Acid blues

Acid Rock was the heaviest, loudest variation of psychedelic rock. Drawing from the overblown blues improvisations of Cream and Jimi Hendrix, acid rock bands relied on distorted guitars, trippy lyrics, and long jams. Acid rock didn’t last too long — it evolved and imploded within the life span of psychedelia — and the bands that didn’t break up became heavy metal bands.

Source http://www.allmusic.com/style/acid-rock-ma0000012327

African-American Blues

Many scholars and ethnomusicologists point to Africa as the origins of the Blues. Albums such as African Blues by Ali Farka Tourehave a noticeable African and American Blues influence. The death of Malian guitar legend Ali Farka Touré has inspired a new round of speculation about the roots of the blues in Africa. Touré famously argued that the beloved American genre was “nothing but African,” a bold assertion. Among scholars, Gerhard Kubik‘s book Africa and the Blues has gained recognition as the most serious and penetrating examination of the subject. Even though the blues is a central component of American music, it is one of the most mysterious, and least understood aspects of our popular music culture.

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_blues

Blues-rock

Blues-Rock (1960-present) The blues had a baby and they called it “rock & roll”! Blues rock is a musical genre combining bluesy improvisations over the twelve-bar blues and extended boogie jams with rock and roll styles. The core of the blues rock sound is created by the electric guitar, piano, bass guitar and drum kit, with the electric guitar usually amplified through a tube guitar amplifier, giving it an overdriven character.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blues_rock>
More Info <http://blues.about.com/od/abluesprimer/u/BluesBasics.htm>

Boogie-woogie

An up-tempo blues style usually associated with the piano where the left hand plays repetitive bass notes in a rhythmic design and the right hand improvises. Originally an integral part of the ragtime and stride piano traditions of New Orleans and Kansas City, it evolved into an important element of Texas-style western swing.

Source <http://blues.about.com/od/bluesglossary/g/BoogieWoogie.htm>

More Info <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boogie-woogie>

British blues

British blues is a form of music derived from American blues that originated in the late 1950s and which reached its height of mainstream popularity in the 1960s, when it developed a distinctive and influential style dominated by electric guitar and made international stars of several proponents of the genre including The Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Fleetwood Mac and Led Zeppelin. A number of these moved into mainstream rock music and as a result British blues helped to form many of the sub-genres of rock. Since then direct interest in the blues in Britain has declined, but many of the key performers have returned to it in recent years, new acts have emerged and there has been a renewed interest in the genre.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_blues>

Canadian blues

Canadian blues is the blues and blues-related music (e.g., blues rock) performed by blues bands and performers in Canada. There are hundreds of local and regionally-based Canadian blues bands and performers, that perform mainly in their home city or town.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_blues>

Chicago blues

The blues music made by these newcomers took on a new sheen as well, as musicians replaced their acoustic instruments with amplified versions and the basic guitar/harmonica duo of Delta blues and Piedmont blues was expanded into a full band with bass guitar, drums, and sometimes saxophone. The Chicago blues sounded more full-bodied than its country cousin as well, the music pulling from broader musical possibilities, reaching beyond the standard six-note blues scale to incorporate major scale notes. While the “south side” blues sound was often more raw and raucous, the “west side” Chicago blues sound was characterized by a more fluid, jazz-influenced style of guitar playing and a full-blown horn section.

Source <http://blues.about.com/od/abluesprimer/a/ChiBlues.htm>
More Info <http://blues.about.com/od/modernbluesessentials/tp/EssChicagoBlues.htm>

Ten Best Chicago Blues Songs
<http://blues.about.com/od/bestoftheblues/tp/BestChicagoBlues.htm>

Classic female blues

Classic female blues was an early form of blues music, popular in the 1920s. An amalgam of traditional folk blues and urban theater music, the style is also known as vaudeville blues. Classic blues were performed by female vocalists accompanied by pianists or small jazz ensembles, and were the first blues to be recorded. Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, Ethel Waters, and the other singers of this genre were instrumental in spreading the popularity of the blues.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classic_female_blues>

Contemporary R&B

As the disco era came to a close, a new generation of producers began adding synthesizers and slick drum machine beats to African-American music. Michael Jackson was among the first post-disco black musicians to cross over to mainstream audiences. In its early years, mainstream R&B was very pop-oriented. Notable 1980s R&B musicians include Luther Vandross, the SOS Band, Mtume, Freddie Jackson, DeBarge, Loose Ends, Stephanie Mills, and Marvin Gaye.

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contemporary_R%26B

Country blues

Country blues, which is also known as “folk blues,” is a primarily an acoustic guitar-oriented type of blues from which many other styles are derived. It often incorporated elements of gospel, ragtime, hillbilly, and Dixieland jazz. The popularity and hit records of original country blues artists like Mississippi’s Charley Patton, or Blind Lemon Jefferson from Texas would subsequently influence scores of musicians across the Southern United States.

Source <http://blues.about.com/od/abluesprimer/a/CountryBlues.htm

More Info <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country_blues>

Delta blues

The Delta blues is one of the earliest styles of blues music. It originated in the Mississippi Delta, a region of the United States that stretches from Memphis, Tennessee in the north to Vicksburg, Mississippi in the south, Helena, Arkansas in the west to the Yazoo River on the east. The Mississippi Delta area is famous both for its fertile soil and its poverty. Guitar, harmonica and cigar box guitar are the dominant instruments used, with slide guitar (usually on the steel guitar) being a hallmark of the style. The vocal styles range from introspective and soulful to passionate and fiery. Delta blues is also regarded as a regional variation of country blues.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_blues>

Detroit blues

Detroit blues is blues music played by musicians resident in Detroit, Michigan, particularly that played in the 1940s and 1950s. Detroit blues originated when Delta blues performers migrated north from the Mississippi Delta and Memphis, Tennessee to work in Detroit’s industrial plants in the 1920s and 1930s.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_blues>

Electric Blues

The electric blues is a type of blues music distinguished by
the amplification of the guitar, the bass guitar , and/or the harmonica. Electric blues is performed in several regional subgenres, such as Chicago blues, Texas blues and Memphis blues.The electric blues first emerged as a fully-fledged genre in the mid-1940s. The initial wave of U.S. electric blues musicians inspired the British blues scene of the 1960s, which included artists such as John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, Cream, Eric Clapton, The Yardbirds and the first incarnation of Fleetwood Mac, as well as rock groups such as Led Zeppelin and The Rolling Stones.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_blues>

Gospel blues

Gospel blues or holy blues is a form of blues-based gospel music that has been around since the inception of blues music, a combination of blues guitar and evangelistic lyrics. Notable gospel blues performers include Blind Willie Johnson, Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Reverend Gary Davis.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_blues>

Hill country blues

Hill country blues (also known as North Mississippi hill country blues or North Mississippi blues) is a regional style of African American music regarded as distinct from Mississippi Delta blues. It is characterized by a strong emphasis on rhythm and percussion (including fife & drum music and the prominent use of the slide guitar), tunes built from guitar riffs, few chord changes, unconventional song structures, and an emphasis on the “groove” or a steady, driving rhythm (sometimes referred to as a “drone” style). Mississippi Fred McDowell possessed this distinctive style that was heavier on percussive elements and African rhythms than traditional delta blues.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_country_blues>

Hokum blues

Hokum is a particular song type of American blues music – a humorous song which uses extended analogies or euphemistic terms to make sexual innuendos. This trope goes back to early blues recordings, and is seen from time to time in modern American blues and blues-rock.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hokum>

Jazz blues

Jazz is considered to have some of its roots in the blues,^[16] and the blues progression is one of several blues elements found in jazz such as blue notes, blues-like phrasing ofmelodies, and blues riffs. Tunes that utilize the jazz-blues harmony are fairly common in the jazz repertoire, especially from the bebop era.

A twelve-bar jazz blues will usually feature a more sophisticated—or at any rate a different—treatment of the harmony than a traditional blues would, but the underlying features of the standard 12-bar blues progression remain discernible. One of the main ways the jazz musician accomplishes this is through the use of chord substitutions—a chord in the original progression is replaced by one or more chords which have the same general “sense” or function; in this case occurring especially in the turnaround (i.e., the last four bars). One well-known artist that sang this form of jazz was Billie Holiday, and almost all well known instrumental jazz musicians will have recorded at least one variation on this theme.

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jazz_blues#In_jazz

Jump blues

Jump blues is an up-tempo blues usually played by small groups and featuring horns. It was very popular in the 1940s, and the movement was a precursor to the arrival of rhythm and blues and rock and roll.^[1] More recently, there was renewed interest in jump blues in the 1990s as part of the swing revival.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jump_blues>

Kansas City blues

Kansas City blues is a genre of blues music. It has spawned the Kansas City Blues & Jazz festival and the Kansas City Blues Society.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_City_blues>

Louisiana blues

Louisiana blues is a genre of blues music that developed in the period after World War II in the state of Louisiana. It is generally divided into two major sub-genres, with the jazz-influenced New Orleans blues based around the city and the slower tempo swamp blues incorporating influences from zydeco and Cajun music from around Baton Rouge.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana_blues>

Memphis blues

The Memphis blues is a style of blues music that was created in the 1910s – 1930s by Memphis-area musicians like Frank Stokes, Sleepy John Estes, Furry Lewis and Memphis Minnie. The style was popular in vaudeville and medicine shows, and was associated with Memphis’ main entertainment area, Beale Street. W.C. Handy, the “Father of the Blues” published The Memphis Blues.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memphis_blues>

Piano blues

Piano blues is a broad stylistic term that may refer to a variety of blues styles, sharing only the characteristic that they use the piano as the primary musical instrument and adhere to the basic harmonic structure of Blues.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_blues>

 Piedmont blues

Characterized by a finger-picked style of playing an acoustic guitar, Piedmont blues features a syncopated rhythm played by the thumb on the bass strings of the instrument while the fingers pick out a melody on the treble strings. Heavily influenced by ragtime music, Piedmont style blues are generally up-tempo in sound and were extremely popular as dance music with African-American audiences during the 1930s and ’40s. Considered a form of “country blues,” Piedmont blues were influential with late-1950s/early-60s folk singers and with some rockabilly musicians.

Source <http://blues.about.com/od/abluesprimer/a/PiedmontBlues.htm
More info <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piedmont_blues>

Punk blues

Punk blues (or blues punk) denotes a fusion genre of punk rock and blues.^[1] Punk blues musicians and bands usually incorporate elements of related styles,^[2] such as protopunk and blues rock. Its origins lie strongly within the garage rock sound of the 1960s and 1970s.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punk_blues>

Rhythm and blues

Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B and RnB, is a genre of popular African-American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when “urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a heavy, insistent beat” was becoming more popular.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhythm_and_blues>

Soul blues

Soul blues is a style of blues music developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s that combines elements of soul music and urban contemporary music. Singers and musicians who grew up listening to the traditional electric blues of artists such as Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley, Jimmy Reed and Elmore James; soul singers such as Sam Cooke, Ray Charles and Otis Redding; and gospel music wanted to bridge their favorite music together. Bobby Bland was one of the pioneers of this style. This is a sub-genre of blues that is very popular with African American audiences but less known by white audiences.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_blues>

St. Louis blues

St. Louis blues is a type of blues music. It is usually more piano-based than other forms of the blues, and is closely related to the jump blues, ragtime and piano blues. Typically, a small number of singers, a pianist and a few other musical instruments (used primarily for rhythm) make up a band.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Louis_blues_(music)>

Mississippi Delta Blues

Perhaps the most influential of the many styles of blues music, Mississippi Delta blues (also called “Delta blues”) rose out of the fertile agricultural triangle located between Vicksburg, Mississippi to the south and Memphis, Tennessee to the north, and bordered by the Mississippi River to the west and the Yazoo River to the east. In this region, where cotton was the primary cash crop, much of the property was owned by white plantation owners and worked by black sharecroppers. Poverty was rife throughout the Delta, and working conditions were harsh.

Source <http://blues.about.com/od/abluesprimer/a/MsDeltaBlues.htm

Delta (Mississippi Delta)<http://blues.about.com/od/bluesglossary/g/Delta.htm

Highway 61 <http://blues.about.com/od/bluesglossary/g/highway61.htm>

Texas Blues

Texas blues is a subgenre of blues. It has had various style variations but typically has been played with more swing than other blues styles.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_blues>

Fire and Drums Blues

Fife and drum blues is a rural derivation of traditional country blues. It is performed typically with one lead fife player, often also the band leader and vocalist, and a troop of drummers. Unlike a drum corps, the drum troop is loosely structured. As such, a fife and drum band may have any number of snare, tom, and bass drum players. Fife and drum performances were family affairs often held at reunions and big picnics.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fife_and_drum_blues>

East Cost Blues

East Coast blues casts a wide net covering all of Piedmont blues – a style that relied on fast, virtuosic fingerpicking and added influences such as ragtime – as well as the urbanized R&B of New York blues and countless smaller regional styles.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Coast_blues>

New Orleans Blues

New Orleans blues, is a sub-genre of blues music and a variation of Louisiana blues that developed in the 1940s and 1950s in and around the city of New Orleans, rooted by the rich blues roots of the city going back generations earlier. Strongly influenced by jazz and incorporated Caribbean influences, it is dominated by piano and saxophone but has also produced major guitar bluesmen. Major figures in the genre include Professor Longhair and Guitar Slim, who both produced major regional, R&B chart and even mainstream hits.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Orleans_blues>

New York Blues

The New York blues is a type of blues music, characterized by significant jazz influences and a more modernized, urban feel than the country blues. It arose in New York City in the early part of the 20th century, and quickly spread to other urban areas and, often, more urbanised listeners than country blues, which is distinctively rural in nature.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_blues>

Swamp Blues

Swamp blues, sometimes the Excello sound, is a sub-genre of blues music and a variation of Louisiana blues that developed around Baton Rouge in the 1950s and which reached a peak of popularity in the 1960s. It generally has a slow tempo and incorporates influences from other genres of music, particularly the regional styles of zydeco and Cajun music. Its most successful proponents included Slim Harpo and Lightnin’ Slim, who enjoyed a number of rhythm and blues and national hits and whose work was frequently covered by bands of the British Invasion.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swamp_blues>

West Coast Blues

The West Coast blues is a type of blues music characterized by jazz and jump blues influences, strong piano-dominated sounds and jazzy guitar solos, which originated from Texas blues players relocated to California in the 1940s.^[1] West Coast blues also features smooth, honey-toned vocals, frequently crossing into urban blues territory.

Source <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Coast_blues>

Check Out these and many other topics on the blues.

*       Blues genres<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_blues_genres>
*       Blue note <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_note>
*       Blues scale <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blues_scale>
*       Blues shouter <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blues_shouter>
*       Gospel music <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_music>
*       Jug band <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jug_band>
*       Origins
*       Soul music <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_music>
*       Twelve-bar blues <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve-bar_blues>