Breathe 2AM Guitar Tutorial to Sound Like Anna Nalick

Hey, guitar enthusiast Lauren Bateman here. And in this guitar lesson, we're going to be doing breathe 2am by Anna Nalek. My student Lori Bennett requested this. So, Laurie, this one is for you. Now we have a bunch of open chords we're going to be using in this song. Fortunately for us, the majority of the song is an A major chord, a D major chord, an E major chord and a G major chord. Now, the B minor chord does pop in a couple times on the chorus section. If you're not the greatest with bar chords. When we get to the chorus, I'll show you how you can approach that. But let's start off with the strumming.

So this song starts out mainly with piano, but we're just going to mimic that on the guitar. It's a very, very simple strumming pattern. So the timing of this song is what we call six, eight timing. So we're going to be counting to six. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 1, 2, 3, four, five, six. So it's going to have this sway feel to it. Okay, so one, two, three, four, five, six. One, two, three, four, five, six. And the accents are going to be on the one and the four. So when we first start this song, we're just going to be doing down strums on 1 and 4. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 1, 2, 3, four, five, six. 1, two, three, four, five, six. Because when you listen to the recording, it's just the piano doing the one and four. But since we don't have a piano player with us, we're just going to strum down on one and four. So if I take a look at the verse, we'll put the chords up on screen. You know, I have two A's, two G's, two D's and two A's. And then it's going to jump into the strumming. So we'll talk about that in a second. But first let's just try playing through with this simplified strumming to get the timing of the song. It's a nice, even kiltered song. So we got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 1, 2, 3, 4th, 5, 6. 1, two, three, four, five, six. G.

Good. You can see I'm kind of my. Whenever you're playing, this is what we call a waltz song. You know, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Or 3, 4 is another waltz time. You'll feel your body naturally want to do this. And this is such a great song if you're someone who's really loves singer songwriters and you love to sing and play at the same time. This is a great song because a lot of the lyrics change, right, with the chord. So let's do that with the lyrics now. Okay, so I'm gonna take it from the top. So you go 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 1, 2, 3, 4th, 5, 6. 1, two, three. Here we go. Ready?

2:00Am and she calls me. Cause I'm still awake. Can you help me unravel my latest mistake? I don't love him. Winter just wasn't my season.

And then it goes into.

Yeah, we walk through the door so accusing their eyes.

Oh, is my voice cracks there. It's morning here. My voice is not warmed up quite yet. But you can hear all of a sudden, halfway through this verse. This is where, if you listen to the recording, the guitar actually comes in. So here we're just gonna do more strumming. Okay. So what we're gonna do is we're just gonna throw some straight strums, some up strums in between. So this song, as I said, is in 6, 8. And the way I think about counting this is 1, 2, and 3 and 4, 5 and 6, and 1, 2 and 3 and 4, 5 and six, and. Or in my head, when I count it, I count it as If I'm in 3, 4, just because for me, it's easier to count. And I feel like I can really accent the one.

One, two, and three, and one, two, and three, and down, down, up, down.

Up, down, down, up, down, up.

So just think about that. Down, down, up, down, up, down, down, up, down, up, down. And on that first down, we want to accent. So we're going to continue accenting.

Okay. And you can dig into this more or less, depending on where you are in the song. So this is what we're going to do on the second half of the verse and. And into the chorus. So let's just take a look at the second half of that verse. Yeah, we walk through the door so we got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

Yeah, we walk through the door. So accusing their eyes like they have any right at all to criticize hypocrites Here I'll hear for the very same reason.

And you can't jump a track. And we're going to the court chorus.

So right there, that's where the B minor comes in. It's a very cool transition because to this point, we've had all major chords. So hearing that minor tone comes in, it's a little bit jarring to hear that in the music. And I think It's a really great setup for this chorus. So we're really not doing anything different on the chorus. Strumming wise, we're going to maintain that 6, 8 timing. The only difference on the chorus is the chords are only one measure versus the two measures that we had in the verse. So let's put our chords up on screen and just try playing a little bit with this chorus section. So our chords are going to be B minor, D, A, E. And then it's going to repeat that on the end. We're going to hold that E for two measures and then we kind of got our transition which is the.

Just breathe, oh breathe.

So that part's going to be G, D, double A. So let's take that from the top. All right, so before we jump into our playthrough, I just want to talk about the B minor chord. So for some people this can be a tricky chord, especially if you're not used to bar chords. There is a four fingered B minor that you could do without the bar. That's always an option. Some people find doing B minor a little bit easier up here on the seventh fret as a bar chord. I don't like it particularly for the songs. It's a very bright song sounding chord. I would prefer it to be down here. Since the very dark song, the even easier version is just to do your first, second and third fingers on the bottom three strings. Because you're using the bottom three strings, it is going to be a little bit tinny. So when you're coming B minor into D, there really isn't a great transition. But when you're going from E major into B minor, you can leave your ring finger down and slide into B minor. Okay? So you can work on that back and forth. And whenever you have a bar chord in a song, just take some time to practice going from, you know, B minor to A, B minor to A and then the other one is E to B minor. Okay. So getting into the chord, just practicing those chord changes can really help speed up the timing. All right, so let's put the chords for the chorus and I will do a more full playthrough in a bit. But first we have to talk about the bridge and a very, very special verse that happens in this song. So if we have our chorus starting with the B Minor, we got 1, 2, 3, ready.

Cause you can't jump the track we're like cars on a cable and life's like an hourglass glued to the table no one can find the rewind Button girl so cradle your head in your hand hold the E.

And breath.

Just.

Breath.

Woe breath.

Just breath.

And we continue into our next verse and chorus. No changes there. But we do have a bridge section which just has a little bit more of B minor and D. And then it transitions into this interesting verse. We go back to less strumming. Now you could on this verse go back to this. But if I were playing this, I might finger pick it or I might. If I have a pick in hand, I might just pick and a. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

2Am and I'm still awake writing this song Forget it all down on paper there's no longer inside inside of me Threatening the life it belongs to so.

I always think of songs from like a performance perspective too. So yes, we could easily just go.

Back to 2am and I'm still awake writing this song. Get it all down on paper it's no longer inside of me Writing the life it belongs to.

So up to you what you want to do. We could just go back to just strumming, but I wanted to give you another option to let you know. You could just play six string arpeggios, which is the lowest note or the bass note of the chord. So on the A chord it would be 5, 4, 3, 2, 3, 4. Or you could do 5, 3, 2, 1, 3, 2. I'd probably stick to the darker notes because this is a little bit of a darker song. G, your bass note would be the sixth string. And then D, it would be 4, 3, 2. 1, 2, 3. Okay, so up to you. Just wanted to give you some options. But that verse does come way down there and we want to do that when we're performing. And that in general, for the bridge section in that last course, I just really, really dig in on the strumming to kind of tie it all together, which is what we're going to do next. I'm actually going to do a full playthrough of the entire song, beginning to end. So let's give it a try. So we're going to take it from the top. We're going to start on the A chord. We'll just do a couple little intros and then we'll get right into it. Ready? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 1, 2, 3. Here we go.

2:00Am and she comes, calls me Cause I'm still awake can you help me unravel my latest mistake? I don't love him Winter just wasn't my season More strumming.

Ready?

Yeah. We walk through the Doors so accusing their eyes like they have any right at all to criticize if it crits you're all here for the very same reasons.

Cause you gent jump the track. We're like cars on a cable. And life's like an hourglass glued to the table. No one can find the rewind button girl Spray to your head in your hand.

And breathe, just breathe Woe breath.

Just breath.

May he turn 21 on the base of all bliss. Just the day sat down with a flask in his aim and sober. So maybe October of last year.

Here in town you can tell he's been down for a while. But my God it's so beautiful. When the Lord's night I always want to hold him. Maybe I'll just sing about it.

Cause you can't jump the track. We're like cars on a cable and lights like an hourglass is glued to the table. No one can find the rewind button girl so cradle your head in your hand.

And breathe. Just, just breathe. Oh breathe, just breathe. Here's the bridge.

Ready?

There's a light at the end of this tunnel you shout you're just as far in as you ever be out. And the mistakes you made they'll just make them again. You only try turning around.

Quiet verse. Ready?

2Am and I'm still awake writing a song I get it all down on paper. It's no longer inside of me Threatening the life it belongs to.

And I feel like I'm naked in front of the crowd. Cause these words are my diary screaming out loud. No you use them wherever you want to.

Cause you can't jump the track. With our cars on a cable and lies like an hourglass that's glued to the table. No one can find the rewind button girl so cradle your head in your hands.

And breathe just breath. Breathe O breathe.

Just breathe. Oh breathe, just breathe.

Oh breath.

Just breath.

Now if you love female singer songwriters as much as I do, then you're going to want to go check out my Sheryl Crow lesson right over there where I'm going to teach you how to play if it makes you happy. Step by step. Go check that lesson out right there.