscure names from the past like Tom Dickson and Allen Shaw. The songs that are taught on the DVD have been selected for their musical merit, but also to build your skills as a Country Blues guitarist, with numbers in D, G, E and C in standard tuning, as well as Open G tuning. The technique building that will come from learning these tunes will give you tools to go in whatever direction you wish to take your music.

A detailed tab/music booklet is included as a PDF file on the DVD. This includes all the lyrics to the songs as well as transcriptions of the guitar playing. The original old recordings of all the tunes is also included.

Intermediate level.

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