In this guitar lesson, you’ll learn three easy fill riffs that you can use to spice up your country & bluegrass rhythm guitar. Each fill riff is one measure long and you can use them in almost any chord progression in the key of G to replace one measure of strumming. These riffs sound especially great over slower country & bluegrass songs.
Western swing music began in the dance halls of small towns throughout the lower Great Plains in the late 1920s and early 1930s, growing from house parties and ranch dances where fiddlers and guitarists played for dancers. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Western Swing became very popular as a subgenre of American country music. Over the years, Western swing has been a huge influence on honky-tonk, rockabilly, and country rock. It also popularized the following in country music: use of electrically amplified instruments, use of drums to reinforce a strong backbeat, expanded instrumentation, a “honky tonk beat”, and jazz/blues style solos.
In this guitar lesson, you’ll learn how to play a slow western swing guitar solo in the key of D. We’ll work through the guitar solo with tablature one line at a time. After you learn the solo, practice along with the Western swing backing track in the key of D. Guitar tablature is available below the lesson video. Hope y’all like this one!
In this guitar lesson, you’ll learn a fun bluegrass guitar lick in G that you can use at the end of a guitar solo or at the end of an entire song. I use this guitar lick all the time when I’m jamming with friends. It’s a pretty simple lick, and it sounds best over a key of G chord progression that ends with: D – – – D – – – G – – – G – – – (there are a ton of bluegrass songs that end with two bars of D followed by two bars of G).
First we’ll learn the lick with tablature, and then I’ll show you two examples of how you can use this lick. Don’t forget to download the tablature below this lesson video, and check out the Guitar Lick Library for more licks like this one.
Thought I’d change it up a bit and record a quick lesson for y’all next to the creek behind my house… Here’s a 12 bar bluegrass flatpicking break in G that has a lot of guitar licks I use all the time when I’m improvising bluegrass lead in the key of G. Pay attention to the chord written above each measure in the tablature — this is the chord that rhythm guitar (and other instruments) will be playing while you play the solo. You’ll see how each lick fits nicely over the chord that’s being played. Try to commit these licks to memory and use them when you’re playing bluegrass breaks over other songs in the key of G. Let me know if you have any questions!
| Video Start Time | Lesson Topic |
|---|---|
| 00:00 min | Listen to the 12 bar bluegrass solo |
| 00:23 min | Line 1 of Tablature |
| 01:30 min | Line 2 of Tablature |
| 02:40 min | Line 3 of Tablature |
| 03:47 min | Practice With Me |