100 Ultimate Blues Riffs for Piano/Keyboards (Book and Downloadable Audio Files)

I am a beginning blues and jazz player, and after months of trying to create my own solo lines with no success, I got this book and started writing professional sounding solos right away. The riffs are quite well written and include notes outside of the blues scale for added richness. They can be used in their entirety or in bits and pieces. They come with a left hand part and chords, but are not necessarily limited to those chords. Many can be played over the entire blues or jazz-blues form. Listening to the CD all the way through is a great way to quickly pick out ones of most interest. For an extra $10, you can order a General MIDI file for use with a keyboard sequencer. The riffs are in a wide variety of keys and can be challenging to transpose to the one you need, but worth the effort. I would rather have more of them in F, C and G to start with rather than in keys that I hardly ever use, but I suppose transposing is a good exercise. There are also several pages at the end of the book where different riffs are transposed and connected into two songs. The songs are also on the CD and an excellent demonstration as to how the riffs can be used.

Great book for getting a ton of different styles of blues piano licks, rhytms, comping styles, and soloing under your fingers. Also, author is very easy to reach and very helpful! I highly recommend this book. I went and purchased the next two in the series and look forward to working through those.-- TJ

Would recommend as a excellent learning source for R and B music rhythm.

A good collection of 'real' licks that you can use. If you understand the blues format this volume will give you heaps to work with.I don't usually like lick books, but I dig this one.I hope there is a volume 2 on the way.

I am puzzled by the positive reviews of this book. As a blues player and teacher I am always searching for new artists and books about the blues and this book does not deliver. The "riffs" are played on a cheezy keyboard - not a real piano and are sequenced and quantized rendering them lifeless and useless. Playing these "riffs" will make you a better piano player, but will not help you learn the blues. Real blues are about groove and soul and feel not just playing a sequence of "riffs" - the vast majority of which would never be played by a real bluesman. Do not waste your money.

Hard to believe these are even called blues riffs, since there is nothing really bluesy about them. Some other reviewers noted how dull and soulless they are -- wished I'd just taken their word for it and not bought this. But I did buy it, and tried it, just to see -- they are total tedium! I recommend Tim Richards'  Improvising Blues Piano  or Mark Harrison's book  Blues Piano: Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series (Keyboard Instruction)  instead. Although neither of these books has as many riffs as I'd like, they are both far, far superior to this one.

I have not had enough time to thorougly play the entire book, but what I have reviewed is exactly what I was looking for. Might yet be a 5 star .

Very comprehensive. Very challenging. I really get a kick out of this book. I'm half way done, and I feel like I've learned a lot. A real wide variety of styles from straight on blues to jazz to funk to pop.

Excellent book containing what I expected. Quick delivery also. What more do you want?

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