Bluegrass

J.D.: Bluegrass

Artist / Title / Progress
Difficulty / style
J.D. Jarrell
Fast Bluegrass Rhythm Guitar

This tutorial on fast bluegrass rhythm was inspired by a friend of mine in the forum. He asked about the strumming techniques all the legendary bluegrass guitar pickers used when playing really fast songs. Im using only downstrokes with the pick, to put even more drive into it. These lessons are the 1, 4, and 5 chord in the key of G, using this fast boom chick strumming pattern.

Published: 09/26/2009 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Fast Bluegrass Rhythm Guitar with Fills

This tutorial on fast bluegrass rhythm was inspired by a friend of mine in the forum. He wanted to learn fills used to walk into the next chord, and I'm still using only downstrokes with the pick. In the first lesson the fills walk you into the 4 chord, and then back to the 1. The next lesson walks into the 5 chord, and back to the 1. The third one is playing everything together, and the last two are G runs picking up and downstrokes.

Published: 10/23/2009 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Driving Bluegrass Rhythm: Medium Tempo

This tutorial on driving bluegrass rhythm was inspired by a good friend of mine in the forum. He wanted to know about strumming techniques all the legendary bluegrass guitar pickers used. This 16th note boom chick pattern is another one, and here I'm using a ghost strum too. I'm playing up and downstrokes with the pick, and using the 1, 4, and 5 chord in the key of G.

Published: 11/21/2009 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Driving Bluegrass Rhythm: Medium Tempo With Fills

This tutorial on driving bluegrass rhythm was inspired by a good friend of mine in the forum. I'm using only downstrokes with the pick for the fills, but using up and downstrokes for strumming. In the first lesson I used the fills to walk into the 4 chord, then back to the 1. In the next lesson I walk into the 5 chord, then back to the 1, and the last one is the full progression.

Published: 01/21/2010 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Driving Bluegrass Rhythm: Strumming 16th Notes

This tutorial on driving bluegrass rhythm was inspired by a good friend of mine in the forum. He wanted to know about strumming techniques all the legendary bluegrass guitar pickers used. This is another 16th note boom chick pattern, but it doesn't have the ghost strum in it. I'm using both up and downstrokes with a pick, and strumming them with the 1, 4, and 5 chord in the key of G.

Published: 02/11/2010 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Bluegrass Rhythm: Strumming 16th Notes With Fills

This tutorial on driving bluegrass rhythm was inspired by a good friend of mine in the forum. I'm using only downstrokes with the pick for the fills, but using up and downstrokes for strumming. In the first lesson I use the fills to walk into the 4 chord, then back to the 1. The next lesson walks you into the 5 chord, then back to the 1, and the last one is the full progression.

Published: 05/04/2010 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Syncopated Strumming Patterns

This tutorial on syncopated strumming patterns was inspired by a good friend of mine in the forum. He asked about some of the bluegrass strumming techniques that can drive the rhythm of a song. I'll start with a couple of easy ones, and then get into the more complicated patterns. I'm using a G chord for all of these, so you can hear the difference that the syncopated strumming makes in the sound.

Published: 06/30/2010 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Introduction To Crosspicking

This tutorial on crosspicking was inspired by a subscriber in the forum, and in these lessons I'll get you started by showing you a simple pattern starting on different strings. The first one is using open strings, and starts on the 4th string. Then I'll show the roll starting on the 3rd string, the 5th string, and the 6th string. Then I'll put them all together, and crosspick from C to G.

Published: 07/22/2010 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Crosspicking Combinations

This tutorial on crosspicking was inspired by a subscriber in the forum, and in these lessons I show you another pattern used for crosspicking. I'll show you the same pattern starting on different strings, and then put them into 3 exercises using the 1, 4, and 5 chords in the key of G. Then I'll show you the combinations for a 1, 4, 5, 1 progression, and there's even an alternate ending.

Published: 02/20/2011 Upgrade
J.D. Jarrell
Four Flatpicking Bluegrass Licks In G!

This tutorial on flatpicking was inspired by my earliest musical influences, and also the greatest flatpickers in history. The first lesson has a couple of licks for the G chord, then the next one I start in G and go to the 4 chord. Then I go back to the G chord for the third lesson, and in the last one I go to the 5 chord, and then back to the G chord to finish it up.

Published: 01/26/2011 Upgrade

Ben: Lick Collections

Artist / Title / Progress
Difficulty / style
Ben Lindholm
Bluegrass Lick Library G2

Bluegrass Lick Library G2 builds on the Bluegrass Lick Library G1 tutorial. Here I will increase the difficulty a little bit, still keeping it fairly simple as far as bluegrass goes. We will play over the same backing track as the G1 tutorial - G | C | D | G | - and I will show you nine more licks to add to your personal lick library.

Published: 02/02/2012 Upgrade
Ben Lindholm
Bluegrass Lick Library G1

In this first tutorial in my Bluegrass Lick Library series is for the novice guitar player who wants to venture into the land of bluegrass guitar. I will give you nine simple licks that you can use over a standard I IV V chord progression in the key of G major. We will practice them one by one, then three at a time, and ultimately all of them one after the other. Good luck!

Published: 01/26/2012 Upgrade

Bluegrass Topics

Artist / Title / Progress
Difficulty / style
Chet Atkins image
Black Mountain Rag (Chet Atkins Style) Chet Atkins

Several subscribers have indicated an interest in learning more about the Chet Atkins thumb and finger style, so this tutorial has been created to go into quite a bit of detail to show the learner how to learn it.

Published: 05/30/2009 Upgrade
Anders Mouridsen
Stealing From Banjo & Dobro

In this tutorial we're gonna look at two traditional bluegrass instruments and how they apply to regular guitar playing. We're gonna talk about the tuning, technique and style of both the banjo and the dobro and look at how you can work these sounds into your regular guitar playing. At the end of the tutorial we're gonna play through an old bluegrass tune using all the new techniques.

Published: 05/17/2010 Upgrade
Ben Helson
The Tony Rice Style: Modern Bluegrass Master

Tony Rice fuses many elements into one distinctive style. This series of lessons will take a look at some of the concepts used in his style: jazz-influenced chords, syncopated and varied rhythm playing, unique use of pentatonic scales, and chords in lead lines and chord substitutions. We'll put them all together into a solo that exploits all of the techniques.

Published: 06/15/2010 Upgrade