I am confused. In the key of A minor pentatonic scale the notes are A C D E and G, so I would assume that the IV chord is E and the V chord G, but in this booklet that I am working through there is an example in the key of A that uses D as the IV chord and E as the five chord???

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Fender Highway One HSS Stratocaster '09
Modified Fender Champ600
Honer Special20 Harmonica

First, the notes of the scales, don't have anything to about a chord progression.

You practice scales for muscle and ear memory, than you learn riffs form your favorite guitarists, and apply those to songs when you play.

The formula for the major scale is w-w-1/2-w-w-w-1/2, w = whole step (2 frets) and 1/2 (step) = 1 fret.

So, in the key of 'A' for a I-IV-V blues progression, you have A (I)-B-C-D(IV)-E(V)-F, I=A, IV=D, V=E.

If in 'G' the I-IV-V would be G-C-D. For your guitar homework today, get a sheet of paper, and starting with 'E' write the I-IV-V chord progression down, than go to 'F', than do the same for 'G', 'A', 'B', 'C' & 'D'.

Than play the chord progression, and the pentatonic scale for each 'key'.
I write key, because if start with, for example 'A' chord (I), this would be the key of the song.

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Tony Houston

Thanks for the link and the advice. BTW that is some nice Blues music, I really enjoyed the cut of "Princess", who plays the harmonica? IS it possible to order cds through the website?

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Fender Highway One HSS Stratocaster '09
Modified Fender Champ600
Honer Special20 Harmonica

I composed 'Princess' while watching a football game. I'm glad you liked it, it's one of the crowd's favorites as well. We would end the snow with it.

That was ex-member Dan Axt on harp. When our bass player Ed White developed cancer, Dan wanted me to fire him and get another bass player so we could keep giggin', but I refused to look for another bass player while Ed was having chemo, so, he quit.

During this time we were recording our second CD The Cold Backhand of Love, so I wiped Dan's tracks. But than we had a keyboard player, and he had to quit after about a year, and I wiped his tracks.

Now, I'm re-recording the guitar tracks. Actually, I had the entire CD recorded, I wrote all the songs, but wanted the band to play on the tracks. I always create the demos here at home, and than made copies for the band.

We don't have any more CD, I had 1500 copies of Prime Cut Blues printed, and we sold them all . But we have tracks available from iTunes and Amazon. I just added a widget to our website for these sites.

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Tony Houston

Prime Cut Blues is sold out, darn! I see you play Albert King, Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf, I really enjoy their music. Never heard of Little Walter but I will check it out. You music is great, I have been searching for some blues to listen to aside from all the greats, and so far I have not heard anything that sounds good. Do you have any other CDs or will you be printing any more in the future? Thanks.

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Fender Highway One HSS Stratocaster '09
Modified Fender Champ600
Honer Special20 Harmonica

good thread guys thouston thats pretty much how my teachers had me learn it,

I know that you're young, and haven't heard of a lot of blues artists but you seem to be on the right track.

You should have at least one Little Walter album http://tinyurl.com/kvjf3y in your collection. Also Magic Sam http://tinyurl.com/lq5etq and Freddie King http://tinyurl.com/m8onln.

I met Stevie Ray Vaughan's older brother Jimmie Vaughan when he was in 'The Fabulous Thunderbirds' he told that in Texas, if you couldn't play King's Hide-Away, you can't be called a guitar player. So buy this DVD Duke Robillard's 'How To Play Freddie King' http://tinyurl.com/kptdyy. It may be a little advanced for you, but keep working with the DVD.

As far as Prime Cut Blues we took the money we made and brought a BOSS BR-1600 recorderhttp://tinyurl.com/lv7htg to record ourselves, rather I'm recording us. And we needed money to promote the second CD, so I'm not going to get any more copies made.

You mentioned Howlin' Wolf, I've backed Wolf's main guitarist Hubert Sumlin a couple of times.

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Tony Houston

That is a great picture, thanks for sharing. You met Jimi Vaughan, That is unreal! I will definately check out the CDs/DVDs that you mentioned. You are right about me being youngish and in the early stages of listening to blues music, I actually came across some Blues music by chance. I was given a CD titled "Blues The Early Years" (I think it was a promotional one) and all I know is that the CD had Lonnie Brooks on there. The first time I heard the CD I did not even listen to the entire thing because I thought it was old and outdated, and silly me I have been chasing that CD ever since and I even have an advertisement in the newpaper. The song "Cold Lonely Nights" by Lonnie Brooks was the very song that inspired me to learn the blues! I have a live version but I still feel that the studio version was the best I have heard, that song was just incredible. Right now I am working out of a blues booklet that arrived about a week ago

A short time after I heard the CD I began learning some pentatonic scales and I started to recognise some of the patterns from that CD, and back then I used to try and play along to the songs but I could never work out how these guys were achieving certain Bluesy sounds (bending strings I later learned). That CD got lost a couple of years or so ago as I have been progressively been listening to more and more blues music. It seems that all the music that I used to listen to does not compare anymore, it all begins to sound like noise and I feel as if I am tracing the roots of all this music, and to me the blues sounds better than anything else. I am actually going to buy a seperate CD rack for my blues music as I just don't listen to my other CDs anymore.

I have only been playing guitar seriously for about 6 months now and after playing around with some various forms of guitar many years ago I am really inspired to learn the blues, that is really all I want to learn right now. I always knew of names such as BB King , Eric Clapton and SRV to mention a few but in the past 6 months I have been introduced to Albert King, Muddy Waters, Lightnin' Hopkins and many more. Even more recently I have just bought CDs by Albert King and Muddy Waters, and a few months ago I bought T-Bone Walker, JB Lenior and Blind Willie Johnson. Their music is just great and I do not know anyone who listens to blues music, especially some of the much older blues music. Well that is enough from me but again it is great to hear someone keeping the blues alive, and by the sounds of your music and your lyrics you really enjoy playing the blues!

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Fender Highway One HSS Stratocaster '09
Modified Fender Champ600
Honer Special20 Harmonica

I know Lonnie Brooks, Primetime has opened for him, and I've played with him many times




Yes, I'm from Dayton OH, and the Fab T-Birds played Gilly's many times in the '80s. I learned so much watching Jimmie, he is truly amazing on guitar.

Umm, you couldn't get the links to work? Ok, here is Little Walter http://www.amazon.com/His-Best-Little-Anniversary-Collection/dp/B000005KQT/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1248031312&sr=8-1.

Magic Sam http://www.amazon.com/West-Side-Soul-Magic-Sam/dp/B000004BIF/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1248031437&sr=1-1.

Freddie King albums http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_m_2_6?url=search-alias%3Dpopular&field-keywords=freddie+king&sprefix=freddi and the DVD http://www.amazon.com/Freddie-King-Duke-Robillard/dp/B00008G83U/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1248031786&sr=1-5

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Tony Houston

Hey thanks for the links, I thought all three samples of each artist was great. You know Lonnie Brooks!!! That is incredible, PrimeTime must be popular where you are from. Lonnie Brooks was the very reason why I wanted to play the blues, and I could never work out how he was able to make his guitar sound so good. Great photo. Well, after some extensive searching I found a CD with the studio version of "Cold Lonely Nights" by Lonnie Brooks I also found a CD with some of the songs from the Early Years CD that I lost a few years ago, one of the songs was "I Hear Some Blues Downstairs" by Fenton Robinson. So that is at least another four great CDs I can add to my collection. I have written the I IV V chords combinations on paper aswell, should make it a whole lot easier to remember.

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Fender Highway One HSS Stratocaster '09
Modified Fender Champ600
Honer Special20 Harmonica