Guitar Lesson: R&B Acoustic Guitar, Round 2

Though you may not think of the acoustic guitar as an R&B instrument, players like Kerry “2 Smooth” Marshall are changing the game by bringing acoustic sounds to new genres. Along the way, Kerry has built a dedicated following as a music educator, session musician, and producer, showing the world how the acoustic guitar can make genres like R&B, gospel and neo-soul sound fresh and surprising.

In this series of guitar lessons, Kerry expands on his video lessons from the previous issue of the magazine, where he covered basic R&B chord progressions, the double-stop technique, and using diminished 7^th chords to capture that quintessential R&B flavor.

First, Kerry dives into the importance of barre chords in R&B acoustic guitar, showing how a couple of simple chord shapes can open a new range of sounds in your playing.

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Next, Kerry explores uses for hammer-ons, a common guitar technique that players can repurpose in R&B to add variety and flair.

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Finally, Kerry showcases a few bluesy, soulful R&B licks in the key of D that you can add to your toolkit to bring more spice to your playing style.

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Discover more of Kerry “2 Smooth” Marshall on his YouTube channel.