Lauren Bateman provides a step-by-step lesson to play "Sundown" (Gordon Lightfoot). She begins by instructing to place a capo on the 2nd fret and outlines chord choices (E major, D, A, recommends B7sus4 and an E5 voicing as alternatives to a harsh B7). She demonstrates multiple strumming patterns emphasizing alternating bass and treble (several eighth-note patterns and syncopated up-strum variants), notes the intro holds an E chord for eight measures, and describes verse and chorus progressions (verses: repeating E/E/B7sus4/E; chorus: E → A → D → E) with suggestions about accents and percussive attack. For lead/improvisation she shows two short motifs built around frets 12–14 (starting on the 14th fret of the A string and D string respectively), recommends quarter bends on the G-string 12th fret and ending phrases on the 14th-fret E note over an E chord. The lesson is aimed at beginner-to-intermediate players with optional variations for skill level.
Questions this video answers
2nd fret.
May 20, 2023.
E (various voicings including E major and E5), D major, A major, and a recommended B7sus4 (instead of a harsh B7).
Eight measures (E chord for eight measures).
14th fret of the A string.
Chapters
Hey, guitar enthusiasts. I have Sundown by Gordon Lightfoot here. And I want to start off by talking about the chords, because there's a few different ways you can do it. You can kind of do it a simplified way, or you could do it.
The way Gordon does.
So let's talk about the chords. We have an E major chord, but before that I forgot. Whoops. We have to put a capo on the second fret. You need a capo to play this song. So we're going to throw that right there on the second fret of the guitar.
And.
And the chords we have E major, D major, A major. And, you know, I was looking online, I saw some people were saying B7, but it's just.
It's really harsh.
It's a really harsh B7. So what I'm going to recommend you.
Do, there's going to be two chord variations here.
I'm going to recommend you do what's called a B7SUS4.
Sounds a lot more complicated than it is. It has a beautiful open sound. So how are we going to play this? The easiest way to do it.
Let's start off with an E minor.
Chord using our first and second fingers.
Okay.
Now just separate those so you have a string in between them. So that string would be your D string. All right, so these two fingers are on the second fret. And then we're going to reach with our pinky, and we're going to put our pinky on the fourth fret of what is that? The D string. Okay. And we're only going to strum the bottom five strings.
Ooh.
Much more open and brighter sound. All right, and this is what Gordon is using on the verse versus this really bluesy, tinny kind of B7 chord. You could use it. It would work. But I really like the sound of the B7SUS4. So that's what I'm going to be using. Another note I want you to know is that on the verses and in the intros, Gordon's using more of what we call like an E5 chord. Now it's a reverse power chord. So if you take that b7sus4 I just showed you, what we're going to do is we're just going to move the pinky down one string, same fourth fret. And then our second finger is going to come back up to the D string like you were playing that E minor chord. And this is it. Okay. Wonderful, beautiful open sounding chord. It's an E5 chords, which means it's neither major. Nor minor, but it is an E chord. It sounds really nice. Now, for those of you who are a little bit more intermediate and are comfortable with. Barring, you may want to just barely the two notes here and then your. Or the three notes and then move your pinky kind of up and down.
That's another option for playing these chords. But for some people, you might have trouble not hitting these bottom B and E strings.
We really want those two strings to.
Ring out throughout this song.
So you decide which chords you're going to use depending on the level you're at. We're going to get into the intro section of the song and talk about some strumming patterns for that. And then we're going to do the verse and the choruses. And then at the end, I'm going to show you a really cool thing you can do over these interludes and the outros, where we're just kind of holding an E chord. If you're playing along with a friend or the recording. So intro, we're just using an E chord again. So if you want to use the regular E major chord or you want to do the E5 chord, whichever is your preference. Now, what Gordon is doing, he's doing some alternating between bass and treble. So he's kind of just doing.
Yeah, but I think he's catching them more on the upstrom. He's kind of hitting the bass note of the chord and then catching kind of the bottom three strings or so on the up strum. So we have this contrast between dark and bright.
So when he opens the song, you're gonna hear this.
Something very similar to that.
Okay, so it's the bass, and I'm doing a down strum on these treble notes. So it's 1, 2, 3 and 4, and 1, 2, 3 and 4. And so on the 3 and the 4, just catching the bass notes and on the ands and catching the up strums on that. Now, you could use that for most of the intro. He's really improvising here. There's a lot of different things. Another one that I kind of hear that comes in is kind of like a double bass and a double treble.
So it's bass, bass, and again using up strums. Down, down, up, up, down, up, down, up. Something along those lines.
And then this is another strumming pattern that comes in kind of towards the end. I hear a lot more up strumming, like a kind of a syncopation going on. So it's down, up, up, up, down, up, so it's 1 and, and, and 4:00am so sound like this.
You can hear how those, those upstrums are ringing out. And again, I feel this section is probably very highly improvised. So as long as you're holding on, you know, to your E chord or whatever and you're alternating.
You can play whatever you want. Bass, bass up, up.
Okay. I'm just improvising at this point. So the goal of this intro is just. Just to play some sort of eighth note strumming pattern and using an alternating bass and treble. Okay. If you just stick with that first one.
Okay, that's 1, 2, 3 and 4 and bass treble. Bass up, bass up, bass treble.
Use that as your starting framework. And then you can kind of expand from there on this intersection. But the intersection is very simple. It's just an E chord for eight measures. Now when I hop over to the verse section, I kind of like to change up the strumming a bit. So we're going to go to that E5 chord and that B7 sus 4. So however you guys want to play them. All right? So the verse sections are very short and they're very repetitive. It's a double E chord followed by that b7sus4 4 followed by an e chord. Super, super simple strumming pattern that you can use. I would probably just use 1, 2 and 3 and 4 and 1, 2 and 3 and 4. And that's probably what I would use.
1, 2 and 3 and 4and 1.
2 and 3 and 4M very, very simple. I hear a lot more strumming coming in, so that's what we're gonna do. So if I just play this through the first verse, this is what it's going to sound like.
I can see her line back in a satin dress in.
You Don't Confess.
That's it. Very, very simple verses here from Gordon. And then we're going to hop into the chorus where I would change the strumming pattern again. So you can see lots of strumming variations in this song. And I will do a playthrough for you guys. Don't worry. I just want to get through all the strumming patterns so that we can put them all together. Now the choruses again, nice and repetitive. I will go to the regular E major here followed by an A chord, D chord, E chord. And then we're just going to repeat that very, very simple chord progression. So it's going to be 1, 2, 3 and 4. And that's the strumming pattern.
I like to use.
Like to open it up a little bit more.
1, 2, 3 and 4.
And. And again I'm just catching the bass strums, the bass notes on that first strum, that down strum.
So it's 1, 2, 3 and 4.
And.
Now I like to get percussive. And so what I'll do on that second strum is I might attack it a little bit more, a little bit more of an accent.
I think that sounds really, really great over this chorus. So let's take a look at the chorus and what that's going to sound like here. So it's going to be 1, 2.
Ready M Sun now you better take care Bye bye. You've been creeping around my backstairs Sundown. You better take care if I find you been creeping around my back.
See, I like how when you accent on that second strum bass note kind of rings out. Boom. You get a nice hit on that second down strum. And then you got your other strums that come in on three and four. And I think it gives it a really, really nice strum feel to the chorus. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to take this from the intro. We're going to do a couple verses, a couple choruses. Since the verses are short just to. So you guys can play along a little bit with me. And if I'm going too fast, you can always use a settings cog down there to slow things down. And then at the end I'm going to show you the little cool lick that you can throw in over these E chords. One, two, Here we go.
Well, I can see her lying back in her satin dress In a room where you don't confess, son and you better take care if I find you've been creeping down my back stairs Sundown. You better take care if I find you've been creeping out of my backstairs.
She been looking like a queen of the sailor's dream she don't always say what she really means.
Sometimes I think it's a shame when I get feeling better When I'm feeling no pain Sometimes I think it's a shame when I I get feeling better when I'm feeling.
OK.
So for those of you interested in playing a little bit of lead over some of these long interludes, there's a couple parts in the song where we just hang out on an E major chord, especially on the outro. There's a couple little themes. I just want to show you two little things you can do to work on improvising. It's a lot of fun. It only requires the use of two frets. Okay. But we're going to be starting out on the 14th fret of the A string. Okay. And it's going to go 14, and then on the string below 12. 14 string below 12. And then back up to the string above 14. I'm going to show you how we can add a little bend in here to make it sound a little bit cooler. But that's the first little motif. It sounds like this.
Very simple. And I'm playing with fingers just one and three. 14, 12, 14, 12. Back up 14.
You'll hear that coming through, especially on the outro section of the song. Now, what you can do on that 12 on the bottom. So the G string, you can just add a little bend to it. And it's just a quarter note bend, very tiny. I would probably bend the string downward versus up.
That's it. So here's the note without the bend, with the bend.
Just pulling down on the string a little bit so it gives a little extra oomph.
Okay. So it's just a little bit of a bend. And you probably heard me put a little, what we call vibrato on the last note.
Okay. And I'm kind of massaging the note. You don't want it to sound like a B. We don't want to go, you know, this really annoying vibrato. Nice and slow.
Okay. You want to just slowly bend the notes. Just adds a little flavor, a little spice to the playing. So that's motif one. Motif two is very, very similar to that. We're going to Start on the 14th fret on the D string this time again without the bends the first time. So it's going to be 14, 12 on the string below, 1412 on the string below back to that 14. Then we're coming up again to the A string. 14. Okay. And then 1214 on the string below. 12, 14, 12, 14. So it's kind of like the real motif is alternating between this 12th fret and the 14th fret.
You can even do that. That sounds good. Cool. But again, just to go through the whole thing, so it's 14, 12, 14, 12, 14 up to that A string, 1412 back on the D string, 14 on the D string. And then we have 12, 14, 12, 14. Okay. And on all those 12s on the G string, you can add a little bend into it.
Okay. So you can. I'm just doing a little quarter note bend on those. But if you can't if you're not good at bends and you can't do that yet, just play the singer notes. It's going to be fine. And that's really the key to this. It's just having fun with it.
Just with like four or five little notes. You can do a lot with those. Actually. It's just four notes over and over again.
The key is ending on this 14th fret here on the D string, because that's the E note and we're playing over an E chord. So as long as you end on that note, it's going to sound really good.
So just improvising a little bit. I know I don't have the tab up for that, but that is. Those are the main two motifs.
Okay. That's motif one and then your motif two.
If you loved this Gordon Lightfoot lesson, then I highly recommend you go check out my lesson on if you could read my mind right over there, where I'm going to show you how to finger pick and play along to Gordon's classic.
