Play Like Your Favorite Guitarists

How to Play the Blues Like Elizabeth Cotten with Pete Madsen

The ultimate goal of many acoustic guitarists is to develop a personal style. A good way to achieve this is to study the guitar styles of the greats and synthesize the ideas you find most appealing. Acoustic Guitar has many lessons offering insights into the distinct styles and techniques of your favorite guitarists—including blues greats, folk icons, singer-songwriters, and beyond.

Illustration of Elizabeth Cotten playing acoustic guitar with a freight train rolling by in the background.

Video Lesson: How to Play the Blues Like Elizabeth Cotten

Few guitarists have had as much impact on fingerstyle folk and blues guitar as Elizabeth Cotten. Learn to capture her sound, phrasing, and dynamic approach to guitar.

Pete Madsen
May 22, 2017

Close up view of Alvin Youngblood Hart's face and the upright neck of his acoustic guitar

Video Lesson: Play the Blues Like Alvin Youngblood Hart

Hart leans heavily on single-chord grooves with monotonic bass patterns. Learn some of these licks and how to capture the feel of Hart's acoustic blues.

Pete Madsen
March 14, 2017

Bob Dylan's Nashville Skyline album cover

How to Play Acoustic Bob Dylan: the Secrets Behind 10 of His Greatest Songs

Learn some of Bob Dylan’s deceptive chord moves, his fluency with standard and non-standard tunings, and his knack for constant reinvention with music examples drawn from his early work.

Adam Levy
October 13, 2016

Illustration of Robert Johnson with guitar.

Video Lesson: Reimagining Bluesman Robert Johnson in Open-G Tuning

Take a look at some of the songs Robert Johnson played in open tunings and learn how to use his melodic and rhythmic ideas in any 12-bar blues.

Pete Madsen
July 16, 2016

Jerry Garcia’s Way: Master the Grateful Dead Guitarist’s Acoustic Style

While dissertations have been written on Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead's electric guitar work, his acoustic side warrants consideration, too.

Adam Perlmutter
February 17, 2016

Video Lesson: Practice Ragtime Fingerpicking in the Style of Reverend Gary Davis [Pt. 1]

For guitarists, ragtime can be a joyful excursion filled with fun and quirky moves. I’ve taken inspiration from Blind Blake, Blind Boy Fuller, and the Reverend Gary Davis to piece together a composition I call “Pete’s Barrelhouse Rag.”

Pete Madsen
January 25, 2016

Video Lesson: Practice Ragtime Fingerpicking in the Style of Reverend Gary Davis [Pt. 2]

Part 1 of this lesson focused on my ragtime piece “Pete’s Barrelhouse Rag”—inspired by the piano-based jazz-blues form that’s heavily syncopated and that was popular in the late 1800s/early 1900s. Now, as promised, here’s a look at three additional variations on the piece. Variation 5 returns to the standard eight-bar…

Pete Madsen
January 25, 2016

Learn Maybelle Carter’s Bass Note Technique

Looking at bass notes this way gives you some flexibility to begin working melodic lines into the otherwise-basic chord progressions in the Carter Family repertoire

David Surette
May 10, 2013