‘Bold as Hendrix’ – Blues/Rock lick in the style of Jimi.
I created this lick in order to demonstrate a few of Jimi’s trademarks. It is particularly reminiscent of his guitar work in ‘Bold as Love’ – hence the name! One approach Hendrix was known for (besides playing with his teeth), was using his thumb to fret the bass notes – in this lick that would be the 1st note of the 1st bar and the 1st note of the 3rd bar.
By taking this approach Hendrix kept his fingers free to do the lead work and even hint at some chord shapes at the same time (for instance notice the legato moving around a C major triad in the second bar). This is similar to how solo Jazz guitarists build up pieces playing the bassline, chords and lead all together to create unaccompanied but very ‘complete’ sounding music.
There’s plenty of hammer-ons and pull-offs as is typical of Rock/Blues and the lick ends with a minor pentatonic run and plenty of vibrato. Have fun with it and feel free to chop and change bits as you like – Hendrix would rarely play the same thing twice!
Click the play button below to hear the lick – the normal version is followed by a slowed down version.
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