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Song request please? and please read.

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(@davidhodge)
Member
Joined: 16 years ago
Posts: 4472
Topic starter  

It's simply amazing the things we have here at Guitar Noise:

https://www.guitarnoise.com/lesson/reading-musical-notation-part-2/

Notation and tab. No chords, but that's easily fixed:
C G
Happy Birthday to you
G C
Happy Birthday to you
C F
Happy Birthday dear whoever you are
C G C
Happy Birthday to you

You can, of course, transpose this to whatever key works best for the singers.

Hope this helps, even though it's nothing anyone couldn't do with a little patience and a search engine... :wink:

Peace


   
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(@davidhodge)
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Joined: 16 years ago
Posts: 4472
Topic starter  

Derek,

You can't transpose something to "slide." You can only transpose from one key to another.

According to posts you've already written, you know how to read music. So you have the notes if you want to play the melody, no matter what tuning you're in. In the example from the Guitar Noise lesson, for instance, almost all the notes of the melody are on the B and G strings and those strings are the same in open G tuning, so you don't have to change those. The notes on the high E string will have to be changed because the high E string is tuned down to D in open G tuning. So the G note (normally at the third fret) will be at the fifth fret, the F (normally at the first fret) will be at the third and the E note (normally the open string) will be the second fret.

If you just want to play chords so that people can sing along, then you find where the chords are, which is something else I was under the opinion you knew. But in case I'm wrong:

In open G tuning -

C is all the strings at the fifth fret
G is either all open strings or all on the twelfth fret
F is all the strings at the tenth fret

You can obviously use just some of the strings for playing chords if you want, like playing just the three highest ones. That's totally up to you.

Hope this helps and hope I didn't miss anything...

Peace


   
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(@slejhamer)
Famed Member
Joined: 19 years ago
Posts: 3221
 

And with all of David's help in mind, what a great opportunity to get some ear training! Figuring out the melody should be easy enough, then fill it out as needed. Everything you need is in David's posts, the linked article, your fingers and your ears. 8)

"Everybody got to elevate from the norm."


   
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(@jwmartin)
Noble Member
Joined: 17 years ago
Posts: 1435
 

Also I'm just going to play the chords In standard tuning on my acoustic so every one can sing along. I'll just have to learn where the f chord is in standard tuning but will not be that hard.

It's between the E and G :D

Dreaded barre chord version...
-1-
-1-
-2-
-3-
-3-
-1-

My lazy way
-1-
-1-
-2-
-3-
-x-
-x-

Bass player for Undercover


   
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(@davidhodge)
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Joined: 16 years ago
Posts: 4472
Topic starter  

But the way I wrote out in my first post was for open G tuning and you later wrote that you're going to play it in standard tuning. The chords in my first post won't work in standard tuning so you might want to double check jw's post, which shows you the F chord in standard tuning that you asked about:
I'll just have to learn where the f chord is in standard tuning but will not be that hard.

At least, unless I'm totally zoned out and reading it wrong (disctinctly possible after six hours of teaching and two of playing), it sounds like you want exactly what jwmartin spelled out for you...

Peace


   
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(@chris-c)
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Joined: 19 years ago
Posts: 3454
 

Hi all,

Amazingly enough, the words and music for Happy Birthday to You are still under copyright. Apparently it still generates a substantial amount of money each year for Warners through licences to use it for various commercial purposes.

The song is basically a rip-off of one written in the 1890s called "Good Morning to All" (which in itself was similar to others). Quite how and why Warners can still make money out of it is quite a study in itself. But if anybody wants to get hold of the melody, the original tune is not under copright. The only difference is that the first quarter note is usually played as two eighth notes.

Interesting article at Wikipedia about the songs history

The melody:

If that image stops displaying - it's in the Wiki article

Chris


   
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(@davidhodge)
Member
Joined: 16 years ago
Posts: 4472
Topic starter  

And the chords for the key Chris has it in (G major) are as follows:
G D7
Happy Birthday to you
D7 G
Happy Birthday to you
G C
Happy Birthday dear whoever you are
G D7 G
Happy Birthday to you

And that's an example of transposing, by the way...

Peace


   
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(@greybeard)
Illustrious Member
Joined: 21 years ago
Posts: 5840
 

David I do, because I want every body to be able to sing along too.
Why does that necessitate a change to standard tuning? A G chord is a G chord, irrelevant of the guitar's tuning, you'll still be playing G, B, D.

I started with nothing - and I've still got most of it left.
Did you know that the word "gullible" is not in any dictionary?
Greybeard's Pages
My Articles & Reviews on GN


   
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(@greybeard)
Illustrious Member
Joined: 21 years ago
Posts: 5840
 

Wellthe pitch doesn't sound good in d tuning but it does in Standard.
Sorry, I don't understand that. The pitch of what?

I started with nothing - and I've still got most of it left.
Did you know that the word "gullible" is not in any dictionary?
Greybeard's Pages
My Articles & Reviews on GN


   
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(@jwmartin)
Noble Member
Joined: 17 years ago
Posts: 1435
 

When you say "normal way", do you mean you are trying to finger a G chord the same way in open D as you do standard? If so, you can't do that. You have to change the way you finger the chords when you change the tuning. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but I'm seriously confused by now. :?

If you play a G, B and D note together, you get a G chord, it doesn't matter if your guitar is tuned in standard, drop-D, open-D or Martian-D. What matters is where those G, B and D notes are in each tuning.

Example:
You are in standard tuning, therefore strings are tuned as so: E B G D A E
So, a G chord can be played as: 3 0 0 0 2 3 (which gives you the notes: G B G D B G)

In open-D, strings are: D A D F# A D
So a G chord (one possible way) can be played as: 0 2 0 1 2 0 (giving you notes: D B D G B D). Of course, G is not going to be your root note played like that, so it might not sound "right". A lot of people just use their index finger and barre across all the strings when chording in open tunings. In open D, if you barre the 5th fret, you've got a G chord (5 5 5 5 5 5 gives the notes G D G B D G). So you could actually play "Happy Birthday" with 1 finger.

Bass player for Undercover


   
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