Slow Blues Solo in A

Your solos know the scale. They just don’t know the song.

If you know your way around the pentatonic box but every solo still comes out sounding the same, this is the piece nobody taught you: how to make those licks follow the chords, so a solo finally sounds like a song instead of a scale.

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The struggle

It happens to almost everyone who learns to solo this way.

When I learned to solo, the advice was simple. Get the pentatonic scale under your fingers, and play along with jam tracks for a few thousand hours. And honestly, that’s great advice… for a while.

But sooner or later, most players hit the same wall. The licks are all in key. The timing is fine. And the solo still doesn’t fit the song the way you hoped it would. All those hours, all those patterns, and somehow it keeps coming out sounding like a scale.

  • Every solo ends up sounding the same. It’s the same box and the same handful of licks, no matter what song is playing underneath.
  • The notes are all right, and the solo still doesn’t sing. That tasty, heart-string thing you hear on the records just isn’t there, and it’s hard to put a finger on why.
  • Practicing more didn’t move it. More scales, more licks, faster fingers… and the solos still didn’t connect.
  • Soloing in front of people starts to feel like a risk. When the spotlight swings around, some quiet part of you would rather pass it along.

The shift

It’s not that you’re playing the wrong notes. You’re just not playing the right ones.

Here’s the part almost nobody explains when you’re learning to solo. Your licks aren’t lining up with the chords underneath them. They’re floating over the top, in the right key but landing in the wrong place. Right scale, wrong moment.

The good news is you don’t have to become a theory whiz to fix that. You need a few simple principles, and you need to see them in action, on a real solo, over a real progression.

That’s the whole idea behind Slow Blues Solo in A. We take a standard 12-bar blues in A and build one complete solo over it, one phrase at a time. For every lick, I’ll show you why it’s there, how it locks onto the chord underneath it, and how to move it somewhere else when you want to.

What’s inside

A few of the things you’ll pick up along the way.

  • One small move that makes any major triad sound instantly bluesy. It’s buried in almost every classic blues lick you’ve ever heard. Once I point it out, you’ll hear it everywhere and wonder why nobody mentioned it sooner.
  • How to work the edges of the pentatonic box. Most of the character in this solo comes from a handful of notes most players walk right past. They’re not far from where you already are. Most players just never look.
  • Why certain riffs in this solo will follow you anywhere on the neck, even to positions where you don’t know the scale. It sounds like I have the whole neck charted. I don’t. I just know this one thing about it.
  • A shortcut for finding inverted thirds all over the fretboard, in any key. Most players hunt for these by feel and luck. This one makes them pop out like they’re highlighted.
  • The “harmony factor” that separates solos people lean into from ones they tune out. It has nothing to do with speed or patterns. Most players never find it. The ones who do tend to sound like they’ve been playing twice as long as they have.
  • The string-skipping move that makes the same notes sound like a different instrument. Same position, same fingers, completely different texture. Most players skip it because it feels awkward the first time. It’s worth learning anyway.
  • A simple way to bend and pre-bend so the note lands in tune, every time. Out-of-tune bends are the fastest way to sound like you’re still learning. This is the fastest way to stop sounding that way.
  • Why double-stops are either the tastiest thing in the whole solo, or the worst clash you’ve ever played… and the one thing that determines which side you land on.
  • The scale pattern I call the “Ultimate Solo Scale,” and why I reach for it whenever I want a solo to feel finished. It’s not about adding another pattern. It’s about what opens up when you have this one.

It’s all built around one complete solo, taught phrase by phrase, so every idea has a real place to live.

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How it’s taught

The Copycat Solo Sessions.

Most courses like this one play you the lick, then move straight on to the next. I wanted something that actually gets the solo into your hands, so I built the lessons around a method I’m calling the Copycat Solo Sessions.

I play a piece of the solo. The jam track loops right there. Then it’s your turn to play it back. I go again, you go again. Call and response, all in one take, with no buttons to push or pages to flip.

It works because your ear is the best teacher you’ve got. Once you’ve traded a phrase back and forth a few times, it stops being notes on a page and starts being something you can feel.

Reviews

What players say after it finally clicks.

Jonathan, I sincerely believe your lesson material on this subject and demonstration of it via this solo is absolutely top notch. I cannot credit you enough! I think any learner who believes just learning lead solos from songs without any regard to understanding the underlying theory framework of scale choices / notes and their relationship to harmony is really making a big mistake in the long run!

Alvin BorthwickAustralia

I have to say that doing the Slow Blues in A course seems to have been the clincher for me. It made me see the versatility of the pentatonic minor scale, and understand the relationship between the notes selected and the underlying chords. After messing around with bits and pieces on the guitar for years, a concerted effort with Blues in A… and I finally feel as though I can play a bit! It feels like the end of the beginning!

Melvin SchofieldUnited Kingdom

This course is/was a lot of fun. I learned so much. Practicing with the track is a blast. It never gets old! The timing is a little tough but when I try with the slowed down tracks it comes together.

Timothy Yslas

Different players, same turn… the moment the scale finally starts sounding like a song.

Before you buy

This one’s not for beginners.

I’ll be straight with you. This is not a first-week course, and it’s not a learn-to-solo-from-zero course. To pull the most out of it, you’ll want a few things already in place.

  • A little theory. You don’t need to be a whiz, but there’s a lot of practically-applied theory in here. If theory is brand new, Guitar Theory Unlocked is the better place to start.
  • Your pentatonic shapes. We lean on two patterns mostly, and dip in and out of the others. If they aren’t under your fingers yet, build that foundation first.
  • Some soloing miles. You should already be comfortable noodling around with scales and riffs. Full tab is included for everything, so you are never flying blind.

If you’re an intermediate player with a bit of soloing under your belt, looking for new ways to actually say something with it, this one was built for you.

Level up, or your money back.

Go through the whole course. Learn the solo, work the phrases, sit with the jam track. If you’re not playing with more intention and more feel than the day you started, if your licks aren’t following the chords better than they ever have, just email me. I’ll refund every penny, with no weasel clauses and no hoops. You keep the tab book and the backing track either way.

Jonathan

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From scale runner to blues storyteller.

Everything you need to play one complete blues solo that actually follows the song.

  • Play a complete 9-phrase slow blues solo over a full 12-bar progression, start to finish, with intention
  • Target chord tones on the fly so your licks follow the changes instead of floating on top of them
  • Use space and silence as a musical tool, and know exactly when not to play
  • Add double-stops that give your phrases real harmonic weight, right where the progression wants them
  • Resolve your solos with confidence, landing the notes that make people lean in
  • Turn the pentatonic box you already know into a real vocabulary, not a scale exercise

What's included 15 lessons, about 90 minutes in all · taught phrase by phrase with the Copycat Solo Sessions interspersed throughout · a course supplement book (PDF) with the theory, riffs and patterns spelled out · Guitar Pro 7 files for the whole solo · the backing track · lifetime access · email support · 60-day money-back guarantee

Stop running scales. Start telling stories. $40 Yes, teach me this solo

✓ Backed by the 60-day, level-up-or-your-money-back guarantee.

All prices in USD. One-time payment, instant access, lifetime access.

Forty bucks, one solo, and a better way to play every one after it.

The point was never to memorize a single solo. It’s to learn how a solo gets built… how the phrases lock onto the chords, where the space goes, how it lands at the end. Learn that once, on this one, and you’ve got a way of thinking you’ll use on every solo you play afterward. The 60-day guarantee puts the whole risk on me.

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