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This is a sample lesson from the Secret Guitar Teacher website. It is part of a course called: 'From Blues to Jazz'. Please visit the website (link above) for more information.
Here is the abridged transcript of the lesson:
Call it Stormy Monday (but Tuesday's Just as Bad) -to give the song its proper title -was written by T-bone Walker and first recorded by him in 1947.
It then quickly became a favourite jam session tune and a whole variety of covers exist on record, ranging from the beautiful vocal renditions of artistes like Etta James, Nancy Wilson, and Eva Cassidy to the frenetic psychedelic performance of Eric Clapton with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers in 1966.
Then, in 1971 the Allman Brothers recorded a live version of the song that, for my money is the best recording of live music made by any band ever.
This is the version we are going to look at in this lesson. Here's what they did with the chord sequence:
Let's look at two useful ninth chord shapes we can use for a song like this. Here's the whole intro broken down in slow motion.
Notice that we end the intro on the augmented chord. This is a commonly used substitution for the fifth or dominant chord in the key, especially in intros and turnarounds in slow jazz-blues.
OK, now into the verse proper. What makes this recording of the song so remarkable is the light touch with which Duane Allman and Dickey Betts treat the chords.
Taking the G9 shape and just working with a couple of notes out of the chord we get three licks.
The first couple of licks work straight from the chord itself. In the first lick we simply pluck the notes on the 2nd and 4th strings at the third fret and slide them up to the fifth fret and back.
When we come to the C9 we can take the same idea up to the 8th fret C root
But typically we find it easier to move across the fret board to use the A string rooted shape which looks like this.
For this song this is best fingered as a five-string chord to include the extra fifth note at the top end like this
Notice that this shape has some similarities with the one we used for the G9 and this enables us to use exactly the same bunch of licks...
The hammer-on/pull-off lick works particularly nicely on this chord and again you can hear Duane Allman playing that on the live recording.
Next, in the third bar the G9 is played for two main beats ...and then slid up one fret to Ab9 for two beats then back to G9 for the whole of the fourth bar. This is then followed by another two bars of C9 then we are into the four bars of classic chord substitution that works so well it has actually become known as 'the stormy Monday changes'.
It starts by climbing up from the G7 using 2 beats on each of the chords that belong to the G major scale G7 Am7 Bm7 then it links back via the Bbm7 to Am7 where it pauses for the whole bar......then moves up to Cm7 for a whole bar before coming back to finish the verse with a relatively conventional turnaround of G7 C9 G7 D+
You can use the E shaped barre chord for the G7, but to get you more used to thinking like a Jazz guitarist have a go at this 4-string shape:
The fifth string can either be muted...
...if you play with a pick, or simply left out if you are using your thumb and fingers
Then, up to Am7 I am going to recommend this shape which we normally play with 2nd and 3rd fingers like this.
Then on the Cm7 he uses two versions of Cm7 starting with a couple of notes from this one...But then linking up to the higher voicing by using this shape
So bars 7 - 10 again altogether go like this
G7 Am7 Bm7 Bbm7 Am7 for the whole bar ...Cm7 for a whole bar...
Then it's into the turnaround with G7
C9 G7 and D augmented.
Some versions of the song opt for a Bm7b5 chord as a substitute for the G7 chord. This makes perfect sense when you spot the close similarity between the Bmin7b5 (sometimes called the B half-diminished chord)... and the G9 you can see that the Bm7b5 is really a G9 without the Root note. Of course, if you are in a band where the Bass or Keyboard player is playing a low G note, the audience will effectively be hearing a G9.
In the next lesson we'll take a close look at Duane Allman's solo and go over the first verse of it lick by lick to help provide you with an insight into his unique style of blues lead playing.
Look forward to seeing you for that.
