Originally Posted by: Bonafan1In one of his blues lessons he talks about finding the root note in the places in the A minor blues scale and how you can (should?) start and end your lick on the root.

You can start and end licks on the root note. You can start and end licks on other notes, too. It's a good idea to practice starting and ending licks on all scale degrees so you get used to where they are and most importantly how they each sound.

Look at the image on the lesson page under the text that shows the fretboard patterns of the pentatonic minor scale pattern in this tutorial:

http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=185

See the numbers? Those are scale degrees. Every circled number 1 is the root note of the scale (the note A).

So just start on the first pattern, the first "box" we all start with. Go to lesson 3 in that tutorial & practice that box up & down & in 3s. Look & listen for the root note. Ending a lick on the root note has a very solid, stable sound because it is the main note of the chord you are using to solo over.

Now, listen to how all the other notes sound, too: 3rd, 4th, 5th, 7th. Each note will have it's own unique, distinctive sound.

After you get used to that try these tutorials that show you how to play scales to target chord tones as the chords in a progression change.

http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=876
http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=483
http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=491

And here is the same idea for specifically for blues:

http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=217
http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=232
http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=826
http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=244