h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

After seeing the great success that was the Guitar Heroes project, thought I'd suggest something else....

How about getting together to come up with a page for the EG along the lines of 'Guitar Songs For Beginners'? It strikes me that there are loads of popular songs that consist of just a few open chords, anyone fancy helping to gather them together in an entry?

For example - Knocking On Heaven's Door (Bob Dylan amongst others) is just G, D, Am; G, D, C; repeat ad nauseum.

They'd have to be songs that have just a few uncomplicated major/minor open chords, playable without a capo or weird tuning, and fairly well-known.

Good idea or pure rubbish?

Not a bad idea.

Wonderful Tonight has to be pretty high on the list. G, D, C, D ad nauseam with a five-note solo.

B

I thought of more last night but live a mile from the nearest modem I can use

Still, two is a start

Depends how low you want to stoop. Achy Breaky Heart only has two chords.

B

Much as I would hate to get judgmental....

How about 'Songs for beginners that only have two/three chords but are probably so bad they'll get stuck in your head for just about forever'? 'Mmbop' has only three chords too, you know.

Maybe you could split them up into two/three/four chord sections. The harder pieces will have some bar chords (oh the dreaded F! How I hated it when I first started playing) - that you should of course explain to the guitar novice will sound more like somebody whacking a wet cat against a table than actual musical notes.

Do you see this as something for the Edited Guide, or as more of an unedited resource that could be linked from the Guild page (and anywhere else)?

If it's for the Edited Guide, then it will probably need to be more than just a list of songs and chords. Of course, you won't be able to include lyrics or detailed tab, as this will run into copyright problems.

What you could do is make it a slightly more general Entry on learning to play the guitar. You could then start with a few paragraphs on different ways of learning to play (e.g. classical training, sitting for months on end repeatedly listening to Van Halen's 'Eruption' solo), noting that the way most people seem to start is by strumming along to simple songs with a book of chords at their side. Then you can get into the list of songs. I wonder if there's a way you could create chord diagrams in GuideML..? Alternatively, you could find a website with the basic chords listed and link to it. This would also fit with Farlander's notes about the difficulties of learning 'F' for the first time

Perhaps you could include something on the other chords - the fact that there's an easy way and a 'hard' way to play 'G', for example. I wouldn't rule out use of a capo, either, as it's an easy way for beginners (and more experienced players, ahem ) to play more difficult chords easily.

Anyway, back to the subject of specific songs...

'Love Me Do' alternates bars of C and G in the verse, apart from the held C on 'plea-ea-ea-ea-ea-ea-ease...'. In the Middle 8 there's a D thrown in as well.

'Get Back' can be played E/E/A/E in the verse and E7/E7/A/E in the chorus.

And what about things like 'Michael Row the Boat Ashore', 'When the Saints Go Marching In' and son on? They can't have many chords...

And, finally (for now ) what about describing the basic 12-bar blues progression. In A (with D and E), D (with G and A) or G (with C and D) it's very straightforward.

Wonderwall is only four chords too, isn't it?

B

It can't be any more than that, but they're not all standard, open chords, so you'd probably need tab or chord boxes to describe them.

Thanks for the suggestions; I'll try to make a start over the weekend. I'm hoping it will be an EG entry, don't want to get into hammer-ons or anything, just a nice simple 'here's a few easy songs you can play' kind of thing. I thought maybe anyone who had a song to contribute could get a writing credit, a nice big carrot to dangle before you all there .

Maybe I could push the criteria to include use of a capo. I was trying to keep the whole idea as simple as possible but a capo opens up a whole load more songs, doesn't it?

Wonderwall does have only a few chords and is dead easy to play - I think you only move two fingers in the whole song - but it's a bit more than the simple major/minor chords I envisaged.

Will get to work on this, then....

The first two songs I learned how to play were actually Metallica - Nothing Else Matters and Seek and Destroy. They are both quite easy to learn, and help train the fingers to recognize nontraditional chord forms. The only problem is that it assumes that the guitarist can read tablature and some parts in the song can get kind of frustrating, but other than that, they were great ways to start establishing finger dexterity, and they're fun to play.

For aspiring classical guitarists, some easy songs are "La Grima" by Francisco Tarrega and "Bouree" by JS Bach.

Certainly, learning open chord forms is really good for a beginning guitarist, but there should be a section devoted to other important guitar basics. Even a chord chart of the C-major scale from frets 0-12 was something I could find nowhere online, but is something I would've benefited from immensely.

-GN

Maybe someone else has suggested it already and I didn't notice it when skimming through the comments so far...

But Wild Thing seems like an obvious one. Same three chords repeated all the way through, plus /EVERYONE/ knows it so it makes a great party piece because you don't even need to be that good at it- just good enough that everybody recognises it (not difficult, lol) and joins in with the vocals...

Maybe that could be the angle for the EG entry- easy chord-based songs to play as a party- piece? There are plenty of disturbingly simple-yet-famous songs out there which would fit this category. A few examples which spring immediately to mind* are Wild Thing, 20th Century Boy, All Right Now and Crazy Little Thing Called Love. Ooh- The PAssenger, 2-4-6-8-Motorway, No Woman No Cry, and More Than A Feeling just popped in as I was about to click "post message".

TK[1]

*In the same way that things usually spring 'immediately to mind' when trying to prove a point- after 20 minutes of vigorous brain-racking.

So what shall I do then? Start writing the entry and credit you as co-authors, if you can supply the name of the song and the chords for it? Am quite happy to do the writing up of the entry but don't know enough 'easy' songs to make it an entry on my own

for the input!

I'll be willing to supply song + chords. Just let me know what you want/ how many songs/ when by/ where you want me to put them

TK[1]

Have made a start at A3856683! I'll add in your songs bit by bit and credit you for them. I think it's best to just keep posting songs on here, the more the merrier - and I'll just keep it going until we have loads or I've had enough

If anyone fancies having a read and checking out if the chord descriptions are understandable etc. that would be marvellous. All suggestions welcome!

Don't forget any/all Greenday songs! First song I, along with many aspiring guitarists, learned..."Good Riddance" all open chords...and no "F"! Just dont tell anyone to learn stairway to heaven, the only surefire way for a beginner to get all guitarists in a guitar shop to hate them...

You'll have to tell me the chords, not just the name of the band

(all in open positions) G5, Csus2, D5, Em, Dsus2

Thanks, am trying to limit it to major and minor chords at the moment as described in the text. The reason for this is that it's really hard to describe chords without reference to a chart! If however a specific song requires just one slightly odd chord, I might consider it.

I got initiated to guitar playing through Pink Floyd's song 'Mother' is all in G and D (OK there's a C somewhere, you can figure out easily where this chord is). A friend who knew how to play the solo taught me the basics so he could play the solo. This song is also very good for a beginner to practise singing and playing at the same time. In spite of its simplicity it's also a beautiful song that can give goose bumps if sung properly.

IS