Spice up your bluegrass lead guitar with our Bluegrass Lick Library! In this guitar lesson video, you’ll learn one of the most essential bluegrass licks that Tony Rice used in the majority of his guitar solos. Also, be sure to check out the other Tony Rice style guitar licks that we have available in our Bluegrass Lick Library. Each bluegrass lick in the library comes with a guitar lesson video, tablature, and bluegrass scale charts.
In this guitar lesson, I’ll teach you a classic country strumming pattern in the style of “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” by Willie Nelson. First I’ll break down the strumming pattern and give you some strumming tips that will help you get those clean alternating bass line picks. Then I’ll show you a couple of Willie Nelson style chord progressions to use for practice. After that, we’ll start working in some classic country bass line walks and I’ll teach you a couple of Willie Nelson riffs that’ll spice up your country rhythm guitar.
| Video Start Time | Lesson Topic |
|---|---|
| 00:00 min | Strumming Pattern Breakdown |
| 01:09 min | Right Hand Pick Technique |
| 02:46 min | Willie Nelson Hammer-On |
| 04:11 min | Alternating Bass Line over B7 and A Chords |
| Video Start Time | Lesson Topic |
|---|---|
| 00:00 min | Progression 1 |
| 00:54 min | A Major Accent Chord |
| 02:37 min | Progression 2 |
| 03:24 min | How to Practice with “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” |
| Video Start Time | Lesson Topic |
|---|---|
| 00:00 min | Bass Line Walk 1 |
| 01:17 min | Bass Line Walk 2 |
| 03:42 min | Bass Line Walk 3 |
| 04:50 min | Bass Line Walk 4 |
| Video Start Time | Lesson Topic |
|---|---|
| 00:00 min | Willie Nelson Style Fill Riff 1 |
| 04:14 min | Willie Fill Riff 2 for a Song Ending |
Practice your classic country strumming and fills over the song “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” by Willie Nelson using the player from Spotify. We’d highly recommend using Spotify for online radio. If you don’t have a Spotify account, click here to sign up free with your Facebook account or with an e-mail address.
In this country guitar lesson, you’ll learn how to play six intermediate country guitar riffs in drop D. We’ll also have three easier drop D riffs for the newer country pickers. I’ll play the drop D licks with tablature and give you a full breakdown along with some helpful music theory tips. After you learn the licks, practice along with our jam track and also test them out over “Modern Day Bonnie and Clyde” by Travis Tritt.
Once you get these drop D country guitar riffs up to speed, try to play them over the song “Modern Day Bonnie and Clyde” by Travis Tritt using the embedded player from Spotify. The chord progression is similar to our jam track progression, but just a bit quicker. We’d highly recommend using Spotify for online radio. If you don’t have a Spotify account, click here to sign up free with your Facebook account or with an e-mail address. Also, check out Travis Tritt on iTunes. He’s got a ton of other great songs to choose from.
In this country guitar lesson, you’ll learn how to play a variation of the 12 bar blues that has a country & bluegrass twang. In both arrangements below, we’ll use triplets to spice up our country fills and we’ll also replace strumming with crosspicking in certain measures to make our rhythm sound even more country. These country 12 bar blues progressions are in the key of G and you can use the fill riffs that we’re studying in this guitar lesson with a bunch of other country & bluegrass songs. Pay close attention to how we’re structuring each country guitar lick around the rhythm chords.