How to Use the Blues in a Jazz Solo

There is something special about the Jazz Blues Guitar sound and that type of phrasing! The blues is a very important part of Jazz, but it can be difficult to get those bluesy phrases to work on a jazz song, the way Joe Pass or George Benson do.

In this video, I am going to show you how to do that, a common mistake we make and also talk the different ways great guitarists like George Benson, Joe Pass, and Emily Remler use blues phrases in jazz solos.

Content
0:00 Intro
0:17 Blues Phrases from George Benson, Joe Pass, and Emily Remler
0:34 Example #1
0:47 Benson's Major Blues Sound
1:38 Play Blues From The Key of the Piece
1:58 The Blues As Leading Notes
2:48 Altered Dominant? Blues!
3:21 Example #1 Slow
3:38 Benson's Blues Approach
4:04 Pat Martino On Benson
4:20 Example #2
4:29 Joe Pass - Watch What Happens
5:24 Joe Pass' Minor Blues
6:43 Example #2 Slow
6:55 Blues In Major and in Minor songs
7:19 Example #3
7:32 Using Blues in a Minor Key
8:11 Emily Remler - Softly As In A Morning Sunrise
8:53 From Blues to Triplet Groupings
9:20 Example #3 Slow
9:36 The Things You Want to Do To Use Blues in Jazz Solos
10:22 Like The Video? Check out my Patreon Page!

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[JensLarsen]

Who is your favourite when it comes to Jazz Blues phrases?

Greetings from a sunny Big Band gig 🙂
Content
0:00 Intro
0:17 Blues Phrases from George Benson, Joe Pass and Emily Remler
0:34 Example #1
0:47 Benson's Major Blues Sound
1:38 Play Blues From The Key of the Piece
1:58 The Blues As Leading Notes
2:48 Altered Dominant? Blues!
3:21 Example #1 Slow
3:38 Benson's Blues Approach
4:04 Pat Martino On Benson
4:20 Example #2
4:29 Joe Pass - Watch What Happens
5:24 Joe Pass' Minor Blues
6:43 Example #2 Slow
6:55 Blues In Major and in Minor songs
7:19 Example #3
7:32 Using Blues in a Minor Key
8:11 Emily Remler - Softly As In A Morning Sunrise
8:53 From Blues to Triplet Groupings
9:20 Example #3 Slow
9:36 The Things You Want to Do To Use Blues in Jazz Solos
10:22 Like The Video? Check out my Patreon Page!

[samuelhendricks]

Love that you got Emily Remler in there. Great musician.

[cialtroneanimato]

Hi, great, great lesson! I just wanted to say that I met Pat Metheny in Sanremo, an italian Music tv festival. He was a guest and Benson was a guest as well. I had the chance to talk to Pat and he had wonderfull words for Benson. I asked a couple things and he said “ you should ask George, he's much better than me”!!

[RCSmiths]

Blues and Jazz: some of my favorite genres for guitar playing! Awesome work man!

[jansen_music]

I think Kenny Burrell is the grand master of jazz blues .Joe Pass said in an interview that Kenny Burrell is a "great"blues player.
I copied Kenny's "Saturday Night Blues" and played it on my gig for Billy Gibbons ZZ Top and he said " that was beautiful".

[DESIENASHOES]

Jazz blues lessons are one of my favourite topics :-) Great lesson

[salvadorgarcia]

Mi favorito en Jazz Blues o incluso en baladas, sin dudas Kenny Burrell. Gran clase, muchas gracias Sr. Larsen

[charlesqful]

Kenny Burrell strikes me as a jazz player incorporating tasty blues lines into his praising

[kingtriplebbb]

Thank you 👍 Sir. Your approach is fantastic ⚡

[MrDotneck]

Excellent - Thanks! My favourites would be Kenny Burrel and for a grittier variety definitely Grant Green.

[kingtriplebbb]

Mr. Larsen can demonstrate using Gibson be I spend my life savings I love that Jazz box, my wife won't agree till I get some gigs going 🤣🤣🤗🎸🎼🎶🙏 thanks for sharing Sir. You sound fantastic 🌟

[scr]

Jen greetings froom Colombia South América. Excelent Chanel.

[kingtriplebbb]

Go slower and call the notes out playing around 3 / 4 notes at time, great job 👍👏 Professor 🎓, thank you for sharing the details Sir. Sounds great 👍 great point you definitely know what you talking about 👍🥇🎸🎼🎶

[vizzo]

you could do when you have time a tim miller analysis

[LarrySiden]

That was great. Are you going to upload a PDF. That would help.

[mannoplanet]

Benson and Martino were great friends. I imagine Martino was just messing around in that comment.

[mannoplanet]

Nice... thanks. (Love the camera (new?) look)

[stevesteiner]

Could you please post a link to the George Benson solo? I searched every way I can think of and couldn't find that specific one. Thanks!

[captainkoo]

Jens, where can I find a PDF of this excellent lesson? Is it on Patreon?

[CliffieVanR]

Hi Jens - I notice in the George Benson solo that he plays a B natural over the C7. Should this be interpreted as a major 7th (which I believe I've heard elsewhere that George uses over dominant 7th chords) or is it more correctly thought of as a pickup to the C?