Just get the basics under your belt ,David. I rushed into grade 2 and had to slow down. Strumming and chord changes are key skills. Keep playing songs.
1 Like
Thank you Richard 
2 Likes
Hi Richard,
How do I improvise and play a backing track to the Am pentatonic scale starting at 5-8 to a backing track
Hi Martin. I know this may sound patronising but you need to read this topic from post 1 and use the links to the relevant JustinGuitar lessons contained in my posts.
Cheers
Richard
2 Likes
Richard, with pattern 1 - lick #3, should I be playing the E on the second string whilst I’m still bending the D on the third string, or should I be releasing that bend and then playing the E?
I hope that makes sense?
Thank you. 
1 Like
@SgtColon Stefan.
You need 3rd finger ready and able to grab the next bend so a silent release is good.
In a different lick context, allowing that bend to ring out when you grab the E can be wonderful as they are the same note, creating a unison sound.
2 Likes
Thank you Richard. I’ll have a play and see how things turn out.
1 Like
Hi Richard. I’m early in learning to play blues and anxious to dig in as this is my favorite genre. Most of the lessons I’ve looked at feature electric guitars. I have a question that maybe deserves its own thread or even lesson: What is different or unique about playing blues on an acoustic versus electric guitar? I imagine blues techniques are used, adapted or emphasized differently on acoustic. Your thoughts? Thanks.
1 Like
I’m not Richard and don’t have his knowledge, but I have been working on some acoustic blues and have a few thoughts. These are generalizations that don’t always hold, of course (nothing “always” holds in music, does it?), but they might be useful anyway.
To me the biggest difference between electric and acoustic blues is that electric is usually played in a band context, while acoustic is often played solo. This means that the solo acoustic player will generally have to supply the rhythm together with the melodic part. Often this means fingerstyle playing, where the thumb gets a groove going on the bass strings (with palm muting) and fingers add licks (or a melody line in general) on the 3 highest strings.
In my experience, acoustic fingerstyle blues tends to work with open strings a lot. The keys are quite often E or A, where the open E and/or A strings are used a lot.
On electric (if playing lead), you needn’t worry about the rhythm, meaning you can concentrate on the melodic part, most often using a pick. This allows a lot of freedom to move around the neck (very high up the neck sometimes), because you needn’t worry about the bass notes.
Bending strings is harder on acoustic and is used much less. The 1/4 bend (blues curl) is very common, but full bends less so. Other forms of articulation (slides, hammer-ons, pull-offs) are common in both electric and acoustic styles.
Muting strings is less important on acoustic, since the sustain is so much less, string noise is generally not an issue.
Ok, these are just some random thoughts about the differences I have noticed. I’ve mostly been contrasting acoustic with lead electric, haven’t really mentioned rhythm electric.
3 Likes
Thank you @jjw John for that summary. Full of information, tight and punchy like a good blues solo! It confirms for me why I’m drawn to solo acoustic blues (give me some Bonnie Raitt). I enjoy playing chord melodies and can do passable slides, hammer-ons and pull-offs on my acoustic. Bends and curls are yet to come. There’s so much to absorb watching videos of the past Blues with Justin club sessions. Back to practice…
2 Likes
You’ve got the job!
That’s a great contribution John.
1 Like
Gee, thanks. Happy to contribute.
1 Like
A nice little one with acoustic setting which you could replicate with a looper
3 Likes
Yes, if you have a jam buddy (or an electro-acoustic guitar and a looper pedal), that opens up more possibilities. In that case, the lead acoustic guitar is much more similar to the lead electric, for obvious reasons.
2 Likes
Or throw on an acoustic blues backing track from YouTube if you have a decent speaker system.
1 Like
I would be all in on “Solo Blues Guitar” if the songs were traditional blues songs, instead of Justin’s compositions. No knock on Justin’s composing abilities, but it’s just more motivating if you are learning well-known songs. I suppose there might be copyright issues involved, but I would think that there of lots of blues standards in the public domain.
Maybe a follow-up course could teach such songs.
1 Like
Hi Richard … is there an change I can get this backing track as a mp3 please ?
1 Like
The tracks that are made by justinguitar on soundcloud often have a download file button that you can use once you create a free account on soundcloud.
This backing track gave me the file 03 Track 03.mp3
1 Like
But you need to grow an extra finger to play that one from soundcloud 
3 Likes