How to Play Country Roads by John Denver Guitar Lesson
Hey everybody it’s Aaron again. The next lesson I’m gonna do is one that’s pretty special to me. I’m surprised that I haven’t done it yet, but, it’s busy to do with everything, it’s just never really come up, but, it’s called Take Me Home Country Roads by John Denver. And I grew up in West Virginia. I was born and raised there, just recently move to North Carolina. So, everyone that I know is, said, can you play this, yeah but I never thought it, so. Alright, it’s pretty simple actually, there’s really two different ways you can play it. You can play it, it kinda like the folk country, I guess you’d say style that some people liked, which is called alternate bass strumming, alright, and that’s just kinda like. You can if you like that, I personally just don’t like playing like that. Certain songs sound better but for this one I let you guys decide. So, there’s really only six chords that you gonna need and all of them are basic simple chords, you probably learned, if not, they’re good one’s to learn a little bit hard. So, alright, I want to take you to the chords first. Alright, the first chord is your A chord, the way, I don’t know how you learned it, but the way I want you to learn it, if you haven’t yet is to put your pointer finger, your pointer finger covers your G string, alright, which is your third up from the bottom, alright. That is the middle string. I guess you’d say of this three that are held down, you hold down your D, G, and B string, alright. I want you to hold down your middle string which is your G with your pointer finger 2nd fret. Ring on the D string, the one above it, 2nd fret and with your middle finger, and then the ring finger goes on your B string, one below the pointer finger, 2nd fret, alright. The reason I want you to do this because in this chord, you may have heard me in other lessons talking about common fingers, alright. In this chord A, okay, when you’re going to another chord is a D, if you have it like this all you do to get to the D is slide the ring finger down, pointer finger stays at the same place, and the middle finger comes down to the string. If you're going to an E chord all you do is your pointer finger slides up to the first fret, stays in that same string and these two fingers come here. So that’s why I like you to make the A like that. So the first chord is A, okay, just like we started, next chord is a F#m, alright. All that means is, it sounds complicated, all that means is that you bar your pointer finger across the 2nd fret, all six strings, then your ring and pinky go here in the A and D strings, 4th fret, okay. That’s your F#m, okay. The chord after that you got your E chord, okay, you can also play your E chord like this. And then you have your D chord. If you don’t know these chords are, you can a, google it, we also have something on the site now, it is, it should be on the right side on the lessons, but halfway down there should be a little picture of a guitar. I’m not sure if it’s, if we have it up yet or not, but basically it’s a chord dictionary, you type in the chord that you want, it gives you a picture of it, so, it’s pretty helpful, but, if it’s not up there yet on FreeandEasyGuitar.com, then it should be coming up soon. But get your D then you go back to your A. The only chord that, other than that, there is an E7, okay, you can play the E7, let’s see, yeah. You can play it, just like your E, and then stick your pinky finger on the 3rd fret of your B string, see how this, okay. And the only other chord is G, four finger or three fingered, doesn’t really matter. I prefer four fingers, but that’s just me, alright. So I’ll take you to the verse, chorus, and bridge and then you guys can figure out the rest. The first one is almost heaven West Virginia blue ridge mountain, shindo river, life is older, older than the trees, younger than the mountain, growing like a breeze, alright. So the chord progression you’re gonna use in there is A, okay, so start in A, with your Fm, oh I’m sorry, F#m, to an E, to a D, to an A. Then you repeat that thing, you repeat that twice, so, you have E, you have A four measure. F#m, four measure. Then you have E, four measure and then your D and A at the end there are split half measure. So, D kinda short and then A. So, I’m gonna strum through it real quick, so almost heaven West Virginia, is where I’m starting. I’m sorry, It’s almost, and then I just having start strumming, so almost. Okay, that’s just how I play it, remember, when M says this strum patterns don’t matter as long as you keep along with the rhythm of the song. Lot of times when you’re singing, nobody even care to listen to the, to the strum pattern, so. Make your own strum pattern up, so it’s easy for you, alright. If you like down strums, make more down strums, if you like up strums, make more up strums. Alright, so you start with almost, and then you go to heaven, I play. So, almost… so, down – down – up – up – down – up – down, then I switch to the F#m, for the West Virginia. Okay, so for the F#m, once you’re in you go down – down – down – up – up, and then I kinda give it a little pause there, and then I go down – up – down – up – down – up, then I switch to the E, blue ridge mountains. So, basically I’m counting on like a strum let it ring for a little bit, then doing up – down – up – down – up – down – up, okay, so it’s like three up downs. Up – down – up – down – up – down, and I’m starting to last up, okay. And then shannondore river is just. So shannondore river in the D is down – down – up – up – down – up, then switch your A, down – down – up – up – down – up. Alright, so I’m gonna play it slowly, alright. Go ahead yourself if you need to write it down, or if you just wanna keep starting the video over again and try to strum, but I’ll play it slow here. Okay, so you just start with almost when you start heaven, West Virginia, Blue ridge mountain, Life is old there, Orange trees, Younger than the mountains, Growing like a breeze. Alright, that’s the verse, I’m not gonna sing it, just coz I’m not in the mood tonight, sorry. But the, then you get to the chorus, the chord progression you’re gonna use here is a little different, it’s A to E to F#m to D, okay, and these are all full measures. So you don’t have to worry about the rhythm changing up. So, I would just strum it like this. So it’s down – down – up – down – up – down – down – up – down – down – down – up – down – up – down – down – up – down – down – down – up – down – up – down – down – up – down – down – up – down – up – down – up – down – up – down. The chord you’re gonna play is an F#m, we’ve played that one already, an E, an A, a D, to an A, to an E. Second time’s through is F#m, to G, to a D, to the A, to an E, this time you’re gonna finish with an E7, which all you did for that, put your pinky finger on the B string, 3rd fret, and then you have your outro, which is easy enough to explain. Sorry if the camera is slanted, I just sat down and started, it looks like it might be slanted, but it’ll be over I guess. So alright, I’m gonna play through the bridge, you guys can listen for the strum patterns and, I might challenge you guys to be, you know, if it is your first lesson, then I’m sorry that you pick this one to start with, but most the less I’ve been giving strong patterns for everything and this one I gave it for the verse and the chorus, I think. For the bridge I’m gonna try not to, I want you guy to try and work it out your own, it’s your own time, and it’s something you, you know, to become better at learning the guitar is to figure some stuff out for yourself even it takes a lot of work, so. Alright, so, I’m gonna start at so I hear a voice, so I’m just gonna play the chord in time, running through the song in my head but I play the chords for you, so. Start in drive. Then it gets back in the country roads again. So, I’m not gonna tell you the whole thing, but most of the time I am just going, down – down – up – up – down – up – down, so a lot of times I’m doing down – down, see, down – up – up – down – up – down. So that’s just get you started, good luck with this one guys check out the tabs, below if you’re on the website, over here it’s on youtube, if you’re on youtube, check out the website, please, a lot of cool stuff on it for you.