Barre-ing and blues

Well hello everyone,
Longtime no speak for the majority of you people :), I hope you are all well.

I'm looking for some help her, I have a problem when it comes to barre chords above the 5th fret example:

I struggle to play a Bm barre cleanly, but I can play the C#m barre fine

   Bm  C#m

E|-2---4-|

B|-3---5-|

G|-4---6-|

D|-4---6-|

A|-2---4-|

E|-x---x-|

I'm wondering if this is the postion on the neck causing problems, any advice would be handy.

Also I'm looking to learn the blues so I can write better songs and solo abit better, whats the best way to go about it?

Cheers,
Jordan.

the further you go down the neck, the more difficult it gets to play a barre chord. especially, the Fmajor is a tricky one as it tends to get hard to play it clean. What i would suggest you do if you have serious problems with it, is just to leave out the 2 on the A-string. So basically you are not playing the root note, but unless you are playing fingerstyle and you are using the 2 on the A string for the bass-line, barely anyone will recognise a difference. Its a much easier way to play the Bm. I would suggest you do that.

"To learn the blues" is a pretty wide topic. peopl spent their lives lloking out to learn "the blues". I don't know how far you are along the way, but what i would do are three things.

1) Look at the blues chord progressions, mostly a I-IV-V chord progression with some variations.
2) Learn the Blues scale across the whole neck in all positions! and then start to connect it with the minor scale as well as other scales.
3) pick out your favourite Blues artists and look at their soloing structure, and their chord progressions.

Hope this could help

admiral

keep playing it and you will learn a way to ring everything out clearly. Yes, it is harder to play down the neck, but make sure your thumb is behind your hand, and you are using the boney part of your finger, not the fleshy one.

You will get it. I don't recommend leaving notes out unless you want it. If I can play it right after some practice I'm sure you can too!!

Good luck.

I actually have the opposite issue. I struggle to playthem cleanly further up the neck. I think this is because of large hands and fingers, but I'll keep it it, improving my form should help I would think.

Like ChicagoMedic says, if you keep playing them you will play them cleaner and cleaner as time goes on. If you learn to play songs as they are meant to played but play them somewhat sloppy, keep playing anyway and over time you will make little adjustment without even knowing it!

Form the chord with fingers 2-3 & 4 first then form the barr with your first finger last. Sounds cock-eyed I know but it works for me.
And hello! Long time no 'see.'!

EDIT! This is only while you get used to the fingering of a new chord. As you know, when you practice it enough your fingers will drop onto the correct shape easily.