4 Easy Steps to Transcribing Songs (for beginners!)

I may have missed something as I’m not familiar with what open power chords are as opposed to the 3 finger shape. Was that covered in a previous lesson?

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Justin mentioned some app besides Audacity. Was it “Transcribe” or something like that? Didn’t quite catch it. But I remember him mentioning that it is a paid app.

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I think there is a typo in the hints for Polly. It says ## twice, but I am pretty sure that there should be a ## chord there as well.

@kunsam Audacity is free and you can import / slow down audio.
Transcribe is a paid for software that is superior in functionality.

Can you share an IOS/Android link for the same? Searching by the name “Transcribe” seems to be giving only text-to-speech stuff.

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Nice idea but Transcribing software needs you to drop a sound file into them before you can start playback. Big barrier is most people hold their music collections in apps that don’t let you move your sound files because of copywrite restrictions even if you have license to listen you don’t have license to move into a transcribe tool so really a no go before you start.

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Hi Justin, quick question. When you say to find the lowest note what exactly do you mean? Are you referring to the lowest on the guitar, or on a music scale? For example, a major C chord, the lowest note would be C right?

Your lessons are life changing. Played piano my whole life, never thought I’d be able to play guitar. Now I’m 5-6 months in and loving it. Getting better everyday! Thank you so much.

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Having a go at transcribing now, it’s a lot of fun. Thanks so much for some easy songs to transcribe - makes it so much simpler.

Thought I would point out there’s an error in the tips for Polly - one chord is mentioned twice, and a chord that’s in it is missing!

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Thanks Justin! And for the support getting to this stage.

I’d recommend Zombie, by the Cranberries. Love your version BTW.

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Never tried transcribing before but I’m so glad I tried. I know I’m on some easy ones but wow I have knocked off Blitzkreig Bop and fly away in about 10mins each.

Also because I worked em out instead of read them they seem to be stuck In my head already.
I even picked up a little subtlety in the strumming pattern in Fly Away that makes it sound schmick.

Thanks for getting this in early on in my education Justin. Pumped.

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Could do Mollys Lips and Blitzkrieg Bop, totally failed on Go with the flow. The other guitars on that were quite distracting too

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Fun exercise! I think the ear training courses make this one a lot easier

A fun one I “transcribed” once since I could not find a TAB online that sounded right is Hikaru Station - Bishounen (Original Song) - YouTube - it only has 2 chords for most of the song. They are more complex than power chords, but chords we went over in grade 2! Capo on first fret

Me too!

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I was also very intimidated by the transcribing section of this course … as I tried the ear training course and didn’t get on with it and gave up as I wasn’t enjoying it as much as the grade courses … but now I’m on this grade 3 this section has given me huge confidence and belief that I can do it ! I already had learnt mollys lips from grade 2 power chord section and a couple of the others … but got stuck straight into polly thinking at first how this is probably not gunna click for me but it did ! I managed to get my head round the verse parts just concentrating on that ! Took me some time then I went back to it to learn the chorus and that clicked so much quicker apart from the one chord but got there quick . Then this weekend I tried fly away thinking it will take me some time … but I got there so much quicker ! Probably cos had only same riff throughout and half the chords !! But blown me away ! Transcribing practice now has been my favourite!

Absolutely hate this lesson! Songs are based on electric guitar and power chords but I don’t have an electric guitar so it is nearly impossible to figure them out. There definitely needs to be some acoustic songs added to round out the lesson. All I’m discovering is how frustrating it can be and not getting any valuable information from this!

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I did this lesson on an acoustic, and it worked just fine for me. But you do have to be able to play power chords.

What was the difficulty you encountered?

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I found Polly worked ok on acoustic. I didn’t try the others on acoustic.

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Transcribing is really hard, especially getting started with it.

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The Intro to “The Middle” by Jimmy Eat World is a great song to transcribe. Ask me how I know…

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In the beginning lessons on power chords, I glossed over most of them because it seems like they are mainly for rock and that isn’t something I’m interested in. The songs suggested here are not anything I like and I don’t want to listen to them long enough to transcribe. 2 questions. 1) Should I go back and learn the power chords? 2) Are there more folk/acoustic songs for learning the transcribing?

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Hi :slightly_smiling_face:
I did ALL THE SMALL THINGS by BLINK 182
I watched the lesson yesterday morning and I have been trying to figure it out ever since and then today something just clicked and without thinking I just knew the chords.

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