This is a Roy Buchanan inspired lesson – he was a fabulous guitar player, who left us with some wonderful music. Roy usually used a telecaster – it was his trademark. He had a very unique sound, and while you can buy the same equipment he used, it’s really all in the fingers. Even though the lesson isn’t about his string bends, it’s interesting to note that he would usually go more than a tone stretch on some of them.
This lesson will be looking at his guitar style a bit and the one string descending riffs that he would use.
Learn More Easy Blues Licks Here
An example of one of the riffs he would do is if he was going to end on a “G”, he would take the third string “G” and he would use the major 2nd interval which is a two fret span, and he would go down a semitone at a time. The trick is all in your down-up picking. If you have a hard time getting the picking going, start with a single string, one fret at a time. You can mute it too with your right hand. It’s not even necessarily four pick strokes to each note – it’s whatever feels good.
The way you can develop the speed in your right hand is to get good at your down-up motion. It does work slowly as well.
You can do this riff on any string. But there should be a method to your madness, so make sure that the note you start on (ie high “G”) is the one you end on (ie low “G”), and make sure that it is a harmony note to whatever key you are in.
If you want to learn more about down-up picking and other techniques, visit the Riff Ninja Academy.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixtQHD0ltFk
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