Playing Blues Together - Do the Blues Ever Really End?
The blues never ends!
How to Play the Blues | Step-by-Step for Beginners
Lesson 6: Do the Blues Ever End?
Well done, blues explorer! Welcome to your final lesson in the Blues Ukulele Series. If you’ve made it this far, you’ve already learned the building blocks of the blues: the groove, the chords, the rhythm, and those tasty little riffs that make people’s heads start nodding.
Now it’s time to put it all together and play blues that sounds confident, musical, and unmistakably cool.
Take a deep breath, shake out your strumming hand, and let’s make some blues magic.
This is what we’ll cover:
1. The Blues Recipe
2. Let’s Put it all Together
3. Build Your Performance
4. Do the Blues Ever End?
1. The Blues Recipe
Think of the blues like a musical recipe with four ingredients:
1. Three Chords (I, IV, V)
2. The 12-Bar Structure
3. A Steady Groove
4. Solos and Riffs
When you combine these, you don’t just play chords - you tell a musical story.
1. Three Chords (I, IV, V)
For this last lesson we’re playing the E Blues, which uses these 3 chords:
E7 (the I chord)
A7 (the IV chord)
B7 (the V chord)
2. The 12-Bar Structure
Here’s a reminder of the classic 12 -Bar Blues road map to follow:
E7 | E7 | E7 | E7 |
A7 | A7 | E7 | E7 |
B7 | A7 | E7 | B7
3. A Steady Groove
Have a go at strumming the chords in this order (remember, each section stands for 4 beats in a bar)
Practice your best shuffle strumming and once you finish bar twelve, simply loop back to the beginning and ride the E Blues train again!
4. Solos and Riffs
Remember our trusty blues scale pattern? Today we're using the E Blues Scale (starting on the 3rd string fourth fret) to play around with some solos and riffs.
E blues scale on ukulele
Let’s Put It All Together! 🧩
The Blues Brothers - ‘Sweet Home Chicago’
What better song to finish with and put all our new skills together!
First of all, practice playing along to the soundtrack with the E7, A7 and B7 chords to get the feel, then throw in some E Scale riffs!
The Blues Brothers - Sweet Home Chicago
Intro [B7] [A7] [E7]
Chorus
Come [E7]on
Oh [A7]baby don't you wanna [E7]go
Come [A7]on
Oh [A7]baby don't you wanna [E7]go
Back to that [B7]same old place
[A7]Sweet home Chi-[E7]cago
Chorus
Come [E7]on
[A7]Baby don't you wanna [E7]go
Hide-[A7]hey
[A7]Baby dont you wanna [E7]go
Back to that [B7]same old place
[A7]Sweet home Chi-[E7]cago
Verse 1
Well, [E7]one and one is two
Six and two is eight
Come on baby don't ya make me late
Hide-[A7]hey
[A7]Baby dont you wanna [E7]go
Back to that [B7]same old place
[A7]Sweet home Chi-[E7]cago
Chorus
Come [E7]on
Oh [A7]baby don't you wanna [E7]go
Well, come [A7]on
Oh [A7]baby don't you wanna [E7]go
Back to that [B7]same old place
[A7]Sweet home Chi-[E7]cago
Instrumental
[E7] [A7] [E7] [A7] [E7] [B7] [A7] [E7] [E7] [A7] [E7] [B7] [A7] [E7] [B7]
Verse 2
[E7]Six and three is nine
Nine and nine is eighteen
Look there brother baby and see what I’ve seen
Hide-[A7]hey
[A7]Baby dont you wanna [E7]go
Back to that [B7]same old place
[A7]Sweet home Chi-[E7]cago
Chorus
Oh, come [E7]on
[A7]Baby don't you wanna [E7]go
Come [A7]on
[A7]Baby dont you wanna [E7]go
Back to that [B7]same old place
[A7]Sweet home Chi-[E7]cago
Outro
[E7] [A7] [E7] [A7] [E7] [B7] [A7] [E7] [E7] [A7] [E7] [B7] [A7] [E7]
Build Your Performance 🎶
Let’s stack the layers and turn this into a mini performance:
First Chorus — Chords Only
Play the 12-bar blues with steady strumming.
Second Chorus — Add Groove
Lean into that shuffle strum rhythm and maybe throw in a bit of chucking.
Pauses & Instrumentals — Add Fills
Slip in your E Blues Scale riffs and solos whenever there’s space.
The Whole Song — Play With Feeling
This is the most important step. Blues isn’t about perfection — it’s about expression.
Do the Blues Ever End? 😎
Take a minute to congratulate yourself on your achievements so far! But remember, here’s the beautiful thing about the blues:
Once you learn it, you never really finish learning it.
You can change the key.
Speed it up.
Slow it down.
Add new riffs.
Jam with friends.
The same 12 bars can create thousands of songs so the answer is NO the blues never do end!
Your Final Mission:
1️⃣ Start the Groove
Play some 12-bar blues progressions
Keep the rhythm steady.
Choose your favorite strumming pattern.
Play each progression twice through to get the groove flowing.
2️⃣ Add Some Blues Magic
Now it’s time to sprinkle in those blues scale notes.
Between chords, try adding a short riff or run.
Don’t worry about perfection!
3️⃣ Tell a Blues Story
Create a musical ‘conversation’ on your ukulele.
Play a short phrase (your ‘call’).
Answer it with another phrase (your ‘response’).
Try this 3–4 times during each progression.
4️⃣ Perform Your Mini Blues Jam
Choose your favorite bluesy song and put it all together:
Chords
Rhythm
Voice
A few blues scale riffs
Play your own version of the blues all the way through.
Now go add some bluesy sparkle to your ukulele world! 💙
✨Before We Go…
Thanks so much for taking part in our free six lesson blues course, we hope you’ve enjoyed it.
Together we have learned to:
✅ Put together everything we have learnt about the blues
✅ Tell a musical story
✅ Build a performance
✅ Play with expression
🚀 What’s Next?
If you want to keep exploring the blues, try learning:
more blues scales
fingerstyle blues patterns
call-and-response licks
The blues has been the foundation of countless styles - from jazz to rock to folk.
And now, it’s part of your playing too.
One Last Thought:
Blues isn’t about playing more notes.
It’s about making the notes you play mean something.
So grab your ukulele, play a slow 12-bar, and let it groove!
That’s the blues.
Happy Strumming 😊
