Okay, I've set myself a goal to perform at an IRL open mic in 3 weeks

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the word pedantic carries a significant and very negative weight to it because the level of detail my mind operates makes other people uncomfortable and they throw the word pedantic at me as a weapon to make me stop. telling me not to take offense to it while excusing its use entirely is the whole reason I’m taking offense.

before I knew why this kept coming up, I just internalized the comments and felt terrible about making other people feel that way (I’ve always been rejection-sensitive, to the point of feeling physical pain over it, which is a common “feature”). now that I know why people keep saying it to me, I know that it’s not something I can change. It’s just the way my brain works. and I am going to stand up for myself instead of feeling terrible about myself over it.

the subject could very easily have been addressed in a better way. @MAT1953 knew he was going to get called out for his comment. it was the first thing he said. that’s the first sign that maybe you ought to think a bit more about what you’re saying, no matter who you’re talking to.

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@Mustela

Nate - I will help if I can. I’m not sure from all the posts which one you have finally settled on. Is it Under The Sea? Or King Of England - with the chord names you give but are unsure how best to play on guitar?

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I think we’ve settled on doing the following:

Under the Sea
Someone to Lava
Phony King of England

Yes, this open mic allows multiple songs. Default is 3, unless there’s a big crowd, and then it starts getting reduced. If a small crowd, folks might even get a chance to get up and play more later.

No trouble with Under the Sea or Someone to Lava as far as guitar goes. I’m going to try on the vocals for Someone to Lava because it would be cool if we could split off the male and female parts. But if not it’s not a big deal because my wife has it.

Phony King of England is the only one with more difficult chords. They aren’t awful, but there are 2 parts with challenging bits. The first is the sort of bridge or whatever near the end that goes back and forth between two chords.

Robin Hood: Phony King of England

According to the sheet music, the two chords are Dm7(add4), which is shown as x 5 x 5 6 3 (which my songbook app doesn’t have, and the chord finder website I’m using calls a G7sus4) and G7. The Dm(add4) is the one that I’ve changed to a different G7sus4 (3 3 0 0 1 1) that is easier for chord changes. And am thinking about just playing a Gsus (3 3 0 0 1 3) since that’s what my wife will be playing on uke, and then changing the G7 to a regular G. Or maybe using G7 and G here. Not sure yet which will be easier for me to use. These are half note changes but the song has a fairly upbeat tempo.

The other tricky spot is the outro which uses Fm, which will be a whole lot easier if I can use the full barre F (which happens just before). The outro progression goes C, C7/E, F, Fm, C, C7/E, F, G7, C over the course of 4 measures. First two measures are half notes, the 3rd measure are quarter notes, and then the final measure is just one strum on C. So right now I’m focusing on chord changes into and out of the full barre F chord with a metronome to try to get to a point where I can use it in the song. If I can’t get there in time, I wouldn’t mind some advice on simplifying the outro. My first thought would be to remove the F to Fm change and maybe the 2nd C to C7/E so the progression would go C, C7/E, F (could use mini F), G7, C. and just make them all half notes (though I like the idea of that last C being a hard strum with a palm mute instead of letting it ring). Would you do it any different?

I’m also curious how you’d handle the rhythm on this one? I’m kinda taking my cues from the bassline in thinking of doing a boom chick sort of strum except for that bridge part where it looks like a down-up-down would be good.

I think we’ll probably wind up playing this a little slower than the recording, but I don’t want to lose the feel. So that’s something we’ll just have to experiment with. I’ve got my Boss drum machine so I can experiment a bit.

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@Mustela

The link you sent to the film clip is a simple two chord song. It goes through two key changes and varying tempos. But you could simplify it and stay in the same key. And it only uses two chords. I don’t know how or why the sheet music gives so many varied chords. One thing I know - sheet music is very rarely written for guitar and most often written for piano with a whole collection of chords that do not translate well to guitar. Try this:

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Capo where you want.
BPM at a speed you want.

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the one I have IS written to include guitar, as it shows guitar chord boxes. My assessment of that is that it is an arrangement that strives to take some of the elements from the other various instruments in the song to add interest (it also shows piano, bass, and vocal melody parts and I’m pretty much ignoring everything except the guitar chords and the lyrics). the sheet music does not include the key changes which is just as well for me. I like the idea behind what the sheet music shows. yes, the bulk of what the sheet music shows is just two chords. but it adds fun little spots at the ends of the verses. as I’ve said, those spots are mostly not an issue.

so while I appreciate what you’ve put together there, that’s not what I’m asking.

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Okay, no problem.

Which two chords are you playing?

The sequence is

I chord → I chord → V chord → I chord most of the way.

Is your I chord (the tonic / home chord) C or G?

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For the bulk of the verses, similar to what you drew up, it’s C and G7. There’s an intro that goes C/Am7/Dm7/G7/C/Am7/Dm7/G7 before the first verse starts with C. Not concerned with any of that. Then the section endings get a C/F/C change (2 beats on each). with a 2 beat rest after, then the next section starts the pattern over.

At the end of the verses leading up to the “Phony King of England” part, there’s an Am/C change. Then the phrase “[G7]Phony King of [Dm7]Eng[G7][C]land” goes like that and then then moves to the next verse.

The part that’s just describing the king goes [G7sus4]sniveling, [G7]groveling, [G7sus4] [G7] (just an instrumental echo) before moving to the next two adjectives and so on.

The final line “[C]Prince [Am7]John! The [G7]phony king of [Dm7]Eng[G7][C]land” gets that Am7 instead of an Am as compared to the previous repetitions of that line and then the outro C7/E, F, Fm, C, C7/E, F, G7, C.

I really like how this arrangement goes and adds some flavor to an otherwise fairly uninteresting 2 chord song (because all the interesting stuff is being done by different instruments). Nothing here is horribly difficult, either.

You may be right about the sheet music I found for Les Poissons not being written for guitar. It is less detailed than this one. It has a single line of music that looks like it’s just the notes for the vocal melody with the chord names above the staff (but no guitar chord boxes). It’s a little nuts in that no lines are exact repetitions of any prior lines. The UG listing for it just doesn’t sound good. My wife tried transcribing it all over the place and it was no go.
LES POISSONS CHORDS by Alan Menken @ Ultimate-Guitar.Com

This sheet music I found sounds good but it’s just too much. I think simplifying it would be worthwhile but probably a challenge to keep it from becoming like the UG listing.

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That is a I → V7 move.
You do not need to play G7 each time, G major would be fine too.
C is the tonic chord.
G or G7 is the dominant chord.
Dominnat going to tonic is called a perfect cadence. You should hear this as the music going back home. Tension to resolution. When the dominant is played as a 7 chord, that resolution is stronger.

C → Am7 → Dm7 → G7 x 2

I → vi7 → ii7 → V7 x 2

This is all quite standard in a chord progression.

C → F → C

I → IV → I

This too is a fairly standard way to end a line or section.

Am → C → G7 → Dm7 → G7 → C
vi → I → V7 → ii7 → V7 → I

Again, this is fairly standard.

G7sus4 → G7 → G7sus4 → G7

V7sus4 → V7 → V7sus4 → V7

Bouncing between the dominant 7 and the sus version creates a to-and-fro sense of movement in the music. The final G7 leads to the final line beginning on C. There is another instance of dominant to tonic.

C → Am7 → G7 → Dm7 → G7 → C

I → vi7 → V7 → ii7 → V7 → I

All fairly straightforward.

C7/E → F → Fm → C → C7/E → F → G7 → C

I7 → IV → iv → I → I7 → IV → V7 → I

Playing the tonic chord as a dominant 7 is done for a purpose. It transforms it to become the dominant 7 of the IV chord. C7 → F is a perfect cadence in the same way that G7 → C is a perfect cadence. Hopefully you can hear how playing the tonic chord in a different way pushes the music strongly to the F chord that follows. The fact that it has an E in the bass (you would call this a slash chord, or C over E) means the bass line is adding to the string movement by going just a semitone up from E to F.
Then the F chord changes character and becomes Fm. This is a common devce in music applied to the IV chord. Play it major (how it ‘should’ be then play it minor before returning to the tonic. That is what happens. Fm goes back to C.
Then it almost repeats but instead of Fm to C we get G7 to C.

In terms of chord grips and how best to play it.

You can play F and Fm using a 4-string mini-barre. If you can play the E-shape barre chord, I recommend that for F, Fm and the G7 to G7sus4 part.

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I hope that helps.
:slight_smile:

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Thanks for the theory intro. All of what you describe does explain why I like this arrangement. I do feel the movement in it, and I get the bounciness of the G7sus4 to G7. it goes nicely with the bounciness of the lyrics there.

I won’t say I’m great or even terribly good with barre chords at this point. I know several shapes and can make them reliably given time. I just need work on getting that speed up, which is taking awhile because that level of control of my left hand is a persistent challenge I have.

Doing G7sus4 to G7 in that way does look like it’d be a little bit quicker, if I can make use of those barre shapes. I’ll have to try it to see how attainable that is for me by next week. Otherwise I was planning to use the open positions.

Interestingly, the chord boxes on the sheet music show x x 2 3 1 0 for C7/E. So it’s not going quite as low with the E in the bass. I’ll try both to see which one is easier for me to get into that full barre F chord. Making that chord with all 6 strings seems like it would give me the benefit of being able to keep my 3rd finger as my anchor, which the other shape doesn’t really have.

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Technically, that is C7 / E also
If you play F as mini- barre this may be a good choice for two reasons.
Everything is on four strings so the changes can be easier and they have a similar timbre.
Plus, the bass movement is still rising from E to F but on the 4th string.

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That’s a great goal. I’m performing at an open mic tomorrow night. First one in person. I’ll be playing the offspring, blink 182, and Green Day.

Jeff from California

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I’ve been working a lot on this. Yesterday I put in enough work that I’m confident with my F barre chord (and the Fm). There’s a few C-F-C lines where I’m going to use mini-F, though. That’s the only way I can be fast enough for that.

On the G7sus4 - G7 part, I think I’m going to use the barre chords. I was practicing it with both the open and barre chords yesterday and found the barre chords much easier. Challenge there is how exhausted my hand gets going back and forth between those two chords for 12 measures. I’ve been pushing myself with a couple sessions per day to get accustomed to it and I’m already noticing improvement.

Yesterday I also tap-tempo’d the recording from the film to see what sort of tempo I need to target. It’s actually slower than I thought it was. About 110-115bpm, so I don’t think I’ll need to slow it down any. I’m not sure I’m happy with doing a boom-chick for the rhythm. For one it’s just complex enough that I’m not going to be able to do vocals with it. Not by Thursday, anyway. There’s a couple rhythmic oddities in there (with the vocals) that I’m going to need to focus on those if I’m going to be handling those vocals. I think my wife has decided how she’s going to strum that and I think this is another one (like with Someone to Lava) where I can play simpler quarter note strums or such to fill space and she can do more with her uke, somewhat like how the film clip has other instruments like the fiddle doing a whole lot more at the top of the register.

It looks like my wife has decided not to play Under the Sea. That one got scrapped because my wife got a request from some regular spectators at open mic (they don’t play any instruments - they just come to watch) to do the Hula Song from the Lion King. My wife will play uke, they will do vocals (one of them just doing the “Yup Yup Yup Yup” part.

The Lion King - Hula Song

I haven’t explicitly been asked to participate in this song, but I think I want to try to do the slide guitar part. With this one, for sure, the whole point is to be ridiculous, so even if I’m absolutely terrible, I think it’ll be a riot. It’s short enough that I might actually do a passable job. It’s definitely not worth an instrument swap so I’m going to see what I can get out of my acoustic guitar. Especially if the Valeton GP-50 pedal I just got can help a little bit with that tone.

Someone to Lava is coming along really nicely. We’ve practiced that one a bit and I’ve sorted out how I want to play it after a little experimentation and some back-and-forth. We played it at the uke jam yesterday (with a whole lot of other ukuleles, a uke bass, and a snare drum) and I got some comments from folks who really like what I added to the song.