we wish you a merry Christmas
“We Wish You a Merry Christmas” tab, chord and lyrics for ukulele and guitar
We Wish You a Merry Ukulele
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How to play “8 days a week”
Here’s a great Beatles tune with pretty simple, hand-friendly changes. You can certainly play this just by strumming the changes but you can also pick individual notes out of them- and even better, the melody notes are not difficult to get out of the chord shapes at all. Give it a listen and reach out to me if you’re interested in more information about how to play “8 days a week” solo finger style on acoustic guitar.
Building chords from the 5 string
Building chords from the 5 string!
Building chords from the 5 string. We know the C scale has no flats or sharps and also that we can play Major chords (triads) with the 1, 3 and 5 scale notes. We can figure that combination out from any note on the 5th string! For instance a C Major is made of a C, and E and a G (1,3 and 5): C D E F G A B C
We know that the “two strings up and two frets back” rule can give us the same note but an octave up. We can do that from the 6 string and the 5 string. Let’s concentrate on the 5 string first. So C on the 5 string is at the 3rd fret and consequently, on the 5th fret of the G string. That gives us our one note in two places!
Starting with C on the 3rd fret of the A string, we can see D on the open D string, E on the 2nd fret, F on the 3rd and G on the 5th. The G on the 5th fret is important to us! Now we have 1 […]
song lessons for guitar students (by artist/composer)
Song Lessons. Here are some of the songs my students and I have looked at together.
Many have a video lesson, pdf chord and lyric charts and/or tabs and notation.
I offer lessons for any level of experience or aptitude and the first online lesson is always free!
Song Lessons By title, alphabetically
If you’re looking for a song you don’t see here, just reach out-
I’m always adding to the song lesson list!
Alan Jackson
Allman Brothers
Alice In Chains
Alison Krauss
Allman Brothers
Andrew Bird
BB King
Beachboys
Ben E. King
Bill Withers
Beatles
- All my lovin’
- And I Love Her
- Blackbird
- Can’t Buy Me Love
- Come Together
- Eight days a week
- Eleanor Rigby
- Hey Jude
- Help!
- Honey Don’t
- Let it Be
- Oh Darlin’
- Something
- Till there was you
- What is Life
- Yesterday
Ben Bernie
Bennie Goodman
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funk on a classical guitar
There’s nothing quite like jamming out over the top of funk changes and you don’t even need to be plugged in to do that! Once you understand the blues scale- even in one spot on the neck- well, you can either look at it like it’s easier to play reasonably decent lines, or harder to make mistakes. Or both, I guess!
This tune is in C#m, so that’s the 1 chord. Since its a minor chord, the 3rd of the chord is flattened. That tells us what notes are going to work correctly when we play them over the top of the chord. To get started we can play C# (root note) E (flat 3rd) F#(4th) G#(5) and B (flat 7) and if you want to call these guys by their fancy-pants name, that would be “C# minor pentatonic”.
How I generally start with something like this is by remembering that if I’m on the the 1 chord, I need to keep coming back to the 1 note! It might sound crazy to just play one note over the chord but think about it – just concentrating on that single note lets you focus on making making interesting rhythmic patterns rather than worrying about where to put your fingers and scales and modes and all that other stuff. So try this: listen for the 1 chord […]
Distance guitar coaching FAQs
Wouldn’t it be great if you could stop a guitar video at certain points and asks the guitarist “what exactly exactly are you doing there” or “what did you mean when you said that?”
Well now you can. Here are some FAQs that might be helpful:
- How do we get started?
First is a video chat, just to get acquainted. Based on our conversation, I produce a video lesson specifically tailored to you! - How does it work exactly?
If you said you were interested in playing a particular song, I make a custom video lesson just for that! I break it down into manageable sections you can play as often as you want at various speeds. During the actual lesson I’ll help you figure out any parts you’re having trouble with. Split screen video show both hands and my face, so you can hear and see just what I’m doing. - How much does it cost?
Distance lessons are $25 per session and the first session is free. Pay for the next session any time before it is scheduled. - Do I need to own a guitar?
Before we start, yes.If you want to use the initial video chat to talk about what kind of instrument you should get, that’s fine! I can show you any of the guitars or ukes in my studio; you can hear them played, and we can […]
Saturday Night
How to play “Saturday Night” by the Misfits on guitar. A simple 1/6/4/5 tune in 3/4 time with… well, you might say “cultural significance”. “Horror punk” was a genre I hadn’t heard of until a student asked for some help with this tune. It certainly fits a cultural niche, music-wise! “Saturday Night” is fun, and not too difficult to get under your hand if you are just starting out on guitar. It will be easier to play it in the key of C than C# though- the video demonstrates a version in C# and offers instruction in the friendly key of C.
The song “Saturday Night,” also released on Famous Monsters and written by Michale Graves, is commonly taken literally to be about killing due to lyrics in the song such as “There’s 52 ways to murder anyone, one and two are the same and they both work as well.” However, the true meaning of the song as explained by Michale Graves is the representation of the metaphorical death of a relationship.
“Don’t let the fear of the time it will take to accomplish something stand in the way of your doing it. The time will pass anyway; we might just as well put that passing time to the best possible use.” — Earl Nightingale, author, speaker
Download the […]
radio garden
Ever wonder what kind of tunes radio stations all over the world are playing? Check out Radio Garden. This app is fascinating! Each of the dots on the globe represent a radio station and you can click on that and listen to what’s on the air. Got a yen to find out what on the radio in Reykjavík, Iceland? Travel the planet, one radio station at a time. Here’s a link to QUAY FM, 107.1, a station in Alderney, in the Bailiwick of Guernsey. Enjoy!