10 Country Guitar Licks Every Picker Should Know

Hey there, it's Aaron Jaxon coming to you today. So it's been a hot minute since I have done a country chicken picking lesson on this channel, but I wanted to start doing these again because I love the style of guitar playing and I love the kind of music that this guitar playing is featured in. So what I've got for you today, um, you know, if somebody came to me and said, hey man, give me a couple of licks to really kind of get started in this like country chicken picking style, these are the 10 licks that I would try to show somebody to start getting a good footing and start to get a good grip on this style of guitar playing. As always, you can get the tabs for this lesson down in the video description and in the top pinned comment. So let's go ahead and jump into lick number 1 here. Okay, so I wanted to start with this lick because to me this is kind of what chicken picking is all about. Now, to cite my sources here, um, I got this from, um, like the original Merle Haggard, the solo that's played on that, you know, the but I, I like to play this lick over here. They'll work both places, or over here. Now, I originally thought that it was Roy Nichols that played this solo, because in my mind, if you're hearing classic Merle Haggard, the lead guitar stuff on there is played by Roy Nichols. A lot of it is, but I did some research a couple of weeks ago and it's actually James Burton that plays, um, that plays this solo, uh, but which is great because he's really kind of the pioneer of this style. Like, to me, like, this style really kind of starts with James Burton, with Roy Nichols, and with Don Rich. So this is a great little James Burton idea here. And, and so like I was saying, to me, this is what chicken picking is all about. We're gonna bend right here, okay? And then what we're gonna do, you're gonna pick the bend that you're still holding. And then after you pick that second string, you're gonna hit the second string with your middle finger and first string with your ring finger. And we're gonna repeat that. We're gonna go— and we'll do that, um, okay, so, um, Okay, and so what that does, that gives us the chicken sound. The baka baka baka gives us that sound right there because we're picking that second string with our pick, and then middle finger is hitting the second string after that, and then ring finger's hitting that first string. So we'll do— okay, and what's cool about this lick like is the case with a lot of these licks, you can move this around and play it anywhere. So that's, that's kind of out of A for down here.

You can do it down in G, F, E, and same deal if you're wanting to do this position up here.

It's just, you can move that around anywhere you want to. So to me, that lick is a great starting place for chicken picking. Comes from really probably the father of the style, James Burton. All right, let's jump into lick number 2 here. All right, so speaking of Chicken Picking 101, this is another one, um, that you kind of have to know for this style. And what we're going to do here for this example, I'm just going to take this little those little sixths going to that little kind of dominant 7. I like to think of that as mixolydian. It doesn't really matter, but what, what you want to do there is when we get up here to this first shape, we're going to kind of deaden that third string, and with our pick we're going to go, which is— it's like double triplets, like 16th note triplets.

Okay, again, chicken picking.

Ideas like this are generally associated with someone like Don Rich. He actually had an instrumental tune way back in the day that was entitled Chicken Picking, and he does—

it's something along those lines.

I don't I don't remember it exactly, but that's the idea. Okay, and so again, we're just deadening that 3rd string, doing a little triplet for that little percussive effect, and then coming up and hitting that high 1st string with our middle finger. Okay, and you can move this around. Again, you want to come up to E and do that. Whoops. You know, you could take it down, um, You take it down to B, and you can also, if you want that same little interval there, if you wanted to come over to D down here, and then same deal, we do, uh, so like I said, I think this goes back to Don Rich. Obviously James Burton used ideas like this, but Brett Mason uses ideas like this all the time too, like at the end of Summertime Blues from Aaron Jaxon, uh, Or at the end, I think it's his first solo, um, to, um, Alan Jackson, I'm in Love with You Baby But I Don't Even Know Your Name. You know, things like that. He uses ideas like that all the time. But that's why I wanted to include this as like the second lick in here, because again, this is like chicken picking 101. So that's a great lick to learn to get down. And like I said, you can move and use that all over the place. So let's now go into lick Number 3. Okay, so John Jorgensen plays this in his famous solo to the tune Hello Trouble, uh, from the Desert Rose Band. And, um, it's just a great little lick that you can move around, but he's kind of taking this little, um, again, that little dominant 7 mixolydian kind of— okay, if we were doing just the major scale on that, it'd be like—

it'd be like, um, which just doesn't have the same feel as like—

but what we're going to do on that, have your middle finger hit the first string and then your pick hit the second string. Okay, and again, you can move that around and play that all over the place. So that was out of G. If you wanted to move that down to F, you know, or if you wanted to do it in A. Okay, amazing little run there. Um, you know, it's just a classic country-sounding lick from the mighty John Jorgensen.

So now let's go into lick number 4. Okay, so I love this lick.

So I originally learned this lick from Vince Gill from his classic solo to the '90s country hit, um, uh, oh my gosh, what's it called? One More Last Chance. Okay. And, uh, so he kind of comes in. Okay, so what we're doing there, um, and this is kind of— I think of it like out of our—

it's in D here. And, um, so there's some challenging little bendy ideas in here, and then we'll do—

and so we're bending right here. You want to have your ring finger and middle finger, and then we're going to bend with that middle finger— I'm sorry, ring finger and index finger. And so you have to keep this note bent the whole time. Okay, now I'll see a lot of people play it like this. They'll do like, um, and that's great if you want to play it that way. Um, that really hurts my left hand, and I can kind of get it done doing and then get back down into position after that.

But again, one more time.

And again, this lick is out of D. But what's cool about this, like a lot of the other licks that I'm showing you here, you can move this around if you want to go into E or C. It's a great lick that you can move around. It's got some great bends. It's got kind of a steel guitar sound to it. Infinitely usable in a lot of different contexts, and it's just a classic little country lick that you have to know. For this style. Okay, let's go into lick number 5. All right, so this is like Brent Mason 101. Now this isn't an idea, um, that I'm necessarily pulling from a specific Brent solo. I learned this from his classic, um, hot licks Aaron Jaxon's video. He teaches this in like the first couple of minutes on that where he's just kind of explaining his basic chicken picking style, and it goes like this.

We'll do—

okay, I love that.

So what we'll do here is—

so, you know, Brent plays it with a thumb pick, obviously. Uh, you know, I'd say most of us watching this are probably playing it with flat picks, but we're doing— so we'll kind of go back and forth with our pick and middle finger to give it that popping sound.

And then we'll do—

okay, so as we're playing that, we're kind of alternating between the pick and our middle finger. All right, and then when we get up to that, hit that with your, um, middle and ring fingers.

And then we're going to do—

so as we're going— we're kind of hitting a little dead note, and then— so one more time. So you can learn a lot about Brent's chicken picking style from that. You know, if you ever hear his solo to Chattahoochee, he uses ideas like that a lot. He'll do like, um, you know, so he uses those little kinds of ideas all the time. But that's a classic Brent Mason style country lick you gotta know if you're learning country chicken picking guitar. All right, let's go into lick number 6 here. Okay, so I couldn't do a like 10 country licks every picker needs to know without throwing at least some Danny Gatton influence into this. So, you know, this lick is more like a, like a lick in the style of— but, you know, Danny was just such an amazing player. He had so many different influences. It was country, there was jazz, There was a little bit of blues, there was bluegrass, there was rockabilly. Um, and but what he would— a lot of what he did, he would mimic an organ in both his like tele lead playing and in his rhythm playing. Um, so, you know, Let's play that again. So that's just right there out of E, but we're kind of doing that little, you know, that little James Burton kind of Don Rich little deadening chicken picking thing. Okay, and he would use a lot of ideas like that that's kind of mimicking an organ, you know.

And what's cool about that, you can move that around and play it anywhere, down to D. B, A. And it's just a really—

and, you know, a great tune to try this out in is like Folsom Prison Blues, you know. It just gives it— it's, it's just, it gives it like an interesting flavor doing it that way. But Danny would use ideas like that, like, um He would also do rhythm ideas that were kind of mimicking an organ, like, you know, just a lot of really cool stuff there. So, you know, obviously this isn't like a complete analysis of Danny Gatton's style, but, um, that's just a kind of lick in the style of there that's a great addition to the rest of the licks that you're going to learn when you're getting into this style of playing. All right, let's go into the next lick. All right, so double stops with bends. This is one of the most important ideas when you're learning country guitar. And so what I played there for you is— okay, and so I did that out of C because these licks get a lot harder to do the further down the neck.

You—

like, if I try to do it in A, it's a little harder, but C is kind of a sweet spot there.

Okay, okay.

So a couple of little variations that you might want to consider whenever you're playing these You can turn these into single note ideas, okay? And if you really want to take it to the next level, you can play them as pre-bend ideas, all right? If you're really wanting to get that steel guitar sound. Now, um, again, I think the first place I came across this was Brent Mason, but basically every country player uses some version of these, whether that's doing these more, you know, doing stuff like that, or even like, um, you know, ideas like that, um, as well. But using these little double stops with bends. And this one's out of C, you know, but you can move these around and play them anywhere.

You can do it in D like I was doing a minute ago, go down to A, E, you know, with all the different variations on that.

So that's another classic country guitar technique that you have to know for this style.

All right, let's go into the next lick.

I love this. I originally got this from Johnny Hyland. I think he plays this, um, with that, that, uh, recording he did with the Don Kelly Band on the tune Truck Driving Man. But it's And again, like a lot of the other players that we've talked about here, he's using that dominant 7, okay?

And it's—

and since his lick is at a G, he's pulling off to the open in between each one of these. And we're doing doing the pick on the 5th string and middle finger on the 3rd. Okay, love that classic little lick. That's great for playing on faster tunes, and it just gives you that really classic popping chicken picking sound that we're all after whenever we're learning this style. All right, let's go into the next lick. Okay, so these ideas are generally associated with Albert Lee. He plays them in a lot of different places, and I think the way he plays it is he'll like—

he'll use his pick.

I cheat a little bit and I just use, um, pull-offs. So we're kind of going from our, like, down here, up here, and up here, and we're doing— okay, so we're pulling off to that open 3rd string. And it just gives us that classic chicken picking sound. Again, generally associated with Albert Lee, but basically every player since him has used these ideas. So that's some other great country chicken picking ideas that you want to get down for this style. All right. So this is kind of like a Brad Paisley style sort of— okay, and so while I'm playing that, kind of pay attention to my picking hand here. Okay, and so using it that way gives it that, again, that pop, that So that's just a great little kind of Brad Paisley style lick again to add to your vocabulary, and it's a classic sounding chicken picking lick that you got to know for this style. Well, hey, I want to thank you so much for hanging out today. These are just kind of 10 of my favorite little country guitar chicken picking licks that I've pulled from a lot of different players here. I hope you enjoyed this. Again, remember, down in the video description and in the top pinned comment, you can get the tabs for all of these licks. I want to thank you for hanging out today. Check out some of these videos to go a little bit deeper with some of this stuff, and I'll see you next time.