We’ve talked here before about country licks—about how they’ve been used by rock guitarists like Jimmy Page, David Gilmour and Steve Howe, and the value they have in broadening your...
We’ve talked here before about country licks—about how they’ve been used by rock guitarists like Jimmy Page, David Gilmour and Steve Howe, and the value they have in broadening your range when playing licks and soloing.
Country shredder Jim Lill has covered this subject before in his excellent video on “10 Beginner Country Guitar Licks,” and we highly suggest you check it out if you haven’t yet.
In this video, Jim approaches the subject again by presenting “Three Quick, Interesting and Useful Country Guitar Licks,” all of which will sound great in a rock context. The lesson includes TAB right in the video for you to play along.
For those who have already watched “10 Beginner Country Guitar Licks,” Jim notes that this video is “the next step for people wanting to get into playing stuff that is a little more interesting.”
Jim describes the licks as follows:
Lick #1
There are 3 flavors of country electric guitar. There’s “Country” which is twangy. There’s “Southern Rock” which shows hints of twang but is mostly just overdriven and switching between major and minor. And there’s “Rock” because the country genre has for a long time embraced the rock-inspired art of the harmonically simple yet tonally pleasing. You mix elements of these three things in your playing to get the kind of sound you want. This first lick is roughly 33 percent of each.
Pentatonics/arpeggios = rock
b3 to 3 = Southern rock
hybrid picked sixths = country
This lick starts with a little southern rock with the b3 to 3 minor to major motion. Then it does a little arpeggio inside of the pentatonic shape, and ends by ascending hybrid picked sixths for unmistakeable country flavor. For some reason when I pick up a