Blackbird by The Beatles Lesson

Song Lessons Grade 6 Songs
1

Learn to play Blackbird by The Beatles on JustinGuitar!


View the full lesson at Blackbird by The Beatles | JustinGuitar

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Do many newish players find it difficult to keep with a metronome on a song such as this where bars are split between 1/8 notes for some bars and any combinations of 1/8 and 1/16th notes in others.

I find I am either rushing the ‘1 + 2 +’ bars or getting behind on the ‘1 + 2 e +’ bars.

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Hi @John_in_Dot
The remedy is a time-honoured one.
Slow right down and get it properly right at a reduced tempo.
It is good advice in so many situations - and this is one such.
With a metronome however, you need to know / notice that it fluctuates between bars of 3/4 and bars of 2/4.
Cheers :blush:
| Richard_close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide & Moderator

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AGAIN terrific lesson thank you

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Paul McCartney actually anchors his pinky which I believe makes this easier.

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@Richard_close2u , I have a question about the 6th bar in the tab. It shows the first beat as two 16ths followed by an 8th note. But in every other measure the pattern begins with an 8th note followed by two 16ths. Is this a typo in this measure? I looked at the lesson a number of times and I don’t see what’s in the tab (and is makes it hard to do the index finger flickie thing!).

Thx
Ron

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That is an eagle-eyed spot @RonZ
Thanks - I have passed it on to the team.
Cheers
:slight_smile: Richard

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Found this video if anybody wants to get a really good look at Paul’s fingerpicking, which is pretty much exactly as Justin says: Paul McCartney ~ Blackbird 1991 (w/subtitles) [HQ] - YouTube

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No chords. Maybe a bug…

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I have a question, in the second riff when we play chord A7 we don’t pluck the third string, so why do we need to hold the whole chord, when we can just hold the fifth string with 1 finger and it will do the same sound? It isn’t very clear for me.

11

I think that, if in the little down strum, you accidentally whack the open D string, it may sound funny.

I’ll test it out tonight when I practice.

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Hello I have some questions about this lesson:

  1. Why does Justin tell us to put the index finger behind the ring finger before we slide the G/B chord up to the 12th fret? Wouldn’t it be easier to keep the fingering as it is and just slide the ring and the pinky finger down?

  2. When I play this song, the open G strings gets quite overwhelming. It kind of makes a “droning” sound and is rather dominant instead of being in the background. Is there a trick to make it sound smoother?
    For one, my G string is always a bit louder than the other strings and has more sustain. Also it has some unpleasant overtones: the open G string sounds quite different to the G note at the 5th fret on the D string, even though both are in tune!

Also a somehow unrelated question:
How do I do smooth slides on the acoustic guitar? Especially when I slide on the thicker strings, I get some kind of “rattling” or “rolling” sound when I pass the point right behind a fret, since even if I press hard, right behind the fret (meaning right after passing the fret, which is where you usually wouldn’t fret for this very reason) there will be fret buzz. According to a luthier, my action is as low as I can go if I still want to be able to flatpick without the strings buzzing.