12 Bar Blues

A lot of modern music is based on 12 bar blues. Lots of people have heard of it, but what is it really?

Well, it is based off a sequence of chords lasting 12 bars then repeating or in some cases repeating with slight variation. If we work with just the basic 12 bar blues configuration, you'll find it really isn't that mysterious.

I have mentioned the concept of I IV V chord progressions before, and 12 bar blues is the poster child for this idea. The basic pattern for classic 12 bar is I, I, I, I, IV, IV, I, I, V, V, I, I in any key. There are variations on this theme, but this is in a nutshell, the idea. You may never hear the chord played, but the music in each bar falls into the rules for the chords in the key.

In my continued journey, I purchased a book called Blues Piano For Beginners by Mark Harrison which I highly recommend by the way, if you are learning to play. In the book Mark explains the basic concept of playing 12 bar blues. His examples use the "Quick-Four" variant and M7th chords in C Maj. It looks like this:

I (C7), IV (F7), I (C7), I (C7) - IV (F7), IV (F7), I (C7), I (C7) - V (G7), IV (F7), I (C7), I (C7). 

There are a lot of resources out there to talk about why, and about the mechanics (like the book linked above).

Knowing this you can apply it to your composition, you don't really need to know WHY it works, only that it does. Using notes from the chords or the chords themselves inside the bars assigned, you can make music that sounds "right." Putting the notes together in a particular way is what makes your composition unique.

I put together a song based on Mark's book. The music is in C Maj, the chord changes as described above, and the piano part is Pretty Close to his. I used a little artistic license (but not much) with the right hand and varied the left hand part also slightly. He has you play a repeating I-V, I-VI, pattern and a repeating I-V, I-VI, IIIb, III pattern with the left hand. I use the I-V, I-VI, IIIb, III pattern in the first 12 bars, and a I-V, I-VI, I-V, I-VI, I-V, I-VI, IIIb, III in the second 12 bars and alternate between those two patterns for the duration.

What does it sound like? Well, It sounds like this: 12 Bar Blues obviously I had to find some guitar, drums and bass that went along with it, the Guitar is a midi VSTi that strums the chord changes and I located drums and bass in a Mixcraft song kit. Hope you enjoy it.


Thanks for playing along.