Life is Beautiful - Keb' Mo'

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This song is very interesting, as it is country, but it incorporates jazz chords, making it quite original. It is also a feel good song. When playing this song, you can either alternate the bass line with your thumb from root to fifth, or you can stay on the root. Keb' Mo' himself doesn't always play it the same way. So, you can pluck away and have fun with hammer ons and pull offs. What is really important is to keep the chord progression. The form is simple, you go through the whole thing three times with a slight variation at the end of each form, so watch for the boxes 1 & 2. There are two main guitar figures, one at the intro, the other at the outro. They are variations of each other.

Life is Beautiful - Keb' Mo' Chord Chart 

Guitar Figure 1

Guitar Figure 2

Life is Beautiful - Keb' Mo' Lead Sheet P1

Life is Beautiful - Keb' Mo' Lead Sheet P.2

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Green Eyes - Coldplay

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This song is a nice country/pop ballad. Three sections that repeat and finish with an outro. The guitar has a capo on fret 2 and the strumming is in 8th note swing feel. The band starts at the pre-chorus after the D.C. (Da Capo)

Green Eyes - Coldplay Chords

Green Eyes - Coldplay Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

The Bird Song - Florence and the Machine

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This song is a little bit tricky to play, because the whole song is ad lib, meaning that there is no fixed tempo like most songs. You need to listen to the singer to follow the tempo of the song. During the full band parts, the rhythm is a bit more constant. The p or pp (piano or pianissimo) mean that you play soft or softer and the f or ff (forte or fortissimo) mean that you play loud or louder.

The Bird Song - Florence and the Machine Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

A Place Called Home - P J Harvey

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This song is very ambient, so the guitar does mostly sixteenth notes the whole song with slight accents to emphasize the drums beat. Just be aware of the Da Capo (D.C.) with repeat.

A Place Called Home - P J Harvey Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Rocky Racoon - The Beatles

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The sound of the piano and the instrumentation of the song are typical of honky-tonk/country songs . The guitar part is pretty simple once you are comfortable with the chords. The double time feel doesn't affect the guitar, but adds energy to the song. Other than that, the song is the same thing throughout except for the intro.

Rocky Racoon - The Beatles Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

When I Come Around - Green Day

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This song is pretty simple. There are two parts in the song: Verse and Chorus. The difficult part of the song is the rhythm in the Intro, Verse and Chorus. The 16th notes are played with open strings; they are only used as a transition between the chords. So, if you have a hard time with the rhythm below, you can simply disregard the 16th notes. The only important thing is to play the anticipation of the chord of B5. 

I believe that Green Day plays this song with their guitars tunes in Eb standard, which means that the solo during the bridge would be played a little bit differently, but the notes are the same. 

When I Come Around - Green Day Lead Sheet

When I Come Around - Green Day Guitar Solo

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Castle on the Hill - Ed Sheeran

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This song is pretty simple, as it uses four chords in different progressions to create the four sections of the song: Verse, Pre-Chorus, Chorus and Bridge. In the acoustic version of the song, Ed Sheeran uses these four chords below. The Bm is played as a Bm7, as it is an easier transition then using the barre chord shape of Bm. The other main difference between the recorded song and the acoustic version is that in the recording the chords in the verse and chorus are anticipated, but in the acoustic version the chords are changed on the first beat of the measures. Other than that, be aware of the DS with repeat after the first chorus and the box 2.

Ed Sheehan - Castle on the Hill Chords

Castle on the Hill - Ed Sheeran Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Lithium - Nirvana

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The format of this song is pretty simple; there are two chord progressions that repeat. The intro, verse and chorus are played the same way except that the chorus is played with distortion. If you want to play the song like the original, you should tune your guitar one whole tone down, so your strings would be tuned like this: 6th:D, 5th:G, 4th:C, 3rd:F, 2nd:A, 1st:D.

In the intro of the song, the guitar plays the chords, but one string at a time. Be careful, as there is a DS with repeat after the first chorus. Lastly, the F#5/C# is not important if you play the guitar. The bass player is the one playing the C# and the guitar plays the F#5.

Lithium - Nirvana Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

How Far I'll Go - Moana

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This song is pretty simple, but be weary of the key change at the end of the song. The ending itself is a little bit tricky as well. 

How Far I'll Go - Moana Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

You're Welcome - Moana (Dwayne Johnson)

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This song is from the Disney Movie Moana. The verse of the song is rhythmically complex, because of the drums. The format of the song is Verse - Chorus - Verse - Chorus - Bridge - Chorus.

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

I Will Wait - Mumford & Sons

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This song is a little bit tricky. It is a 4/2 time signature, which means it has this folk/country feel which is accentuating the down beat and playing the up beat on the high strings. There also are 6/2 time signatures which add half a measure to your regular measure. Other than that, make sure you have energy when you play the song. I believe that the guitar player in the band plays this song in a different tuning, but you can play it in standard E..

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Roll On - Khari Wendell McClelland

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This song is originally played on piano, but you can also try to play it on guitar. If you are playing with a bass player, you don't need to worry about the bass notes (/G#), but if you are by yourself, if you don't play them, it won't sound the same.

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Have You Ever Seen the Rain - CCR

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This song is fairly simple with basic chords and a strumming in eighth notes. It is very straight forward: Intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus x2. The only changes in the rhythm are in the intro where there are sixteenth notes

CCR - Have You Ever Seen the Rain Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Redemption Song - Bob Marley

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This song is pretty simple in terms of chords and it has a very recocgnizable introduction. The tricky thing with the song is to put all the parts of the song in the right order. So, if you notice on the chart, there are a several repeat signs with boxes and a DS al Coda. All these signs are to keep the chart as short as possible, but try to listen to the song reading the chart first to get a good idea of how it works.

Below is the intro for the song that replaces the "Guitar Fig 1" (first four bars with repeat) of the lead sheet.

Bob Marley - Redemption Song Intro Guitar Fig. 1

Bob Marley - Redemption Song

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Summer of '69 - Bryan Adams

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This song is pretty simple and involves mostly power chords. This version of Summer of '69 is the original electric version, the acoustic is similar, but played slightly different. There are three main parts in the song that repeat: verse, chorus and bridge.

Summer of '69 - Bryan Adams Chords

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

On the Road Again - Willie Nelson

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This country song seems simple, but it has a twist. A typical country song has verses and choruses that have 4 or 8 measures. In this song, every verse and chorus have 7 measures, which makes it very odd. This song also uses a G# which is not part of the E major scale.

Strumming-wise, the song is a 4/2, which means that every down beat is played on the low strings alternating between the root and fifth of the chord and the up beats are played on the high strings.

Willie Nelson - On the Road Again Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Hey Ya - Outkast

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The chords in this song are pretty simple and the rhythm is very typical of guitar. What makes this song so interesting is the added 2/4 time signature as well as the number of measures per verse. The song is pretty much the same the whole time, except for some breaks on the guitar.

Outkast -Hey Ya

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Zombie - The Cranberries

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This song is pretty easy, except for the strumming pattern. The song uses the same chords for the verse, the chorus and solo. If you have a hard time with the rhythm, you can also play eight notes for the whole song.

The Cranberries - Zombie Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Wonderwall - Oasis

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This song is great for practicing your strumming hand. It's a complex strumming pattern, but it's almost the same thing the whole song and your fretting hand doesn't have to move too much. 

On your fretting hand, keep your third and fourth finger on the two first string 3rd fret; the only fingers moving are your first and second finger. Note that this lead sheet is written for guitar only, as the guitar is supposed to have a capo on fret 2. To get the version for the rest of the band, check out the Lead Sheet

Below are the chords used:

Wonder wall - Oasis Chords

And here is the lead sheet:

Oasis - Wonderwall Lead Sheet

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com

Stand By Me - Ben E King

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This song is pretty simple, as it is the same chord progression for the whole song. This version is for a full band, as the guitar only plays triads on the second and fourth beats. You can try different inversions of triads if you want.

Stand By Me - Ben E King Lead Sheet

If you wanted to play the song by yourself, you could simply change the strumming pattern using full chords like this example below.

Alternate strumming

We hope you enjoyed this lesson. If you have any questions or comments you can contact us at patrice@paliatsky.com