Chords for How Great Thou Art- Fingerstyle Guitar Lesson

_ _ [C#] _ _ _ _ _ _
[E] _ _ _ [G] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[C] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [F] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [C] _ _ _
_ _ [G] _ _ _ _ _ _
[C] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ [G] _
_ _ _ [C] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [F] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [D] _ _
_ [G] _ _ [C] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [C] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Am] _ _ _ [C] _ _
_ _ _ [F] _ _ _ _ _
[C] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [A] _ _ _ [Am] _ _
[G] _ _ _ _ _ _ [C] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [G] _ _ _
_ _ _ [E] _ _ _ [F] _ _
_ [D] _ _ [C] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [B] _ _ _ [D] _ _
_ [Am] _ _ [G] _ _ _ _ _
[Am] _ _ _ [C] _ _ _ [F#] _ [D] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _
[A] _ _ _ [C] _ _ _ [G] _ [C] _
_ _ _ [Dm] _ _ [C] _ _ [G] _
_ [C] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [Cm] _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ Howdy, welcome to BanjoBenClark.com.
I'm your [N] humble host Banjo Ben Clark, and I'm here to teach you some fingerstyle guitar
today.
Is there a prettier song in the world than How Great Thou Art?
I want to thank a student of mine, Ken, who suggested that we learn this song.
I've never worked out a fingerstyle version for this, but I've always wanted to.
So we're going to learn it today.
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All right, let's dive into How Great Thou Art and the Key of C.
How Great Thou Art, fingerstyle guitar and the Key of C.
I don't know if there's a more
beautiful song in the world, in my opinion.
I'll wrestle you over that one.
First thing I want you to notice is that we have all of our pick strokes, all of our fingerings,
right-hand fingerings, beneath each one of the notes.
So if there's a T in a circle, that means that we're going to play the string with the thumb.
[Em] If there's a one, it's an index finger.
If it's a two, it's a middle finger.
And that's the only fingers I use in this particular song.
Now that being said, I'm not going to be just a finger stroke Nazi on this one, okay?
So if there's a particular pattern, finger pattern that works better for you, or if you
want to bring in your ring finger to play some of these notes, that's just fine.
But this is a general guideline to how I play it.
The next thing I want to stress is that we need to keep our melody in the forefront.
There's a lot of notes [N] that are happening.
So if we play all the notes at the same volume, you're going to lose the effectiveness of the melody.
So we're just going to keep that in mind.
And the melody is pretty straightforward in this version.
It doesn't get just too crazy.
Although this is a challenging song.
So I just want to take a minute right now and encourage you to follow this thing through
and learn it.
Okay? Learn it.
It's going to be worth it.
[G] It's going to be tough.
There's going to be times when you think you can't get through a spot, but you can, I promise.
We're going to start out by playing the melody with our right hand, _ of course, _ _ _ on these open G strings.
My Lord, my God.
But as we do that, we're going to walk the bass.
And that's one thing that makes this version so pretty is that our bass notes are going
to change _ as the melody plays on.
So the first measure sounds like this. _ _
_ _ _ Just walking right up. _ _
_ _ _ When we get into measure two, I want you to go into your C chord, your regular C chord,
but leave your middle finger off because the first note in measure two, we're going [D] to
pluck the fourth and fifth strings together _ and then [B] immediately hammer [C] on to the second fret.
[D] _ _ _ [G] _ _
[A] _ [G] _ _ [C] _ _ _ _
And then now that we've got that down, we're just going to pick through the rest of the
strings [Em] as you can see there.
_ _ [C] _ _ _ Then I want you to [Gm] play with your pinky, the third fret of the B string there towards the
[E] end _ of measure two.
So measure one and [G] two together sound like this.
_ _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
And I like to leave, well, I definitely want you to [Gm] leave that pinky down so that we [C] get
the C add nine chord. _
Okay, [G] one more time. _ _ _ _ _
[C] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Isn't that pretty?
_ But notice our melody [G] notes.
We're going to keep those the loudest.
_ _ _ _ [C] _
So that means that whenever we do the rest of these notes in measure two, we kind of
fade off on the volume a little bit. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Now leave that down.
We're going to come back [B] and pick through these strings [Cm] again, [C] measure three. _ _ _ _ _
So [Em] where's our melody?
Our melody is not until we play this G string again, measure [C] three. _ _ _ _ _
So we're going to make those a little bit louder.
The first time we play it, we play it with the third fret on the [Gm] B string.
And then we come right back to it and [C] lift our pinky.
So measure three sounds like this. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ And then right there at the end of measure three, [G] I have an open G string and I put that
there so we give us time to get [E] set up to go to the F bar chord.
[Em] _
So you have to do it kind of quick and you have to do it strong to make the [G] notes clear.
But in that last note, measure three, that's what I'm going to use to lift my fingers and
get ready to come down [Em] hard with the F [C] bar chord.
_ _ _ _ _ [G] _ [F] _
_ Okay, [G#] so we're going to make the F bar chord.
It's just like an E chord.
Move it up one fret and then bar [F] all the notes with your first finger.
We're going to pick those three notes together at the beginning of measure four.
_ [F] _ _ _
_ _ And then to get our melody again on the last beat of measure four, we're going to lift
[Fm] our middle finger, _ play those two notes and then [Am] hammer on really quick.
Okay, [Em] so measure four slowly [F] sounds like this. _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
Now leave that down.
Measure five, we're not going to switch anything with our left hand.
We're just going to play through these notes again. _
_ _ _ _ Where's our melody?
[A] Our melody is this A note right there.
[G] So that's what I'm trying to bring out to the front in measure five.
[Am] _ _ [G] _ _ [C] _ _ _ [Gm] _ [F] _ _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _