If you're on the hunt for high quality blues harmonica tabs, you've come to the right place! You
can find a complete list of my offerings NOW by scrolling halfway down this page.
But first, a word of warning: Because of the work that I put into my blues harp tabs, and
because of the precise rhythmic notations that EVERY tab offers you, I don't give my tabs away. I
charge $2 (and occasionally only $1) per tab.
So why should you pay me for my tabs, when the alternative--free tabs--is so widely
available? Great question!
You can find lots of free tabs on the web, simply by searching the phrases "free harmonica
tabs" and "free harp tabs." I urge you to make this search, and to check out those tabs!
You deserve better.
Now check out the FREE HARP TAB that I offer for the first chorus of Junior Wells's famous
solo on "Messin' With the Kid." I don't give away much on this website, but I'm giving away the
first page of this multi-page tab because I want you to judge for yourself. The miniature version is
on the right side of this page ⇒
The full-sized tab and the solo itself (as an mp3) can easily be downloaded from the following
two links:
Please compare my tab with the original recording and with any other tab of this passage, if
you can find one. "Messin' With the Kid" is an advanced tab for advanced players, but that's my
point: I treat you like the serious player that you WANT to be and I KNOW you can be.
And rest assured: I offer a range of easier tabs for developing players. I sort all my tabs into
four skill-levels: beginner, advanced beginner, intermediate, and advanced intermediate.
Whoever you are as a player, I've got something that will expand your mind, challenge your
current technical abilities, and raise your game in noticeable ways. (If you'd like to know more
about my approach to tabbing, please scroll to the bottom of this page and read "a word about
my tabs".)
My current offerings are listed below. When you hit the "tab link" for a given tab, you'll be
taken to a page at Tradebit, a filehosting website where I store all my products. There you'll learn
more about the song and, if you'd like, you can hear a preview of the video lesson that
accompanies the tab. (The videos cost $5; many people purchase both the tab and the video.
But you're free to purchase the tab alone, a la carte, and lots of people prefer to do that. It's
entirely up to you.)
⇒ If you'd like to know who I am, BTW, just hit THIS LINK and you'll be taken to my bio page.
I'm an internationally-known blues harmonica performer and instructor. Half a dozen of
my albums--listed as "Adam Gussow" and "Satan & Adam"--are currently available on
iTunes. I've been creating original blues harmonica tabs for more than 25 years. Few
tab-creators can match these qualifications.
If you'd like a complete list of my tabs AND instructional videos, organized as a searchable,
hyperlinked Excel spreadsheet that grades the tabs by skill level and tells you what harp key to
play each song in, you can download that by hitting this link:
A word about my tabs: Many years ago, when I got my first harmonica teaching gig at the Guitar Study Center in
New York, I purchased a few of the commercially available instruction books. Most of them used standard harp
tablature--numbered arrows pointing up and down--but none of them indicated, with even minimal precision, the
duration of each note, not to mention the rhythmic emphases (syncopation or "swing") that made for real blues. A
few of them offered this information in the form of actual musical notation instead of tablature, but like most harp
players, I didn't read music. So I developed my own form of tablature from the ground up.
My tabs give you numbers and arrows to indicate which hole you play and whether it's draw or blow, like
standard harp tabs, but they also give you a precise rhythmic count underneath the arrows. As you'll see if you
order one of my videos, I'm a stickler about counting time. If you can't count your way through a tab, you can't play
the song with the precision and intensity it deserves. ModernBluesHarmonica.com is NOT about mush-mouth harp.
No matter what level you are, I believe in treating you like a serious musician. Counting time accurately is part of
what it means to be a musician. My tabs are specifically designed to ground you in rhythmic fundamentals. Most
of them are hand-drawn, but please don't confuse this handmade aspect with carelessness, backwardness, or lack
of precision. I take great pride in my work. You can find a few other accurate, precision-engineered harp
transcriptions on the web: Glenn Weiser, David Barrett, Joe Filisko, Winslow Yerxa, and Wayne Snyder all do masterful work.
But I believe that my tabs offer a combination of accuracy, accessibility, and an attention to syncopation that makes them unique.
Before you go, here's a music video featuring my version of "Crossroads Blues." The tab and video lesson are available above:
