Tony's Guitar Lessons: 2009

Saturday, November 28, 2009

The Who: Behind Blue Eyes

The Who's Behind Blue Eyes is another great song to learn with. I especially like Limp Bizkit's version which was used on the movie Gothica. In the full version of the song, Pete Townsend uses "sus" chords, or suspended 4th's, but we can ignore these for the time being.

We have a couple of new chords to play, G, Bm and A.

Playing the G chord: use fingers 2, 3 and 4 (pinky). This is much better than the standard 1, 2, and 3 and makes it easier to move to other chords like C.

Playing the A chord: personally I use fingers 2, 1, 3 in that order. You can use 1, 2, and 3 if you prefer.


Em                     G               D
No one knows what it's like, to be the bad man
       C          A
To be the sad man, behind blue eyes
Em                     G          D
No one knows what it's like to be hated
  C                   A
To be fated, to telling only lies

CHORUS
    C  D                   G    C  G
But my dreams, they aren't as empty
   C          D        E
As my conscience seems to be
    Bm           C
I have hours, only lonely
        D                      A
My love is vengeance that's never free

No one knows what it's like to feel these feelings
Like I do, and I blame you
No one bites back as hard on their anger
None of my pain and woe, can show through

CHORUS

Then it goes into the fast bit which we'll leave for now...

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Your first song! House of the Rising Sun.

The first song I start my new students off with is House of The Rising Sun. The majority of people have heard of it - even the younger ones - and it immediately introduces 5 or 6 of the most common chords.

It's a traditional American folk song and was popularized in the 1960's by The Animals, making it to number one on both sides of the Atlantic in 1964.

For the beginner, the hardest chord here is the F chord. This requires you to bar your index finger across both the first and second strings. F is probably the hardest chord you'll need to learn for quite a while, and it's used a lot so you may as well start working on it now!

Here are the chords:

House of the Rising Sun


Intro:  Am  C  D  F  Am  E  Am  E7

      Am    C        D          F
There is a house in New Orleans,
     Am        C      E    E7
They call the "Rising Sun",
     Am       C       D           F
It's been the ruin of many a poor boy
    Am     E        Am    E7
And God, I know, I'm one.

My mother was a tailor,
She sewed my new blue jeans,
My father was a gambling man,
Down in New Orleans.

Now the only things a gambler needs
Is a suitcase and a trunk
And the only time he's satisfied
Is when he's all a-drunk

Oh, mother, tell your children
Not to do what I have done -
Spend your lives in sin and misery
In the House of Rising Sun.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

What Kind of Guitar?

So what kind of guitar do you want to play? I don't mean what make of guitar, but what style do you want to play? Folk, country, rock, blues, classical, jazz...? That, and your age, will determine what kind of guitar you should buy.

Most kids under the age of about 12 will have a hard time with a steel-strung, acoustic guitar. The best starter guitar for this age group is either a nylon-strung, "classical" guitar, or an electric guitar. The standard steel-strung acoustic guitar is a) too big and b) too hard for young fingers to learn on.

If you're an adult just starting, then you can choose whichever one you want! The electric guitar is the most versatile in terms of styles, but you might just like to play folk, country, pops etc, in which case the acoustic works a treat. And of course you don't need an amp for it.