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Blues Guitar Institute

Improve Your String Bending Now

The Most Fun You Can Have on the Guitar


When I first picked up the electric guitar, it seems that instinctively I started bending strings.  After hearing the sounds you could get as you bend the string until it nearly breaks, I was hooked.  This was crazy fun.  From that day forward, string bending just never left my playing.  And I love to listen to a great solo with soaring bends.

Think about bending masters like David Gilmour and BB King.  Those guys can grab your soul with a single perfectly bent note.  What a way to create some emotion in a solo.

These sounds are very unique to the guitar.  I guess you could bend a string on a violin, but I bet it wouldn’t sound as cool as a guitar. Yeah, I’m pretty sure about that.

String bending, its kind of our thing.

Why have I never tried to improve my string bending?

I have no idea.  I guess that if you play fast licks, you don’t really get an opportunity to hear that you are missing the note.  Maybe I never heard how badly I was bending.  Let’s just say that bending to the correct pitch was never really a focus for me.  Maybe I would naturally get close to the right note, but close really isn’t good enough.  Trust me.  After working on this for some time, I can tell that my overall sound has improved drastically.

My String Bending Exercise

Over the last several months, I have been concentrating on bending to the right pitch.  I try to avoid over bending and under bending, and really target a dead-on accurate bend.

Here’s a quick video explaining my string bending exercise.  You’ll hear some perfect bends and some not-so-perfect bends.  I am still working to get these down 100% of the time but this exercise has helped me come a long way in a relatively short amount of time.

I hope you get a lot out of it.

Cheers and Keep Bending!

When you are ready, there are two ways I can help you:

Back Porch Blues Course:  A proven system to fingerpicking the blues.  This step-by-step course guides you through building fundamental fingerpicking skills.  Plus, you’ll learn three levels of a delta blues style performance study to put your new skills into action.

Become a myBGI Member: Membership comes with access to Back Porch Blues plus over 70 step-by-step courses.  Get proven results with one of myBGI’s structured Roadmaps.

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