Hi there,
Want to add some variety to your blues chord progressions? Thought so 🙂
If you are used to just playing the traditional 1, 4, 5 chords in a 12 bar blues (usually with dominant 7,9 or 13 chords) you’re only sticking with 3 possible chords.
There are some cool chords you can add to make the traditional 12 bar sequence more interesting.
So are traditional 12 bar blues in D could be:
D7 Â D7Â Â D7 Â D7Â Â G7Â Â G7Â Â D7 Â D7Â Â A7Â G7Â D7Â Â A7
2 really classy chords you can add are the 6th and 2nd chords from the key. So in D major the chords would be:
D Em F#m, G, A, Bm, C#dim
Now for a really bluesy sound we’re going to make the 6th chord Dominant 7th and the 2nd chord a minor 7th.
The 6th dominant 7th chord can be seen as a secondary dominant (please refer to my blog on secondary dominants for an explanation of this)
The 2nd chord is diatonic (belongs to the key)
Here is a suggested chord progression using these chords.
In roman numerals they would go like this . IÂ IVÂ IÂ IÂ Â IV Â IVÂ IÂ VI Â Â IIm7Â V Â I Â IIm7 / V
1.D7Â 2.G7Â Â 3.D7Â Â 4.D7Â Â Â 5.G7Â Â 6.G7Â Â 7.D7Â Â Â 8.B7Â Â Â 9.Em7Â Â 10.A7Â Â Â 11.D7Â Â Â 12.Em7Â /Â A7
(in the 12th bar you can split it between the 2 chords – this bar is often referred to as the turnaround)
Have a play around with the above then have a go in different keys. So in A the progression would be:
1.A7 2.D7  3.A7  4.A7   5.D7  6.D7 7.A7.  8.F#7   9.Bm7   10.E7   11.A7   12.Bm7 / E7
Hope you’ve found this blog useful
Thanks for reading
You can find Js Music School on twitter via @jsmusicschool @harvey_jsmusic
ROCK ‘N’ ROLL
James