Why I Suck... Progress Report #4: T- Bone Walker

This month we're looking at possibly the most influential of all the early blues artists – the guy who the BB Kings, Chuck Berrys et al listened to and copped licks from, the one and only Aaron Thibeaux! (Better known as T-Bone Walker). Straight away I heard licks I recognised from Stevie Ray Vaughan and the intro to Johnny B Goode – clearly we're dealing with someone very significant in the blues pantheon.

T-Bone Walker was born in Texas (as with Freddie King a generation later) in 1910, but it was not until the late 1940s that he would start to come to prominence, as one of the first blues guitar heroes to embrace the electric guitar in the immediate post-WW2 era. His devotees included none other than Jimi Hendrix, who also admired his abilities as a showman – it was Walker who pioneered the technique of playing with his teeth, behind his back, and behind his head!

The basic foundation of his style is, as with so many blues players, the basic minor pentatonic scale. In fact, the more of his licks I transcribed, I've really found that his style is a lesson in doing more with less. He was adept at phrasing across the bar line, creating long flowing lines that never seemed to run out of notes. Interestingly, there's not too much in the way of “techniques” - hammer ons and pull offs, string bends etc – and I think we can ascribe that to the fact that he was playing a hollow body strung with 0.013 gauge strings. Most of his string bending seems to have been “sound effect” rather than melodic – quarter tones hinting at major/minor ambiguity or pulling the 4^th toward the b5th. What's interesting is the sheer amount of notes he was able to cram into a line, as this lick from the intro to “Don't Throw Your Love On Me So String” indicates:

However, he was not averse to going “outside” in terms of note choice, and seemed to have a particular affinity for the augmented (R 3 #5) triad – this chord is notable for having each of its intervals a major third (four semitones) away from each other. Symmetry is a topic I'll address another day, but essentially anything symmetrical – augmented, diminished, whole tone scale, b5 interval – tends to have a jarring, abrasive sound that functions almost as a warning light going off in the mind. Augmented triads feature in his intros, particularly in his signature track “Stormy Monday”, and I would be remiss if I didn't share this ear catching turnaround lick from Stormy Monday with you:

As you can see, this is just an augmented triad shaped moved up and down the fretboard, catching a large number of “wrong” noted before resolving back to a chord tone. Be sparing with this though, this is probably the kind of thing you can only play once a a gig...

Although the basis of T-Bone's style was the minor pentatonic, he was adept a extending this basic framework with the addition of the 2^nd, 6^th, b5 and major 3^rd degrees, creating the “hybrid”blues scale which, let's be honest, we all use even though there doesn't seem to be an official name for it.. (Music Theory, meet Blues.. hey, Theory.. where did you run off to!?!) and here's a lick which demonstrates how naturally he was able to integrate these notes:

Now, you'll have heard this before, because it's also used in the intro to Johnny B.Goode, and everyone's heard Johnny B. Goode! This is what I mean about him being influential – he's the guy Chuck Berry stole that from!

Turning to chords, there's a lot of stuff that T-Bone invented (or at least popularised – in a style of music like blues where it's very much an oral tradition it's next to impossible to truly say who “invented” anything!) that any aspiring blues player needs to check out – don't forget, even in blues, you need to be able to set up a groove and accompany the singer, and plodding out the same Chuck Berry boogie shuffle in every song is going to get old very quickly.

T-Bone had an affinity for the dominant 9^th (written as 9 for short – so G9, C9 etc) – R 3 5 b7 9. I've shown it here with it's root on the A string, and this shape is actually derived from a C shape.

He would tend to pair this with a technique sometimes called the “Gospel Slide” or the “6/9 Slide”. Basically what you do is take the notes on the thinnest 3 strings, slide them up a tone, and then back. If you're starting with a C9, that means you start with a 3^rd fret barre across the G, B & E strings giving you Bb (b7) D (9) and G (5). You slide that up a tone and get C ® E (3) and A (6 or 13). This averages out as giving you R 3 5 b7 9 13 – a dominant 13 chord without ever having to play a whole dominant 13 shape. Clever! He does the same idea on the D, G and B strings with an E root voicing but note that only the D and B string notes are slid, as if you slide the G you end up with a #11 which won't fit the sound we're after.

(If you want to see this demonstrated, check out the YouTube practice Vlog)

So there we have it, a potted history and style analysis of an often overlooked but crucial artist in the evolution of blues guitar. This has been a real eye opener and I've come out with a new respect for his abilities – maybe T-Bone spent a little time in negotiations with a certain horned individual down at the crossroads at midnight! See you next month for the Iceman himself, Albert Collins.