Hey, Scott!

Originally Posted by: scottintacoma253I was wondering if someone could point me in the right direction so I can better understand "the turnaround" in blues. I am having a heck of a time understanding the concept.

In general a turnaround in music is a little melody or phrase that ends one section and leads to the next section.

Specifically in blues a turnaround is a little melody that effectively "sums up" everything that the music has done so far, but in a shorter time. Basically starting at the I chord and quickly moving through the IV & V chords. Doing this makes a turnaround a very effective way to end a chord progression or blues chorus or verse pattern and then either start over or end the song. It's an annoucement that the blues form has reached the end of the form & is going to start again or end!

The most common blues turnarounds usually have some variation of a desending line like this. Both examples are in E.

|--0--0------------------------|------------------------|[br]|---------3--3--2--2--1--1--|--0----------0---------|[br]|-------------------------------|------2--3-------------|[br]|-------------------------------|------------------------|[br]|-------------------------------|------------------------|[br]|-------------------------------|------------------------|

Or an ascending line like this.

|--------------------------------|------------------------|[br]|--------------------------------|------------------------|[br]|--------------------------------|------------------------|[br]|--------------------------------|------------------------|[br]|-----------------0--0--1--1--|--2---0---1---2-------|[br]|-0--0--4--4------------------|------------------------|