Livin' On A Prayer Guitar Lesson

Today we're diving into one of the most iconic rock anthems of the 80's - Bon Jovi's 'Livin' on a Prayer'. I know the riff started playing in your head just from reading the name! It's the kind of song that gets the whole room singing by the second verse, and one any rock-guitarist should add to their repertoire!

Before we get started, quick disclaimer - this blog post won’t include tabs. The lesson write-up will include details of each section, and how to piece them all together, but if you're looking for the exact frets and strumming patterns, definitely check out Dion's incredible video lesson! That’s where all the detailed fingerwork and rhythm is broken down into all the detail you need!

So grab your guitar, turn that gain up (but maybe not to stadium level just yet), and let’s get into it!

Intro/Riff

Let's get straight into the fun bit - the riff. It’s chunky, driving, and instantly recognisable. And you'll be pleased to know that it sounds more complex than it actually is!

The riff is fully based on the E minor pentatonic scale, which is part of what gives it that punchy, classic rock feel. Let's take a look at the scale box we're below:

There are a handful of things we need to consider/do to make sure that we're playing the riff correctly:

Timing: The timing of the riff itself is pretty straightforward - it's just eighth notes. However, the riff first enters with a pickup on the fourth beat of the bar before the full phrase of the riff properly starts. This might be a bit confusing, so, to clarify - the entire riff, or phrase, is exactly one bar long. The riffs first enters with the last two notes of the phrase - the 7th fret on the E-string and 5th fret of the A-string.

Muting: We're going to use palm-muting to mute every note we play on the low E-string. This really helps the notes on the A-string 'pop', and helps keep the right timing and feel. As we want the pitch to still come through, try palm-muting slightly closer to the bridge. This will also help the notes from bleeding into one another, and keep it tight!

Another key feature of this riff is the guitar tone used - it's an effect called a talk box. It's what makes the guitar sound like it's being sung, and well, it's because it kinda is… if you haven't seen a talk box in action, I'd check it out on YouTube! With that said, this is a pretty niche effect, and I'd expect maybe 1% of you reading this actually have one. So, either let the gain/overdrive do the work, or, if you have a wah pedal or filter of another kind, play around with it until you find the sound you like!

Verse

The verse is by far the most straight-forward section of the track. The guitar drops out and the bass takes over the work of playing the riff. All we need to do is play two chords. What makes it even simpler, is that we just need to play powerchords in two different positions - C and D.

Keep the tone the same as the riff, and make sure there's plenty of gain to help them sound saturated, full, and have plenty of sustain!

If you don't want to just sit back and let the bass have all the fun, try playing along with the riff. If you do, make sure that you're palm-muting every note, and really drop the overall dynamic. This will help the chords really make a statement when they come in!

Pre-chorus

This is the part that really takes the energy and dynamic up a notch! And all we need to do to make it happen is add an E powerchord to the C and D powerchords we've just played in the verse! The E5 chord is exactly the same shape as the C5 and D5 chords, just starting on the 7th fret this time!To help create the lift in energy, we're going to play the chords in ascending order - C5, D5, then E5. There is a slight change upon the fourth and final repeat that leads us into the chorus - check out the structure below!

The last piece of the puzzle for this section is making sure that we're pushing the D5 chord. Dion approaches this with an up-stroke, to help with the natural flow and feel to transition to the the D5 chord on the 'and' of the fourth beat of the bar.

With that said, here's the main strumming pattern that Dion outlines:

You don't have to strictly follow this pattern - try changing it up using your own style and flair and find something that works best for you!

One last note before we move onto the chorus - you probably noticed that Dion included some mutes/scratches in his strumming. The best way to get the right sound for these mutes is not by palm-muting, instead, using a technique called dampening.

Dampening is the technique where you release the pressure of your fingers on the strings without fully coming off the strings. If you're practicing this on the C5 chord as an example, you should still be holding the chord shape, just without touching the fretboard!

Chorus

The chorus is once again completely driven by power-chords - we just need to add two more positions: G5 and E5. Yes, we've used E5 in the pre-chorus, but we'll need to drop it an octave and play it starting on the low E-string for the chorus!

To avoid getting an E minor sound, make sure that you're either muting or avoiding the open G-string. It's not the end of the world, as the context of the other chords naturally make it feel like an E minor; it's just more true to the track to keep it as a power-chord!

As the power-chord shapes should be pretty familiar by now, let's dive straight into the structure for the chorus:

The strumming pattern is fairly similar to the pre-chorus as well, as we're once again using a pushed rhythm with an upstroke - this time for the C5 chord.

The lead parts

Aside from the key change towards the end of the track - which we'll take a look at later - we've covered all we need to know for the rhythm sections. That leaves us with the short lead phrase in the second verse, and more importantly - the solo! Let's not waste any time, and get straight into it!

Verse 2 lead

As we haven't hit the key change yet, we're going to still be in the key of E minor - more specifically, E minor pentatonic for this lead run!

We stay almost entirely within box 1 - the minor pentatonic shape we all know and love, with the exception of one bend. Let's take a look at the shape first:

The only time we stray outside of this shape is when we catch the full tone bend on the 17th fret of the high E-string. This is a great point to go back to the video and have a listen to exactly how Dion is playing it!

We need to target a handful of techniques for this section: bends, vibrato and double-stops. Let's take a very quick look at each of them:

Bends: Be sure to bend up a full tone for both bends in this part. Be mindful that you're hitting the right pitch (equal to 2 fret above the fret you're bending), as well as the speed in which you bend and release. You can put your own flair on these bends, just try not to make them too quick!

Vibrato: A big, wide vibrato is essential in creating the powerful 80's rock sound! Don't hold back, and be sure to add vibrato to all your bends, too!

Double-stops: A double-stop is a guitarist's way of 'play two notes at one time'. The best way to play the double-stop in this section is to flatten your index finger to barre across the 12th fret. This will make it easier to catch at speed, make the other frets easier to catch, and let you add an even vibrato on top of it. Don't forget to really dig in when you play this!

Solo

This is the part I'm sure many of you have been waiting for - the incredibly singable, energetic solo that just proves that you don't need to always be shredding to write an iconic piece of lead playing!

As this is quite a lengthy solo, let's break it down into a handful of different phrases. I'd recommend learning them separately, and piecing them all together once you've got them under your fingers.

Phrase 1

A lot of solos jump straight to soaring, high pitched bends to make it clear it's the guitar's time to shine. This solo, however, start rather low and gradually crescendos up to the top - a fantastic story-telling song-writing technique!

We're staying within E minor pentatonic for the first phrase - and just on the A- and D-string at that. It's fairly straight forward as we're just targeting notes within the box provided below, with one full tone bend on the 7th fret of the D-string.

Phrase 2

We're making a slight detour from E minor pentatonic for this phrase, and giving ourselves a few more notes to choose from by jumping up the fretboard to play the E natural minor scale! The two added notes to the pentatonic scale are the second degree (F#) and the flat six degree (C).

Once again, we're staying in one box position, with a focus on vibrato and bending. The one technique that Dion uses that we haven't yet had a look at is rolling. Rolling is using one finger to play the same fret across two or more strings. The way it differs from barring, is that we need to use that same finger to mute the string that we're no longer playing.

Let's take a look at the exact example in this phrase, where Dion uses his pinky to roll across the 15th frets of the high E- and B-strings. Firstly, he makes sure that his pinky is covering both the E- and B-strings. He then flattens his pinky to play the E-string, then 'pops' or bends the knuckle up to release the pressure on the E-string, while catching the B-string. This allows you to seamlessly move between strings, all while muting unwanted notes and string noise!

Phrase 3

We're going to be staying pretty much within the exact same scale shape for the third phrase, and this time we're bringing back the double-stops! The key to this phrase is that the accents (which happen to be the double-stops), are all on the off-beat. However, we want to start the bar by playing the 14th fret on the D-string on the down-beat - which helps us confidently get into the off-beat groove! Make sure that you're palm-muting this note to really help the off-beats stand out even more!

The two double-stops we're playing are third intervals, which is arguably the most common voicing for the technique. The first is played on the 12th frets of the G- and B-string, forming a major third, and the second is on the 14th fret of the G- and 13th fret of the B-string, creating a minor third.

To finish the phrase off, we're essentially outlining a D major arpeggio. Start by bending and releasing the 11th fret (F#) on the G-string up a semi-tone, and continue by playing the 12th of the D-string (D), then the 12th of the A-string (A).

Phrase 4

The fourth phrase starts exactly the same as the second phrase - and only changes once we've hit the 13th fret on the B-string. This time round, instead of hitting the bend on the 15th fret, we want to use the rolling technique with our first finger to play down the 12th frets of the B- and G-strings. We then quickly hop back to the B-string to finish the phrase off with a full-tone bend on the 15th fret.

Phrase 5

We finish off this incredible solo with a speedy little chromatic shred run! You'll want to alternate pick all of this run to get it up to speed. Starting on the G-string, we're going to play the 14th, 15th and 16th fret. We then hop across to the B-string and play the 15th, 16th and 17th fret, and this time, we play it twice. Finally, we move over to the E-string and play exactly the same frets as the B-string, and finish it off with a full-tone bend on the 17th fret.

And there you have it - everything you need to know to play this truly iconic solo! Be sure to practice each phrase separately to really master the techniques before joining them all together. I know you'll have a lot of fun working on this one!

Key change

Before we can it a wrap, we need to talk about the section that adds all the drama to the end of the track - the key change. Let's give it a shot… Essentially, 'all' we're doing is playing the chorus section, but modulating from E minor to G minor. To do this, we need to move every chord up three semi-tones, or three frets. As an example, the E5 chord played on the open E-string would now be moved up to a G5, played on the 3rd fret. See below for all of the moved chord shapes!

It all gradually comes to an end with a fade out - a very typical stylistic feature of 80's rock! This is an undeniably cool way to end a song, but it makes it tricky to find the right spot to stop playing along… I would recommend seeing this as an opportunity to practice your dynamics - see if you can gradually play softer and softer with each progressive chord during the fade-out.