I am mostly a blues player, but I still encorporate a lot of modal based and sometimes diminished runs (which might or might not be considered shredding) but it is still similar to what shredders do. You can have soul in either style of playing, it just depends on how you are doing it. Most shredders that I hear don't play with much soul, their playing doesn't sound varied, it sounds more like practicing scales up and down the neck, and I think that might be what they want it to sound like, they just want to go fast. But there are certain players that you might classify as shredders such as Yngwie Malmsteen, who in my opinion plays his style with soul. You can tell he can really feel it.....Yes, at times he fills his entire song with notes, which can be a bit boring, and overwhelming. But you can hear certain things he plays really talk to you on a personal basis. I love Yngwie's Concerto Suite for Guitar. That is definately an example of shredding with soul.

Blues on the other hand is meant to be played with soul. Blues itself, even the words/singing, or any instrument used in blues really requires you to reach into yourself and pull out those notes. You've got to feel it. This feeling is very hard to describe. I think it could almost be a matter of..."If you have it you have it, and if you don't you don't" and that's the way it is. When I sit down and play along with one of my old blues albums from albert or BB, I just let all my emotion out, and that DOES NOT mean playing as fast as I can. It basically means less think....more feel. Don't think about where you're going to go up the neck, just let you're soul take you there.