What are some chord substitutions for a I-IV-V blues progression?

Question

I was watching a video of SRV and one of the things that really stood out was the fact that he seemed to have a different iteration of the I-IV-V turnaround - and made it look/sound effortless. Any starting points/suggestions for substitutions for a I-IV-V turnaround?

Answer 1

IV is mostly thought as a subdominant chord.

V is mostly thought as a dominant chord.

You can substitute the IV chord to other subdominant chord such as II-, bVII.

Answer 2

Hi, I suggest take a look of some of the jazz blues progression. Perhaps tunes like Au Privave, Now is the time or Blues for Alice by Charlie parker. These are all 12 bars blues. There are lots of turnarounds and chord substitutions on those and they are great tunes. Simply you could ad I vi- ii- V7 in the turnarounds because that's pretty common.