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My interview with Bill Henderson is now online. In this interview I talk about and play examples of the early innovators of blues harmonica (De Ford Bailey, John Lee Williamson, Little Walter, Big Walter Horton, Rice Miller and George Harmonica Smith), as well as the important players that came after them (James Cotton, Junior Wells, Paul Butterfield, Charlie Musselwhite, Rick Estrin, Kim Wilson, William Clarke, Rod Piazza, Mark Hummel, Gary Smith, Howard Levy and Carlos Del Junco to name but a few). continue reading...

One of the required tools in your practice room is a recorder... one that you can easily record with and quickly listen back to for immediate feedback. When listening back to your recording you're freed from the act of playing, allowing you to focus 100% on your performance... rhythm, technique, articulation, tone, etc. Listening intently to your rhythmic performance relative to the metronome will clarify where you're speeding up and slowing down so that you can adjust accordingly.

The time signature for blues is 4/4. The top number denotes how many beats per measure/bar and the bottom number denotes which rhythmic value receives the beat (in this case, the quarter note... 1/4). It's important we keep track of where each bar is. The emphasis of many licks starts on beat 1... many rhythmic patterns (such as chugging/chording) are one bar in length... and this is where chord change happens, which influences how we phrase. continue reading...

The first step of using a metronome is pretty simple, but many players forget it. Practicing is done best when done slowly. Start at a tempo that's slower than you think you need to practice... MUCH slower than the targeted tempo. Your goal will be to play the passage of music you're working on accurately at the slow tempo and then click the metronome one notch higher each practice. This is called the Metronome Method. continue reading...