How may times haven't you heard "Hey you're a guitar player - why don't you play 'happy birthday to you' for us?"
Next time you'll say yes and do 'Birthday' instead :D
I've stumbled across a tab for this one occationally and have always thought that it won't sound any good with just one guitar. However, I think now that it can work pretty well. IMO you have to play some more chords tones than just the melody line in the avarage tabs to make it sound good.
Something like this can work, and it is not too hard. Verse
(I've indicated the length of the tone above the tabs - shouldn't be necessary if you know the song. Also, it would have been more correct with half the tempo, i.e. substitute s with e, e with q etc. )
A chord (riff1)
s s s s s e s q q
x -(0/2)----------------------------
x -(2)------------------------------
----2--2--2--2--2--2--2--2----------
----2--2--2--2--5--4--2--2----------
----0--0--4-(0)(0)(0)(0)-0----------
x ----------------------------------
You say it's your birthday...
D chord (riff2)
s s s s s e s q q
-----------------------
-----------------------
-----------5-4---------
---4-4-4-7-----7-4-----
---5-5-----------5-----
-----------------------
They say it's your birthday...
E chord (riff3)
s s s s s e s q q
-----------------------
-----------------------
-----------7-6---------
---6-6-6-9-----9-6-----
---7-7-----------7-----
-----------------------
I'm glad its your birthday
Solo:
s e e e s s s s s q s e e e s s s s s q
---------------------------|-----------------------------|
---------------------------|-----------------------------|
---------------------------|-------------5--s9-7---------|
-------5--7--5-------------|--------5--7---------10-7----|
----7----------8-5---------|----7---------------------10-|
--5-----------------7-5-s3-|--5--------------------------|
Chorus
'
C e e e e G
---------------x--x--x--x-------
--1-1-1-1------0--0--0--0-------
--0-0-0-0------0--0--0--0-------
--2-2-3-4------0--3--2--0-------
--3-3-3-3------2--2--2--2-------
---------------3--3--3--3-------
Lyrics
Play riff1 for an intro
A (riff1)
You say it's your birthday
A (riff1)
It's my birthday too yeah
D (riff2)
They say it's your birthday
A (riff1)
We're gonna have a good time
E (riff3)
I'm glad it's your birthday
A (riff1)
Happy birthday to you
Bridge - just strum chords
E
Yes we're going to a party party
E
Yes we're going to a party party
E
Yes we're going to a party party
Chorus
C G
I would like you to dance
C G
(Birthday) Take a cha - cha -cha chance
C G
(Birthday) I would like you to dance
C G
(Birthday) Dance
E
Somewhere here comes the solo
Take it over into the chorus
Do the verse once again
End with riff1
Or something like that - you might want to listen to the record.
...only thing I know how to do is to keep on keepin' on...
LARS kolberg http://www.facebook.com/sangerersomfolk
I just learned this song in about an hour last weekend. It was my birthday on Sunday and it was my wife's birthday six days earlier and I thought it would be cool to play this for her:
(You say it's your birthday....It's my birthday too yeah)
Either this song is super easy or I'm getting better at learning songs. Anyway, Thanks for posting this lars. It's a great tab for solo guitar. During the drum section, I play muted chords to keep the timing. It helps fill in the gaps and, with some cool distortion, it sounds great!
Dave
This is not one of my favorite Beatle songs, but like all Beatle tunes, it is here to stay.
Jim Colyer wrote "I Looked Twice!"
