Songs for Beginner Guitarists: Crafting Your Initial Skills
Ideal songs to start your guitar playing journey
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Beginner guitarists can often feel overwhelmed when learning the guitar. With these clear tips from 5 well-known songs, that journey just got a little bit easier. Let’s get strumming.
Songs for Beginners:
Beginner Guitarists: Songs to Get You Started
I remember my early days as a guitarist as if they were yesterday. Those balanced feelings of sheer determination, crushing defeat and hopeful optimism. Learning the guitar sure can be a rollercoaster of emotions.
However, there are many ways to avoid stress and frustration when starting out. All you’ve got to do is get a good understanding of your basic components, such as chords and how to read TAB. From here, you can start getting some enjoyment from your playing.
These 5 songs are ideal songs for beginner guitarists. They comprise basic chords, along with some fun and simple riffs. So, let’s see what we’re up against.
Time Of Your Life – Green Day
Our first track comes from 1997, and is one of Green Day’s more sedate tracks. Moreover, it has been very popular with my beginner guitar students recently. I hope that others can enjoy it too!
Throughout most of the song, there’s a rhythmic picking pattern. This is great and sets the nostalgic tone for the track, but it’s not what we’re after. Here, we’ll be focusing on strumming through the chord progression. It’s not exactly what’s happening on the record, but it’s more than enough to strum along to.
We’ll want to strum four down strokes on a G major chord, which is the duration of one bar. Then, we’ll split the next bar between Cadd9 and D major. For me, I’ve found that the best way to play Cadd9 is to simply move my index and middle fingers down a string each after the G chord.
Brown Eyed Girl – Van Morrison
Moving on, we’re jumping back into the swinging sixties with this Karaoke staple. But what if you’ve swapped the microphone for your guitar? Look no further.
Here, we’ve just got a straightforward bunch of chords. Four strums on each of them, and there’s a lot of scope to add some strumming patterns down the line should you feel able to do so. Otherwise, just grab your pick and get started.
Furthermore, I’ve included a simplified version of the intro riff as a TAB. This is ideal for beginner guitarists as it still achieves the main melody, just without the tricky major 3rds.
Breaking The Law – Judas Priest
Now that we’ve looked at one riff for beginner guitarists, let’s look at another. This one from Judas Priest is nice and repetitive, so it gives you plenty of time to master it.
What I like most about this riff is that it uses a couple of open notes, whereby we don’t have to fret any notes. Easy win! Plus, it’s one of those riffs that just sounds mega and will really impress your friends and family.
If you’ve looked at it already, I’d 100% recommend using alternate picking to play through this. Otherwise, down-picks will be fine, but it could slow you down further down the line.
Pyscho – Muse
Another heavier example here. Muse have such a bright range of songs, coming from this drop D monster, contrasting with effortlessly emotional ballads.
So, the main thing you’ll want to learn with this one is how to tune to the drop d guitar tuning. But, what is it? It’s dead simple. All we need to do is pick an open D string, followed by the low E string. From here, we want to downtune that E string by two whole steps until it is also the same pitch as the D string. Hence, drop D.
Similar to another beginner guitarist favourite, Smoke On The Water, this riff works with lots of zeros, threes and fives on a single string. Plus, we’ve got a cheeky half-step bend at the end. Don’t worry though, just pull the string down a little.
Wait there! To help you get that exact drop D tuning, I’d recommend grabbing a guitar tuner from *Thomann. Luckily, they have plenty to chose from:
Don’t You Want Me – The Human League
Our final look at songs for beginner guitarists comes from Sheffield in the early 1980s. In the interest of balance, we’ve got another open chord song from the pop charts.
With all of the synth action in this one, a lot of players don’t expect it to be as straightforward as it is on guitar. Happily, the verse just works around two chords. Just two, that’s it!
From here, the pre-chorus has an exciting build with another bunch of relatively easy chords. Then, for the chorus, we return back to that F and G progression from the verse.
Relevant Gear
As a beginner guitarist, you may be learning on an old, borrowed guitar that won’t be doing you any favours. Here are a few guitars that’d I’d want to consider if I was learning all over again.
Beginner Guitarists: Worry Not!
So, having looked at those songs, you’ll hopefully see that learning the guitar doesn’t have to be a boring and complicated process. Don’t get me wrong, you still have to work hard. But, these songs can provide the fun and colour that’s missing from your practice schedule.
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