You may know Steve Trovato from a variety of places, he’s taught extensively for USC, Musician’s Institute in Hollywood, Truefire, Hal Leonard, and many others over his illustrious career… but my favorite thing he’s done are the lessons he’s done for you here at Blues Guitar Unleashed 🙂

This one is the style of Albert King’s “Crosscut Saw” and it’s what is commonly called a Blues Mambo feel.

This is  not one of the more common feels for blues, but it sure is a lot of fun and Steve gives a great explanation of how you need to find and play in the spaces of a blues groove. I know you’ll get a lot out of a few minutes with this video.

Here is the TAB for this lesson and here is the jam track (right click on the links to download.)

I hope you enjoy this lesson and please let us know what you think so we know what types of lessons to make more of for the future.


    71 replies to "Albert King Style Lesson With Steve Trovato"

    • david moon

      cool rhythm. I got the backing track and the tab. I couldn’t find any way to download the video locally.

      In the tab,for key of G you really should have F# in the key signature, and then make it natural if it’s a flat 7. Then in the D chords you won’t need the sharp on the Fs. The tab doesn’t care, but if we’re doing standard notation let’s do it right.

      • PAUL

        WOW, Steve Looks younger than today. This is how long I have been with you Griff.

      • Ricardo

        G7, C7 and D7 chords are all in different keys.
        G7 is the V7 in the Key of C.
        C7 is in F.
        D7 is in the Key of G.

        Writing in the Key of G would require a natural sign for the F’s in the G7 chord.
        Writing, as it is, in C requires a sharp on the F’s in the D7 chord.
        Either way you still have to flat the B in C7.
        Neither way is more “correct”.
        Since the first chord is in C, that’s the way I would go as well.

    • kep

      Thanks and keep them coming

    • Jean Dominique

      The idea of mambo/latin beat gets me excited. thank you

    • Dan

      I almost always wish that there was a tab for the “backing track” as well!
      It’s certainly the case on this occasion.
      I know it is fun to discover things the natural way, but if at meal time one is been spoon fed the main ingredient, why not the sauce and veg at the same time as well?
      Other than that I loved it!
      Dan

    • Drake J.

      Hey Griff; Good lesson from Steve, but I’d Like to see some more up to date tunes, like maybe from Robert Cray, or Buddy Guy, still, those older tunes are a great foundation to learn from ! Thanks for the lesson ! Drake J.

    • tony

      seems funny that this vido came around when i started to break cords apart looking for a truly unique sound . this teaching here has been right in step lately. with how i am progressing with my learning. i like this guy steve { cool sounds }.

    • Tea

      I like that, it was really cool.

      Thanks

    • Joseph

      Beauty in simplicity, as well as the silence between the tones mahesh it interesting.

    • Alexander Blue

      Like Steve’s teaching methods Tater … however … I think the tune blows.
      A.B.

      • PAUL

        seen this before. not to knock Steve, but he is not as good fo a teacher then Griff. He made a few flubs. very simple. He did not clip the neck in a box video so i could not see his fingers. i had to do it by ear, until i saw the tabs.

    • Mike Kessler

      I love the sound and the vibe, it’s a good kinda laid back funky blues feeling.

    • Mark Arnold

      Thanks guys good stuff like others have said adding to the bag of tricks !

    • jim

      Very weird. Last night I was going though the “52 Rhythm Fills and Variations” course that I bought a few months ago.
      Got up to Example 3.3 (Latin Blues in G with sus4 chords and fills)! Guess I’m REALLY supposed learn this one!
      And I think I’m finally comfortable with sus4 (and 2) chords…I get it!
      Thanks Griff!

    • Rich Croce

      Very cool lesson Griff. More rhythm ideas especially small chord and jazzy chord change examples would be helpful.
      Thanks for doing what you do.
      Rich C

      • Jim Cinnater

        I second what Rich sez! more great rhythm ideas that make us stand out more on guitar plus never step on other musician’s toes!! Steve Travato’s super!!

        Jim C.

      • James

        Love the music but I need finger/string spoken and shown the way you do it griff. Thanks

    • Ann

      realy love this….so cool.

    • Harrison

      Nice and clean, I can see where it could take one places. Posibilities are great.

    • Daniel Rose

      Thanks that was very cool !!

    • William Hyslop

      Thanks to Griff and Steve

    • ozzy

      Thanks so much for all you do Griff. I love Steve and I love you. Anything you or Steve puts out is wonderful and always will be. Thanks again and please continue to send me your lessons cuz I always learn something from them. You are a great teacher and I have great respect for you. God bless my guitar friend.

    • Steve Jenkin

      Thanks Griff
      Steve Trovato is the master instructor his comments and instruction has given my personal playing over the last 2 years an new edge. Well done to both you guys .
      SteveJ
      from down under
      Aust.)

    • Ann

      Realy like the beat and sound ….good lesson.

    • bob gerbasi

      won’t open..??

    • Mr. Smith

      I like his explanation of resolving the Sus chord and imitating piano with fingerstyle plucking. Good concepts that I’ll remember.

    • mike

      Nice. I love those riffs that really focus on the rythm

    • erdogan

      many thanks for the lesson.

    • Doug

      Cool.. great…smooth….hmmmmm should I quit my day job now…. for sure!

    • bunk

      easy enough but great stuff! Thx

    • D. Hunt

      Very nice… I particularly like the way this style results in a more solid rythmic coordination of beat to chord change..

    • Kitty

      Great! I still need to strengthen my wrist for bar chords. Are there exercises for this?
      Thanks, Kitty

      • Jeff

        Not an exercise but maybe to tweak your approach a little. You don’t need the full bar chord (all 6 strings). As Steve explained, you only need to make the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th strings ring. As it turns out, those are the easiest to make ring when you play a “full” bar chord. So if you naturally are able to make those 3 strings ring without killing your wrist, that’s all you need. And, as Griff has said many times in the past, most of the time you simply don’t want to nor do you need to play all 6 strings of a bar chord Usually all you need are 2 or 3 strings when you are playing with a band.

    • ron wood

      well done 1st class example of different !!!

    • John Smiles

      Excellent! Another snippet to add to my expanding music vocabulary.
      Many Thanks.

    • Tommy Loo

      Helpful instructions that go slowly and are relevant to basics so it becomes easy to follow because they relate to my experiences; Thank you much!

    • Pat

      Love it! Straight forward, funky, thanks!

    • MagicMigit

      Very sweet stuff. Thanks for sharing!

    • Michael

      Did i see a lesson where Steve played a lick over the 5 then 4 chord with a little turnaround ?
      Was keen to try and master this one but can’t seem to find it ?

    • les

      thanks griff im still having trouble i cant see the dvd its just not showing for some reason les

    • banjo paul

      I love it ! Thanks so much .

    • John

      Like the Steve Travato lessons Griff. I took some of his Voodoo Blues lessons a while back.. Good stuff, thanks!

    • Russ

      Well, that was cool. Thanks.

    • Mike jones

      Neat lesson thank you both any chance by Steve of a chuck berry especially Carol thanks

    • Tea

      Thank you Griff & thanks to Steve. i really learned something from that,
      i love playing chords & rhythm.

    • Derald

      Nice lesson, Thanks

    • jim

      Great lesson. Great to see a well done lesson on rhythm guitr. Hope to see more.

    • Dave Shephared

      Neat lesson. Thanks Griff for sharing Steve’s lessons.

    • Gary

      Steve,

      Thank you for both lessons. You are an accomplished teacher clear, complete and succinct. I like your style.

      Thanks again for the lesson.

      Gary

    • forby

      nice lesson marra forby sunderland

    • Audrey

      Real Nice-Thanks
      Audrey

    • Dr. O

      Thank you…Fingers cAme before picks!!!!

    • Chris from perth

      Like the piano analogy. Still dying for the blue les Paul tab

    • Brian Palmer

      Thanks good stuff Steve! Every thing helps

    • Quero

      Nice…it makes me feel like dancing with the tune…I’ll surely would like to dig with this lesson thanks Steve and Griff.

    • Ken Craig

      Love it, so simple and so effective. I was playing it in the house and some friends thought I was more than cool. I love to play the four note chords with my fingers. 6th string root, 5th string root, they all sound great in a rhythm.

    • steve

      very clear and simple, nice rhythm-I have not used a pick in years so this
      came naturally

    • Dave AKA Bluewater

      Steve,
      I enjoy your teaching. Tab and Jam track work fine.
      Ditching the pick works well for me. Adding the sus4 sound in the context of 12 bar 7th chord progression is fresh sounding and adds to my bag of tricks. That’s cool. Sounds Jazzy.I also played it with hybrid picking which gives the little chord a little stronger 7th feel too.
      Thanks!

    • Griff

      Got the TAB link fixed… sorry about that it was a typo on my part.

    • Chris

      Nice blues groove, great for both the right and left hand, thanks a lot for the lesson.

    • Keith

      Could not get tab….and I’d love to be able to see the sus configuration. Nice lesson though

    • Gerry Leftwich

      I can’t pluck with my right hand fingers…period. I have always played with a pick. Sorry, but this particular lesson is of no use to me. It would have helped a bit to see the tab for the fingering of the chords, but the tab isn’t working…you get an Error Message.

    • Jeremy

      Another great piece of information. It opens up whole areas and really gets you right in the groove. Good on you Steve and The G rif Hamlin. My question is, if the blues is so sad why does it make me feel so good!

    • Shirley

      Help…this is very cool…would love to have the tab! Thx

    • roger robichaud

      Awesome! thanks.

    • Patsy Selman

      My opinion is you need to tell us what finger you are putting on what string ( E A D G B E ) and what friet to put what finger ( first finger – middle finge- ring finger – pinky finger) other than that its pretty cool thanks patsy

    • Chris L. Babcock

      Yes same here…no tab…get an error message…..great video though…..

    • Doug

      Same problem. Tab won’t download.

    • John H

      Hi Griff,
      Thanks to Steve for the lesson. Unfortunately the TAB won’t download, I get an error message that the file is damaged.
      cheers
      John H

    • Barry

      No tab found.

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