Dave Rubin: A Blues Guitar Expert Looks Back

After crafting more than 150 instructional books, the esteemed player, educator and Hal Leonard author discusses his approach to teaching the heart and soul of American music.   

The musician, educator and author Dave Rubin writes blues-guitar instructional books so well that you don’t need to play guitar to enjoy them.

To say that another way: The historical context he includes in his Hal Leonard resources, along with his diamond-sharp performance tips, combines graceful prose with a profound cultural understanding of this quintessentially American art form. 

Take, for example, his inspired book/audio resource Power Trio Blues, whose introduction details the fascinating Chicago-blues origins of what became an iconic rock format. Or his deep dives into Freddie King, Roy Buchanan, Jeff Beck and other guitar gods, which blend approachable transcriptions and musical analysis with well-researched track notes that wouldn’t feel out of place in Rolling Stone. You could read Rubin’s books on the subway and still get your money’s worth, but as a source of instruction, their wide-angle approach makes them remarkably effective — essential, even.

Rubin, who is based in New York City, fell in love with the blues as countless baby boomers did, through the great rock guitarists. From there, he became fully immersed in the tradition, first as a musician and then as a teacher and author. He’s written more than 150 instructional books on blues, rock and country guitar, most of which were crafted during his three-plus-decade run as an author for Hal Leonard. He’s also collaborated on resources with a wide range of artists, from his friend Bob Margolin to master guitar tech Doug Redler, and contributed prolifically to most of the great guitar magazines. Funnily enough, considering his gift for analysis, Rubin can’t quite pin down the source of his passion for the blues, so compelling is the music’s power of expression. “It speaks to me personally,” he says. “I don’t know where that comes from. It’s sort of indefinable.”

We recently caught up with the kindly, unassuming guitarist to learn more about his evolution and approach. Throughout this interview — which has been edited for clarity and space — Rubin’s answers tended to reflect the same strategy found in his books, melding his sweeping historical knowledge with lucid explanations of musical concepts. Enjoy. 

In a way, I feel like your signature as a clinician is to support your exercises with context and performance notes that read like excellent music journalism. How did you arrive there? What was that process like?

It makes me feel good that you take it that way, because that’s my intent. It was a long process that wasn’t planned out. I went to art school; I have a bachelor’s degree in painting. This was the late ’60s. And hearing Eric Clapton on that first Bluesbreakers album really pushed it. I always wanted to play, and it took me a while to do it. Once I started playing a little bit, and once I got introduced to the blues, I realized that all the rock ’n’ roll I listened to was really blues-based.

And I’ve always been a history fan. I like American history, and I always wanted to know more, even before I started playing, before being in bands. I started playing late, but I always wanted to know the answers. Why do you play this? Where does this come from? I was always interested, and I thought it enriched the experience. And as I came to love the blues more and more, I wanted to share that. I’m like, “Look at this. This is great American music.” 

You started playing late?

I didn’t start playing until I got out of college. I’ve always been the oldest person in any band I’ve been in. It had to gestate for a while. And then finally I said, “Well, I don’t care. Everybody I know started when they were 12, 13, 14. I’m starting after I graduate college.” This was in Philadelphia. I went and bought a Telecaster.

You’ve written titles in the Signature Licks and Play Like series, which I think are two of Hal Leonard’s most interesting concepts. Again, this goes back to context. While straightforward transcriptions are great, your notes on technique and history really fill in the gaps; these books are genuine lessons rather than play-by-numbers. Tell me about your approach to those series. 

When I would teach, even before I was writing those books, I would simplify the songs. I said, “Let’s get to the heart of it. We don’t need every detail here. We don’t need every pick scratch. People want to play the songs — and then if they want to dive in deeper, we’ll dive in deeper.” So I was already thinking that way, and then when they started the Signature Licks series, I thought, “This is perfect.”

I was an editor for Guitar One magazine, and they had the same philosophy there, which they called “Streamlined.” I am a huge fan of that. I’ve always tried to make my teaching and my books accessible. The Play Like books, they’re kind of a step forward from the Signature Licks — an even deeper dive into usually one artist’s music.

The blues, by and large, has been an oral tradition, and you’ve built your career in many ways by writing this tradition down on paper. What’s the greatest challenge there?

Feel. It’s hard to teach feel. When I get a new student, the first thing I do is say, “OK, play something for me. Play whatever you want.” What I’m listening for is rhythm, and to see if they have a sense of it. “Oh, thank God, they can feel it.” The shuffle beat is your heart beating to swung eighth notes. I’m so happy when they have that, because I don’t think that can be taught. It can be improved upon.

In your own teaching, say a really talented rock guitarist comes to you and they’re interested in playing some of the authentic electric blues styles, like the West Side of Chicago, or Texas, or West Coast. What’s the first thing you do with them? 

I try to get them to slow down. I tell them to listen to the blues legends from the past, especially the prewar and the early postwar ones, like B.B. King, as well as some people who aren’t so well known. When they had an uptempo tune, that’s where they would play fast sometimes. But then they’d play a slow blues, and that’s not where they tried to cram every space with notes. And I see a lot of rock players have done that. Clapton is guilty of that too, or has been in the past. 

There’s a time to play faster. You get some chops under your fingers and, wow, you want to go with it. But the blues is really about feel, and about listening to the melodies. Let’s play some melodies instead of just shredding the scales. Miles Davis talked about the space between the notes. What are you saying with your notes? 

Think of Stevie Ray Vaughan — often imitated and never duplicated. God knows he could play a lot of notes, but listen to him when he’s slowing it down and he’s in his Albert King mode.

Along those lines is the incredible sense of harmony that blues greats developed, often simply through listening and playing. They just knew how to match the right tones to the chords as they passed. Do you have a principle for teaching that? 

The early, prewar blues guitarists didn’t solo a lot. When they did start to solo, they were totally influenced by the vocals. So the vocalists are listening to the chord changes. They’re listening to the structure of the song, and they’re reacting to that, and they’re not trying to sing a lot of words. That was the point of the early blues solos. They were doing their version of the vocal melody of the song, so they are [naturally] following the chord changes. They’re hearing it.

I’m not saying that’s all you can do when you’re soloing. But listen to the vocal line and realize that that was the source of blues playing — not getting to improvise and twist the neck on your guitar.

It’s easy to think about B.B. King or Buddy Guy first as guitar heroes, but we should never overlook the fact that they’re wonderful blues singers as well. They could floor you without ever touching the instrument.  

Early on, B.B. probably thought of himself as a blues singer rather than a blues guitar player. Obviously he knew he could play, and he played his best, and you can’t give him enough credit. But I think he was always surprised that we loved his guitar playing so much — although he influenced everybody. 

Tell me about one of your career highlights as a performer. 

This is an easy one. I’d have to say backing up Chuck Berry twice. Of course, he was one of my rock ’n’ roll idols growing up — where I first started paying attention to the guitar. The first time I played with him was at a county fair in Virginia, and it was the most people I’ve ever played in front of. There must’ve been 10,000 people out there in this field. And of course I’m thrilled; I’m playing guitar with my hero, Chuck Berry. The band I was in, we were more of a rock ’n’ roll cover band with some blues. We were older and we knew his music, and I particularly did, and I made sure that when we played Chuck Berry songs, we played them right. So it didn’t take him long to realize, “Oh, these guys know my music. I don’t have to worry here. I can just do what I want.” 

He never said what he was going to play. You had to listen and figure out what song he was playing, ’cause he never introduced it. And you think to yourself, “I know the intros to all his songs.” Well, he changed them all around. You had to wait till he started singing to figure out what the song was. So in the middle of the set, without further ado, he breaks into a slow blues. I’m looking forward to hearing him play, but in the middle of the song, he throws the solo to me. My life flashes before my eyes. And the first thing that occurred to me was, “Don’t try to show off. Don’t look like you’re trying to show him up.” I just played a couple of notes from a blues scale, really slow. Lots of vibrato and bending. And after I was done, he walks up to the microphone — 10,000 people there — and he says, “And who says a white boy can’t play the blues?!”

Put that on your tombstone [laughs]. That’s awesome. Too often in guitar instruction, the blues is treated merely as a kind of stepping stone — something to understand so you can play jazz or shred. But you’ve homed in on the blues. You take the entire tradition very seriously. Why do you think you’ve made the blues your life’s work? 

It speaks to me personally. I don’t know where that comes from. It’s sort of indefinable. It doesn’t necessarily come from my background at all, except for listening to the music. And it’s meant so much to me in my life. Second only in importance to my family and my friends is the blues. That’s it — and playing blues guitar. And I get a lot of satisfaction out of being able to pass that on to people.