4 Beatles Songs You NEED to Learn on Guitar

Day Tripper

We start off with one of the catchiest riffs of all time! Day Tripper is based around an E blues idea, where we go from the minor to the major 3rd all within the first 3 notes! We're mainly in E minor pentatonic box 1, adding in the major 3rd on the low E string and the 2nd on the D string. Here's that diagram to help you to visualise it:

The riff outlines a quick E to B to D progression, but we really want to focus on the notes here, rather than the chords. The tricky part of this riff is going to be getting the speed - we're picking every note, although the last can be a hammer on. One way to save a bit of time is to barre you index finger on the A and D strings since you're on the same fret for both. We recommend trying to use all downstrokes here, but if you prefer to use alternate or economy picking to get to the speed that's fine too!

Taxman

Here we can see how the Beatles are using rhythm to get a catchy hook - no need for a riff! We're based around a D7 C shape, and strumming on the 2 and the 4 of the bar. Then the hook is a D7#9 aka Hendrix Chord, which we play on the 1 and 2 of the bar. Here are the chord boxes and the rhythm pattern for you to follow:

Blackbird

Now we shift from the rockier electric sounds to the fingerstyle acoustic Blackbird. This tune is based around a G and runs through some beautiful chord voicings with liberal use of the open strings, and uses a fingerstyle picking pattern throughout. I would highly recommend learning the chord voicings and the picking pattern separately. The are often referred to as 'shell' chords since you're playing the outside notes of the familiar chord shapes. Here are the chord shapes you need, but try to see the CAGED shapes underneath:

If you love this song and want to study it in more detail please check out Thomas' lesson here.

Here Comes The Sun

It's time to dust off the capo! For Here Comes The Sun we need to capo on the 7th fret. It is of course possible to play the chords without the capo, but it just won't sound right - those high voicings are key to the sound of this song. The actual chords we are playing over are A, D and E7 but as we have the capo on we can think in terms of the open chord shapes we're using which are D, G and A7. In this tune George Harrison masterfully weaves the chords with the melody using a pick and aiming for either the lower or higher strings in each voicing. Aim to use a constant down up picking pattern for this one to get that same feel. You'll find that many of the melody notes are played with your upstrokes. When you're playing this song it's useful to think about how we're combining the melody notes with the underlying chords. Here are those melody notes over each chord so you can visualise them: