Hey Jude Guitar Lesson for Beginners - 5 Chord Song!

Hey, guitar enthusiasts. I'm gonna be doing a simplified version of the Beatles. Hey Jude. In this lesson, let's talk about the chords. We're gonna be using lots of open chords. We have a D chord, we have an A chord. We have a G chord, an E minor chord, and a C chord. Now, there are a couple of seven chords. I'll show you how to get into playing those. I'm going from A to A7. Very easy transition. But if you're someone who isn't great with. With seven chords yet, if you're a beginner and you haven't learned them yet, don't worry, you can just use the regular chords. If you see D7, you can use a regular D chord. Just understand it's not going to sound exactly like the song.

So let's talk about going from A to A7. This one's pretty easy because if you make your A chord with fingers 1, 2, and 3, all you have to do is lift up your middle finger. I used to tell students in lessons, I was like, this is the one time you can tell me how you really feel about me as a guitar teacher. So you can just flip me off. Flip me the bird. All right, so if you do fingers 1, 2, and 3, you can just lift up that middle finger and you go from a seven. So we have a, A seven. A, A seven. Now if you make your A chord with fingers two, three, and four, it's the same thing. You lift up the third finger. I think that's a little bit more awkward. Or, you know, you can just always move your fingers into place no matter how you make your A chord. But that's what I like to do. Fingers 1, 2, and 3, and then just flip me the bird. And then you got an A7 chord. So that's easy. The harder one is going From D to D7. So we have our D major chord. And then you have to make a backwards D chord. So you kind of have to take your second finger on the bottom, move it up to the third finger on the second fret, then put your third finger in place. And then the first finger comes to the first fret on the B string to make that point. So you might have to sit and just practice that transition a little bit. It doesn't happen a ton of times in the song, but it does happen. And then the final transition is D7 to A7. That one's pretty easy because if you're in D7, you can just move your second finger up one, your third finger up one, and you've got that A7 chord. So. So let's talk about the strumming pattern we're going to use. Okay. I'll give you a very simple strumming pattern because this is going to be a beginner song. Okay. But I will give you an option if you want to spice it up, you want that challenge. But I'm going to be playing through using this simple strum. So simple strum, it's basically four down strums and an up strum. It's great. It's going to be 1, 2, 3, and 4. 1, 2, 3, and four. Play down, down, down, up, down.

One more time.

And that's the great thing about hey Jude is it's a very nice and even and slow kiltered song. So it's wonderful song for beginners to get into their groove, do some strumming and play around with some chords. Now if you want to spend spice things up a little bit. This is a strumming pattern I really like to use on this song. It's a little bit more late beginner, but for some people it is doable. So I want to show you this in case you want to step up to the challenge. But like I said in the playthrough I'm going to be doing soon, I'm going to be using that beginner strumming pattern. So this strumming pattern is going to be three downs followed by an up, and we're just going to repeat that. So it's going to be down, down, down, up, down, down, down, up, down, down, down.

So that would be counted 1, 2, and a 3, 4 and a. 1, 2 and a 3, 4 and a. So you choose whichever strumming pattern is going to work best for you. We're going to start talking about the different sections of the song right now. So this song has three sections. There's a verse, there is a refrain, and there is the outro. The kind of the na na na na part. All right. And that's where the chords completely change is on the outro. So I'm going to play through a verse with that simple strumming pattern, and then we're going to talk about the refrain because there's a cool option to throw in a walk down. But first, let's play through the first verse here. One, two. Ready?

Hate you.

Don'T make it bad.

Take a step that song and make it better.

Remember to let her into your heart Then you can start to make.

It better.

Hey Jude, don't be afraid.

You were made to go out and get her.

You let her under your skin, Then you begin to make it better.

Now just a quick note for females like me so you can hear on that last note better. This is really low for my voice. So if you're a female, you can use something called a capo, and you can clip it on probably like the third or fourth fret. You. It'll make it a little bit higher for your voice so that it's a little bit easier to sing. So just a quick note on that. And for those of you who don't know me, my name is Lauren Bateman, and I help make the guitar make sense. I specialize in helping absolute beginners, especially older adults in their 50s, 60s, and 70s. Most of the people in my guitar course are in their 60s and 70s, believe it or not. So you're never too old to learn to play guitar. So let's move on to the refrain here. It's not like we're going to be changing a lot. We're still doing the same strumming pattern, but there is a really cool section where we could throw in a walk down. Let me show you first, and then I'll explain.

Did you hear that? There was, like, this cool little walk down.

All right, so what am I doing here? Okay, and this comes in twice on this refrain part. It's when we go from the G chord to the E minor chord. Okay, so we start off with D7, so that's fine. Or again, if you need to play it as a D chord, it'll still work.

And anytime you feel the pain, hey, Jude refrain.

All right, so if you can't play that D7 chord, don't worry about it too much. You can always use the D chord, make it easier for yourself. So we're going from a G chord, and we're going to change up the strumming just a little bit here. So on the chord G, we're going to do down, down, up. And then we're going to need this F sharp note on the top string. So watch my fingers. I'm on my G chord. I'm going to lift up this finger here. My. What's that? My second finger. My first finger is going to come to the top string, second fret. And I'm almost muting the fifth string a little bit with this finger, finger. And I'm going to do it down, down, up. Okay. It's not the greatest sounding chord, but it'll work. So we got G.

And then when we get back to E minor, it's the regular strum pattern.

So if I take that from D7, it's going to be 1, 2, 3 and 4.

1, 2 and 3, 4, and 1, 2, 3 and 4.

Okay, I'm going to do it one more time. I'm going to count it, and then we'll do it one time through without me counting over it. Because the counting, everyone wants to work on timing. It's very important to count while you're doing this stuff. So we got 1, 2, 3 and 4.

1, 2 and 3, 4, and 1, 2, 3 and 4.

1, 2, ready, go.

So that walk down is going to happen twice, okay? In this refrain, and I'll play through for you guys to hear it. And then on the very end, there's that change from D7 to A7, the DA DA da part. We're also going to do that same strum pattern. It's going to be half a measure of D7. So down, down, up, and then A7. Down, down, up. And then we stay on the A7 chord. Let me play through the full refrain so that you can see it. And then we're going to talk about the outro and I'm going to put it all together in the end for you. 1, 2, 3, 4.

And anytime you feel the pain can't you refrain don't carry the world upon.

Your.

But well, you know that it's a fool la.

Little col.

And then we go right back into hey June.

So we got a reverse refrain, another verse, and then we have this outro. And this is where the C chord makes its first appearance. So we're changing. It's just a repetitive chord progression. It's going to be D, C, G, D. Okay.

So since I've already played the first verse in refrain, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna do a playthrough. I'm gonna take it from the second verse. I'm gonna play refrain the next verse, and then I'm gonna do the outro so you guys can hear that better. Better, better, better. Nah. And I apologize for my singing. I'm a little stuffed up. I have a head cold still. But please forgive me and thank you for being here. One, two, ready?

Hey Jude, don't let me down.

You have found her. Not going to get her.

Remember to let her into your heart when you can start to make it better.

And anytime you feel the pain.

Refrain don't worry the world upon his shoulders.

But well, you know that it's a fool who plays it cool by making his world a little colder Da da da da da da da.

Hey Jude, don't make it fun.

Take a sad song and make it better.

Remember a letter into your heart Then you can start to make it better, better, better, better now.

Na na na na.

Na na na.

Let'S repeat it. Ready?

Now, if you have fun with this, and you're looking for a very simple two chord Beatles song, go check out my Eleanor Rigby lesson right over there. You're going to have so much fun with that one.