Chords for Guitar Cover - Learn How to Play Sundown by Gordon Lightfoot - Steve Stine Guitar Lesson

Hey, Steve Stein here, and today we're going to be looking at Sundown by Gordon Lightfoot,
another really fun song by Gordon Lightfoot.
And if you've seen my video on Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald,
this is also capoed at the second fret.
I'm going to start off by showing you an easy way to play
this song, as easy as I can, and then I'm going to go back and show you how I think it really goes,
and then you can decide which is going to work best for your guitar practice.
So if you've got the capo here, all we really need is to be able to play an E chord, an A chord,
a D chord, and a B7 chord.
[F#] So when the song starts, it just starts on an E chord. _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ Now when the drums kick in, you would still just play that E chord, but if you know how to play an
E7, you can take your pinky and place it on the third fret, again, relative to the capo,
the third fret of the second string, _ _ _ _ _ and you're going to hear that sound in there.
So it just starts off with an E chord, _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ and then when the drums kick in, you add that pinky on,
_ _ _ _ _ and when you start singing, you just go back to the E chord, _ _ _ _ _ then [C#] B7, _
_ [F#] then E.
_ [C] So the verse is really [F#] going E, _ _ E, _ [C#] B7, _ E.
[F#] _ _ _
_ Now right here is where we start the chorus,
and the chorus is going to go E, A, D, E.
_ And [B] _ _ _ _ _ [E] _ _ _
_ [F#] again, _ _ _ _ _ _ you just hang out on E until you start
singing again, and then you start the E, B7, E thing.
So your verse is E, B, E, and in this case,
we're playing a B7 right now. _
When you first start learning how to play guitar, there is no real
great B chord to play.
B7 is about as easy as it gets, and I know sometimes even that's difficult,
but the verse would be E, B, E, and then when you start the chorus, it'd be E, A, D, E.
That's
how it would go.
All right?
Now, there is a little bit more accurate way to play this,
but it is a little more difficult.
So let me show you what's happening here.
So I would play my E
chord like this. _
[G] So what I'm doing is I'm playing, again, relative to the capo, [F#] I'm playing 0, 2,
2 with my first finger, _ _ and then I'm playing my pinky on the fourth fret of the third string, _ _
and then I'm leaving these two strings open.
So I've got, _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
okay, and then when I want my B chord,
what's cool about doing it this way is all I have to do is add my third finger onto the fourth string _ _
on the fourth fret right there, _ _ right like that.
_ So I'm going from my E when _ _ _ I want B,
[C#] _ _ _
_ [F#] _ _ and then back to the E, I just take that finger and put it on and take [Gm] it back off.
Now, again,
if this is too difficult, you don't have to do it this way.
I just want to show you how this goes.
So in the verse, when he's singing and I'm moving back and forth between E and B,
all [F#] I really have to do is this chord right here and then add this third finger on and then back. _ _ _ _
Now, the question that I have is when we go to the B, the actual B, can we still hit the
sixth string?
And to be honest, I think it's fine either way.
Sometimes when I play this,
my E, of course, I'm playing all six strings. _ _
_ _ And then B, [C#] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ I'll skip this string. _
_ _ [F#] _ _ And then E,
I'll add it back in.
But to be honest, if you hit the sixth string, I don't think it would sound
terrible anyway.
Okay.
And then we get to the chorus, which we talked about was E, A, D, E,
right?
Well, we're still going to do that.
Okay.
We're doing E the same way.
But then A,
what we're going to do is we could just [B] pop over to A and [E] then D _ and then back [F#] to the E.
_ So now your chorus would look like this.
_ _ _ [B] _ _ _
_ [E] _ _ _ _ [F#] _ _ _
_ _ Okay.
If you want to get really crazy,
you could do this.
You could play your E this way.
_ Okay.
And then when you want your A,
just take your first finger here and move it down one string.
_ So _ [B] now you're playing zero on the
fifth string, _ [C#] _
two technically, again, relative to the capo, two [F#] on the fourth string, four on
the third string, and then the two zeros.
So I'm just playing this for an E chord.
_ _ And then I'm moving this first finger down for the A and [E] then D _ [F#] and then back to the E.
_ I'm just giving you ideas.
I think any of it is just fine as long as you're enjoying it.
Okay.
But that's one way you could do it.
So now let me play both ways for you.
And then if you can
play along with me, and then we're going to talk about the strum just a little bit as well.
So
let's go back to just the open chord.
So the song starts with just an E. _ _ _ _
Then when the drums come
in, we're going to add that pinky.
So here we go. _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Now he's going to start singing.
So I'm going to
take that pinky off. _ _
_ _ _ Okay.
So we're on the verse now.
One, two, ready?
And _ _ _ _ _ B7, _ [C#] _ _ [F#] E, _ _ verse or chorus,
E, _ [B] A, _ D, [E] _ _ _
_ [F#] E. _ _ _ _ _
Okay.
If you want to do it the other way, we would start with this.
Right?
This one right here.
This new way.
Now the question is, is if we're on this E and we want to
do this E7 thing like we did when the drums came in, what could we do?
Well, we could take the
middle finger here and we could place that on the second string, third fret, again, relative to the
four.
Now that feels really weird.
This finger is not being used at all. _
So now I'd be doing this. _ _ _ _
And then when the drums come in, I add that in.
_ So I'm putting it right there.
Okay.
_ Sorry.
Here we go.
Here it comes. _ _ _ _ _
_ Then when he starts singing, I'm going to take it back up. _
_ _ E.
Remember, I just added this finger on the third finger right here,
_ _ _ and back up.
Now we got our chorus, which was E, A, D, E.
So I'm playing E here _ to A.
Now I can
either just drop that finger down one _ [B] or go to [F#] an actual A, whatever you like better.
_ _ _ [E] And then D _
and then [F#] back to the E.
_ _ _ Okay.
Now, as far as the strum goes, let me show you.
Let me play just
the very beginning of this so you can kind of hear this. _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [N] See, it changes a little bit when
the drums come in, but you've got sort of this, _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ boom, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, down, down, down,
up, down, up, down, down, with more of an accent on the second beat.
One, two, three, and four,
and one, [F#] two, three, and four, and. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [C] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [A] When the drums come in, you kind of hear this, da-da, [N] bum, ba-da-da,
boom, bum, bum, ba-da-da, down, up, up, up, down, up.
So I kind of move back and forth between those
two strums.
But again, I think the most important thing is just find what's going to work for you
and not confuse you.
Because really, for me, playing songs isn't necessarily about absolutely
replicating the song.
It's just enjoying the moment of playing along with something.
So whether
or not you're playing the chords this way because you want a little bit of a challenge, or whether
you're not, you're just playing them the normal way because you just enjoy the song, don't stress
over those sorts of things.
Okay.
You can always start with something and then add something else
or do it a different way later once you're enjoying it and you choose to do something else.
So take care, stay positive, and I'll talk to you soon.
Hey, Steve Stein here.
Thank you so much for
watching this video.
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