Blues guitar playing is an instrumental technique which is used to accompany the singing of blues music. It often incorporates the use of a slide guitar technique.[1]
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Blues is based on west African tonal scales, harmonies and rhythms, brought to America by slaves. After emancipation the former slaves and their descendants continued to improvise and build on the original style, carrying it to large urban centers of the north including New York, Chicago and Saint Louis where it continued to grow and change. Around the beginning of the 20th century, a trumpeter from Alabama named W.C. Handy, now known as the "Father of the Blues", was the first to gain public attention playing it.[2]
Guitar blues style, often known as downhome blues, as played by Leadbelly, R. L. Burnside and Junior Kimbrough, remained true to its origin as the more orchestral urban varieties blended with jazz and R&B. Blues could be about anything: a woman, something they enjoy doing, or just, how they're feeling.
Many early guitarists such as T. Bone Walker and Robert Johnson rapidly gained popularity, and by 1920, blues became one of the most listened to musical genres. It lost audience to jazz and other styles in the 30's, returning to popular attention in the 50's and 60's with the creation of blues-rock. Blues-rock combined old blues solos with newer popular rock elements. Some early blues-rock guitarists were Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Lonnie Mack, Michael Bloomfield, Eric Clapton and many others.