Chords for Bob Brozman & Woody Mann Teach A Country Blues Guitar Duet

Now we'd like to introduce a 16-bar ragtime piece that we call Mr.
Blake.
It's sort of dedicated to the style of Blind Blake, one of the great guitarists of the century.
And being 16 bars, it consists of two 8-bar halves.
We're in the key of C.
Woody's in standard tuning, playing in C.
I'm capoed, playing out of G positions.
And basically the first half ends on the V chord, and the second half ends on a I chord.
Then we'll put this little interlude in between with a couple of minor chords, just to break up the verses.
The transcribed version, which we'll be playing for you at the end of this segment, is quite slow.
But this song is actually meant to be played at a pretty good tempo to get that bouncy ragtime feel.
And once again, we're trying to compliment each other, listen to each other, and not get in each other's way.
And that requires a lot of listening.
Yeah, [G] and just briefly, I just want to talk about this idea of this rhythmic thumb.
In this song, you can [C] really hear it.
And you have to be, sometimes when I'm changing chords, like in the beginning when I'm going [E] from the C to the E chord,
there's a lot [C] of bass ideas.
[E] _
_ [A] _ _ [C] _ [E] _ _ _ [Am] _
[A] _ So the [E] bass line is almost the rhythm part in itself.
And that's why it's even more of a challenge for Bob to fit in, which he does so beautifully.
Because this guitar part is really a complete guitar part, a complete dance part by itself.
[Db] And so it's great playing with Bob when he's in the capo in G,
[C] because it gives all these [E] low chords and this kind of thumping [C] rhythm of the thumb a nice compliment.
And let's play [F] it through once.
[C] _
[B] Mr.
Blake.
One, two, one, [Bm] two, [C] three. _
[E] _ _ [A] _ _ _ _ _ [D] _
_ _ _ [G] _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ [E] _ _ [A] _ _ _ _ [D] _
_ [Bm] _ [G] _ [C] _ [Ab] _ [C] _ _ [Gm] _
[E] _ _ [Am] _ _ [E] _ _ [Am] _ _
[D] _ _ _ _ [G] _ _ _ _
_ [C] _ _ [E] _ [A] _ _ _ _
_ [D] _ [Bb] _ [G] _ _ [Ab] _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ And you [B] can hear, as Bob was saying, [D] it's a 16-bar tune with [G] ends on the G in the [C] middle,
and then it ends on the C at the end.
And I'm just playing a [Abm] lot of trying [A] to go from chord [E] to chord with as much rhythmic [G] bass as I can to keep that drive going.
And on the top line, trying to play [Am] some melody notes.
[E] And if you notice in the middle section, _ [Am] _ [E] the rhythm changed a little bit.
[Am] _
What I'm playing in [G] the bass obviously [E] changed at that point, and [N] same thing with Bob.
And that's that same _ Caribbean, New Orleans, ragtime jazz rhythm of [E] one, two, three, one, two, three, one, two, one, two, three, one, two.
_ [Am] _ _ [E] One, two, three, one, two, [A] three, one, two, one, two, three, one, two, [D] three, one, two, three, one, two, three, one, two, three.
[G] _ _
_ [C] Now that's a little simple trick I did there of just [G] taking an adjacent note and going one, two, three, one, two, three, one, two, three.
_ _ [N] Remember, you always want to look for easy things that sound hard, not hard things that sound easy.
This is a great dance piece.
Why don't we go to the slower version of this that we had transcribed.
And as Bob mentioned, the song lays a lot better at faster tempos.
So what we suggest is certainly play slow, play as written from the tab, and be aware of playing the right notes with the right fingers.
Meaning the thumb with the bass, the melody on top with the fingers.
And by doing that, you're developing a really good technique.
So let's go to the slow version of Mr.
Blake. _ _ _ _
_ [C] _ _ _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [A] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ [D] _ _ [Am] _ [F] _ [Gb] _ [D] _ _
[G] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ [E] _ _ _ [A] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [D] _ _ [Am] _
[Bb] _ [G] _ _ _ [C] _ [Ab] _ _ [C] _
_ _ [E] _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _
_ [E] _ _ _ [Am] _ _ _ [D] _
[Gb] _ _ _ [D] _ _ _ [G] _ [A] _
[Bb] _ [G] _ _ _ [C] _ _ _ [E] _
_ _ _ [A] _ _ _ _ _
_ [D] _ _ [Dm] _ [Bm] _ [G] _ _ [C] _
[Ab] _ _ _ [C] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ [A] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ [D] _ _ _ [F] _ [D] _ _ _
[G] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ [E] _ _ _ [A] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [D] _ _ [Am] _
[Bb] _ [G] _ _ _ [C] _ [Am] _ [Ab] _ [C] _
_ _ [E] _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _
_ [E] _ _ _ [Am] _ _ _ [D] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [G] _ [A] _
[Bb] _ [G] _ _ _ [C] _ _ _ [E] _
_ _ _ [A] _ _ _ _ _
_ [D] _ _ [Dm] _ [Bm] _ [G] _ _ [C] _
[Ab] _ _ _ [C] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [N] _ _