50 Jazz Blues Licks is an exclusive series of video guitar lessons by David Hamburger covering the jazz blues styles of historically great guitarists like George Benson, Kenny Burrell, Joe Pass, and many others. A new lick will be released each week, so be sure to subscribe and check back often!

Red Garland first rose to prominence as the pianist with Miles Davis’ mid- to late-1950s group, the quintet which also included saxophonist John Coltrane, bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Philly Joe Jones. Although he played on the renowned Prestige albums Cookin’, Relaxin’, Steamin’ and Workin’ and Miles’ first couple of records on Columbia, Garland was gone by 1958, out playing with his own trio. While still with Davis, however, Garland did a few quintet sessions under his own name, with Coltrane on tenor and Donald Byrd on trumpet, Soul Junction and All Mornin’ Long, which have also been reissued under Coltrane’s name as Complete Recordings (With Red Garland and Donald Byrd). The title cut to each original album include pretty endless quantities of Garland playing relaxed, deep-dish blues, while “Soft Winds” and “Billie’s Bounce” are blues in a more uptempo, straight ahead vein. On the latter in particular Coltrane carves up the changes in double time from the get-go, though elsewhere the he still holds forth in a fairly conversational, pre-”Giant Steps” vein and Byrd blows all the textbook bebop lines you could want to hear. And there’s the minor blues “Birks Works,” which is positively cooking.

Video Guitar Lesson

If you like these guitar lessons, be sure to also check out Frank Vignola’s Jazz Up Your Blues, which showcases essential jazz blues vocabulary and techniques, Mark Stefani’s Jazzed Blues Assembly Lines, which takes you on a sonic learning tour through the funky rhythm and blues stylings and fretboard concepts of top jazz blues players, and of course all of David Hamburger’s courses.