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Clapton's guitar playing career is as long and diversified as the line of guitarists and musicians he has influenced.
Like Jeff Beck, he was fortunate to come to prominence at an early age with The Yardbirds, while also in awe of
American blues. More than a blues buff, Eric was a self-professed “blues snob” and was quoted as saying, “If it
wasn’t black, I wasn’t interested.” This attitude of his formative years had kept the blues close to his heart despite
the many stages his musical life has seen. As featured guitarist with John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers and shortly
afterwards, the guitar-playing third of blues/rock supergroup Cream, Eric Clapton is unquestionably a founding
father of the blues/rock sound.
Eric's style is at once personal and universal. Not without a healthy supply of chops, Clapton is well known for
his reservedness and tendency towards simplicity as a soloist. His solos are distinguished by a foundation of
balance, authority and stateliness. Generally, Clapton favored Les Pauls during his Bluesbreaker period,
Firebirds, 335’s and SG’s with Cream and Stratocasters post-Cream.
This solo is played over a vamp in E, with a triplet feel a la Cream. The E pentatonic minor (E GA BD) forms
range from I in open position to I and Il an octave higher at the 12th fret and above, and this scale is the impetus
behind the solo. Eric has long been a master of combining and balancing the moods of pentatonic minor and
major. Look for the phrases that use E pentatonic major (E Fi Ga B Ci, i.e. bars 10, 14, 19 and 20) along with E
pentatonic minor. His ability to play phrases that swing from major to minor in a natural and lyrical way is one
of his strongest trademarks. Another Eric Clapton trait is the seamlessness of position changes that further
compliment the smoothness of his phrasing: check out bars 15 through 22 for evidence of this. During his Cream
days, Eric affectionately named the sound that occurs when all the tone is rolled off of the rhythm pickup
“woman tone”—and has since become a part of the guitar player’s vernacular. This sound is heard in bars 19
though 27. The solo ends with a smoking pentatonic minor lick with pulls and hammers that are characteristic of
Clapton's faster, legato playing: 3 slurred notes followed by a picked note in succession. He has been known to
begin this 4-note idea from other intervals of the scale such as the root, 3rd or +7th-this one begins on the Sth.
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