Joe Bonamassa Style File

Did I Just Invent The Scariest Pentatonic Lick Ever??

 

Why I Suck... Series 2, Episode 11 - Joe Bonamassa

So, back in 2019, during the closing weeks of The World That Was, one of my students gave me a copy of Joe Bonamassa's “Live At The Greek” - I'd been aware of him for a while but had never really sat down and checked him out. Suffice it to say, I liked what I heard and “Live At The Greek” was a fixture in my car for quite a while. I also jammed along with it at home and discovered that OK, I could play some fast and widdly stuff but compared to Joe, I just.... sucked.

Now, in fairness, most players will come up short measuring themselves against someone like him, but there was something about it niggled me... the sheer inventiveness, confidence and elegance of his phrasing.. this wasn't something you could learn by pounding up and down scale patterns with a metronome. And then it hit me – Bonamassa had spent years picking out the licks of the Kings, T Bone Walker, Hubert Sumlin and co by ear, whereas I.. hadn't. I'd skipped a crucial part of my education. And this made me rethink the blog as a practice tool – by learning to transcribe the licks of these pioneers, I would learn phrasing and feel, become a better and more well rounded player.

It's worked. And I've truly fallen back in love with the guitar these last two years, discovering the joy of getting inside the heads of guitarists I've long worshipped and discovering exactly what Jimi or BB or Clapton were trying to communicate – intangible things that sheet music simply can't communicate. So in the unlikely event that Mr. Bonamassa is reading this – I owe you a debt of gratitude.

Right, onto the man himself! Born in New Hartford, New York just a mere six months before me (so we've both outlived Freddie King), young Joe didn't wait until he was 17 and instead got started at the age of 4. By the age of 11 he was being mentored by the insanely gifted and tragically departed Danny Gatton (who is yet another candidate for a spot on the blog), by 12 he was opening for B.B. King – I think by that point I'd managed to master “Cockles & Mussels Alive Alive O” on my very first nylon string. A cautionary tale indeed. Start early and go hard to achieve greatness! By 18 (when I managed a shambolic, under rehearsed gig at a sixth form prom in Long Clawson), Bonamassa was playing in a band named Bloodline – featuring the sons of jazz legend Miles Davis, Doors guitarist Robby Krieger and Allman Bros bass player Berry Oakley. His first solo album debuted in 2000 (in fairness, mine debutedv1998, but it was AWFUL and was made entirely on cassette on a Tascam 414, whereas Joe's was recorded at Pyramid Studios in New York.. and I doubt Joe is as embarrassed by his as I am by mine!)

Live At The Greek, where all of these examples are drawn from, was recorded in August 2015 and released in 2016, at the finale of the Three Kings tour – a tribute to the music of BB, Freddie and Albert King and I heartily recommend it to any fan of blues or just guitar playing in general as Joe really goes to town, stretching his legs with some absolutely sublime playing.. so let's get to business and steal some licks!

This first comes from Freddie King's “Love Her With A Feeling” using the Bb blues scale, and notice the artful use of the quarter tone bend between minor and major 3^rd and the slippery slides into the b5 (E in this key) on the 9^th fret G and 7^th fret A strings, as Joe echoes himself in a lower octave- like Hendrix last month, there's a lot of micro-scale “storytelling” here, continuation of theme.

This is drawn from the gospel standard “Ole Time Religion” again in Bb and stands as a brilliant example of how to keep your nerve at a very high tempo and stay melodic! Joe is using Bb major pentatonic (R 2 3 5 6 -although he does tweak the ear with the odd b3 in paces) but what is noticeable here is his skilful use of the 4^th (Eb) on the 16^th fret B – outside the major pentatonic, and often a bridge note between major and minor, the way he integrates it into a pretty standard “magic 3 notes” lick is beautiful and as always – even at this tempo – he makes it sound absolutely effortless.

Here we have a lie from “Sittin' On The Boat Dock” in C# and shows an interesting approach using position 3 of the minor pentatonic and introducing the 2^nd, creating a hexatonic scale (also used by Eric Johnson, among others) and cycling through the pattern using a slight rhythmic offset that tricks the ear into thinking that there's more going on than actually is there! Introducing the 2^nd to the minor and the 4^th to the major pentatonics creates a cool hexatonic effect that's actually pretty easy to begin integrating into your own playing.

The big one! This is the absolute monster, jaw-drop “how the hell did he do that” lick from “Going Down” and Joe is absolutely pedal to the metal here – this is in D minor pentatonic and Joe again starts from position 3 using the magic 3 notes again but stretching out to the 20^th fret on the high E with the little finger, effectively “stealing” a note from position 4 before slithering down through position 2 into position 1 – note also the 3^rd finger roll down from 13^th fret B to 13^th fret G (b5), sliding down to 12^th and pulled off to 10^th, a move heavily associated with Stevie Ray Vaughan – finishing off with alternating between the 5^th (A) on the 10^th fret B and root on the 10^th fret high E. Wow.

So there we go, a brief look at the approach of a very formidable, very complete guitar player who I have learned a LOT from this month. Next up, we return to SRV and I'm attempting to transcribe what I consider the greatest piece of guitar playing ever - but before that, I need to do some practice before putting the YouTube demo video up....