Easy Songs To Play On Acoustic Guitar – My 10 Favorites
Hi, Chas here. I’m glad you stopped by to check out my list of easy songs to play on acoustic guitar.
Be warned though, my list of favorite easy acoustic guitar songs is constantly changing, so as of the writing of this, these are my favorite ten.
Maybe next time you come back, my ten easy songs to play on guitar will have changed, so check back.
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My Top 10 Easy Songs To Play On Acoustic Guitar:
1. Lyin’ Eyes – Eagles
2. Folsom Prison Blues – Johnny Cash
3. Driver 8 – REM
4. Apologize – One Republic
5. Wreck of The Edmund Fitzgerald – Gordon Lightfoot
6. Wicked Game – Chris Isaak
7. When The Stars Go Blue – Ryan Adams
8. Upside Down – Jack Johnson
9. Mr. Tambourine Man – The Byrds
10. Sunlight – Michael Tomlinson
One of the things I love about playing guitar is that once I became fairly good at it, I broadened my guitar horizons. As I grew as a guitarist, my number of easy songs to play on acoustic guitar increased dramatically.
I began learning how to play more complicated songs in a fairly short period of time. See, I’ve been playing guitar for over 20 years, but I remember what it was like when I could only play “Streets of Laredo.”
It’s really quite limiting when you can only play a handful of easy acoustic songs. What’s worse is when you only know parts of a handful of songs. Worse yet is when you can never really learn and play any acoustic guitar song all the way through.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been to guitar superstores and watched guitarists run through every cool lick or chord run they know in about 3 minutes. I did the same thing.
I never really could play for anyone or any group because I didn’t know how to play very many songs. And, I couldn’t play the ones I knew very well.
Mind you, this was before the internet. So, the only way I was really going to expand beyond a small repertoire of easy to play acoustic guitar songs was to take some lessons. And, it was the best thing I ever did in regard to my acoustic guitar playing.
Taking guitar lessons opened up a whole new musical world for me. No longer was I limited to playing only easy guitar songs. After a short time, I could expand to more difficult songs too.
Nowadays, the internet makes learning guitar so much more easier and convenient. If only there was an internet when I started taking guitar lessons. I could simply sign up for an online acoustic guitar lessons system. It would have been great.
When you take an online guitar instruction course, you are being taught by some of the best guitar teachers around. And, you can pick the guitar style you want to learn. Whether it’s acoustic rock, heavy metal, country, bluegrass, and so on. The opportunities to increase your number of easy songs to play on acoustic guitar are unbelievable.
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Successfully Dealing With Ending A Relationship
Ever since people starting coupling up, they have been splitting apart. The earliest writings we know of (both secular and religious) talk about how to handle couples breaking up. And even though it has been going on for millennia, dealing with ending a relationship is has not gotten an easier. Hearts get broken, people get hurt, and it can be painful and confusing at the same time. Here are some things for you to consider, to help you navigate a relationship that’s ending.
The first thing you need to convince yourself of is that the past is the past. It is a common tactic to try to purposely erase the memory of your ex completely from your mind. But, trying to forget it means you are focusing on it. In other words, you are turning the past into the present. By doing that, you can be sure that you are dredging up old, painful memories and that you will feel miserable in the process
As mentioned it’s not easy, in fact, it can be emotionally wrenching and one of the toughest things to face as you go through life. It may seem impossible now, but you must let things run their course. Give it some time. They say “time heals all wounds”, and though it’s difficult and you feel awful, the saying is true. Keep this in mind as you’re dealing with ending a relationship.
Another thing you must do is establish firm ground rules, especially if you know there will be situations where you are likely to encounter one another; work is one such example. Your best bet is to keep things as platonic as possible at first. Sure, there were good times, but you don’t want to start talking about them immediately after the break up. You also want to avoid talking about the bad times, or whatever led to the breakup.
When dealing with ending a relationship, you may want to do your best to avoid your ex, but don’t do this to the point of obsession. If you are trying too hard to avoid them, you are, in reality, giving them more power, and not dealing with your real feelings.
By the same token, you need to understand that the relationship is over, at least for now. Don’t make the mistake of being overly friendly to show you are “back to normal”. It will only make you look foolish or phony. You may also want to get back together, but you just have to give this some time. If you try jumping back in too quickly, you run a high risk of alienating your ex even further.
Perhaps you will never get back together, maybe you have no intentions of doing so, but it’s always a good idea to get along with other people. Following the tips above will leave the door open to the possibility of reconciling, or, at the very least, not having your blood boil every time you hear of or see your ex.
Navigating The 5 Emotional Stages Of A Relationship Breakup
The following emotional stages of a relationship breakup are only guidelines to help you navigate through a difficult time to a happier ending. What’s important to understand is that even though they are uncomfortable, each of the following feelings are quite normal.
What follows are often referred to as the “five emotional stages of grief”. Each of the concepts apply just as easily to a relationship breakup. The major difference is that some of the stages can happen while the relationship is still in tact.
The first stage is denial. There are plenty of stories about spouses and significant others who justified the odd behavior of an ex before a breakup.
“Oh, he probably got lipstick on his collar when he accidentally bumped into someone.”
“She didn’t call to tell me she was going to be late because she was too busy with work.”
Those are two rather blatant examples that may not apply, but how about this one? “We don’t argue that much, we just like to discuss our problems.” Open communication is great, but not when it’s used as an excuse for calling each other names and saying hurtful things. You have to make an honest assessment of your relationship if you want it to succeed, denial prevents that from happening. If you are able to recognize and correct things at the denial stage, then you may not have to worry about the rest.
Anger and resentment may be the most common of the emotional stages of a relationship breakup. You broke up, and now you’re mad at your ex. Even if deep down you know it was mostly your fault, you find reasons to be mad at them. You have to let go of the anger and resentment before you can move on. Plus, it is much better for your overall health when you’re not carrying around so much anger.
Trying to patch things up is a worthy goal, but resorting to negotiation (the next stage) isn’t the best way to go about it. Here you will say and do anything to get your ex back. You will change, make promises, and do “whatever it takes”. But you’re not really thinking them through. More than likely they do not fit in with your character and will be impossible for you to follow through on. When you notice you’re using the word “if” a lot, it’s a sure sign you are at this stage.
Depression as one of the emotional stages of a relationship breakup can really pop up at just about any time in the process. You may believe that you could never love somebody the same way again, or worse, that nobody will ever love you again. Regardless of when it occurs, be willing to seek professional help if you need it.
The final stage is acceptance. It’s just like it sounds. You have come to terms with your relationship and accept whatever has happened. You start feeling better (not necessarily great, but better) and are ready to start being yourself again.
Remember, these five stages are just a guideline. You may not experience all of them, and they may be in a different order and vary in their intensity. Now that you are aware of the stages, it will be easier to get through them if the situation arises.
Easy Songs For Guitar And Tablature
Tablature, or more commonly known as “Tabs” is a modern method of musical notation for guitar. It is a very straightforward system, but there are a few things to consider if you want to learn how to play easy songs for guitar using tabs.
First, most guitarists learn how to play songs by downloading user-submitted tabs from guitar tabs websites. Some of these sites have some of the most comprehensive libraries of guitar music on the net.
But, to be honest, many of the user-submitted tabs at these sites are personal interpretations and do not represent exactly how a particular song is played. Even the easiest of songs sometimes is not correctly scored at user submitted sites.
Don’t get me wrong. There are tons of very good tabs on the web, but some tabs at these sites are just really bad.
Following that, the old online guitar archive (OLGA) was shut down because of copyright infringement on guitar songs. OLGA used to be the most accurate guitar tab site on the web, until it was shut down. Perhaps this is another reason why internet guitar tabs are not always note-for-note accurate.
Second, guitar tabs do not keep musical time like traditional sheet music. You can never really play any song “blind” from guitar tabs, not even easy ones. You always need to know what the song sounds like before you start to play it.
But who really wants to play a guitar song they’ve never heard before?
Reading guitar tabs is extremely time consuming without the assistance of specialized software that will walk you through a song. Except for the very easiest songs for guitar, tedious reading of tabs can destroy a guitarist’s desire to learn new songs.
How To Overcome Bad Guitar Tabs
Given that guitar tabs are a great tool, but difficult to work through AND; that many tabs are inaccurate, there is a solution and you can play most songs exactly right with practice.
See, I started playing guitar before there even was an “internet”. I had no choice but to trot down to the local music shop and start taking lessons if I wanted to play guitar.
With guitar lessons, I learned music theory. That theory made it possible for me to recognize how to play songs, even without tabs. Perhaps you might consider taking some guitar lessons if you would like to advance your guitar playing?
Easy Songs To Play On Acoustic Guitar – How Easy?
Finding easy songs to play on acoustic guitar is really a matter of perspective. What might be an easy song to play for one guitarist might be very difficult for another.
Many beginning or intermediate guitarists like to perform songs that are easy to play because they have not reached an advanced level of playing yet.
After a guitarist gains a certain amount of playing experience, it’s not too difficult to find lots of simple songs to play on acoustic guitar. The key to being able to play lots of acoustic guitar songs is to keep practicing.
After all, practice makes perfect. After a while, your guitar practice will payoff because you will find that many more acoustic guitar songs are easier to play.
Most advanced guitarists will tell you that there are no easy acoustic songs to play on an acoustic guitar unless you get some sort of guitar instruction. I could not agree more.
So, as you advance as a guitarist, you will increase the number of easy to play acoustic guitar songs. This is why I ask, “how easy is it to play guitar?”
Well, playing acoustic guitar well depends upon a number of factors.
I believe the most important factor in becoming good at guitar is to find a great guitar teacher or top online guitar instruction method.
The next factor, no less important, is practice.
Finally, when you develop a good repertoire of easy songs to play on acoustic guitar, you will be able to play live as much or as little as you like. As with anything else, being good at playing acoustic guitar is all up to you.