David's Tip of the Day - Variation, Part 1 - Hook

The concept of variation is pretty straight forward... present an idea and then repeat it with some change. By repeating an idea you create a theme for a chorus or entire song if you carry it through to the end. If you repeat it through the entire song, then we call that idea the Hook of that song.

Our example for this series will be B.B. King's "Rock Me Baby" from the release "Blues on Blues," available on the iTunes store. This performance is in the key of C, so you'll need an F Harmonica (I prefer the Low F) for the following examples.

Listen to the song and note what all of the instruments are doing. You'' hear the piano and guitar play the hook. Try to learn the hook on the harmonica and we'll speak more about it tomorrow.