Easy guitar songs for beginners

Hey Dudes and Dudettes – CMC here, your master of ceremonies
for all things guitar.

So you wanna know about easy guitar songs for beginners, huh?

Wow…that goes waaaay back for me. I’ve been playing and
learning since I was 12 when I got my first guitar for
Christmas.

First, I’ll give you MY list. Then, I’m going to Google some
other things and see what’s out there, what other people
think and give you that next article. Feel free to do that as
well as my list is going to be from the late sixties to the
early seventies- truly the “classic” era of rock and roll
but you might want some more recent songs as well.

It’s pretty incredible to think that I still remember those
first songs I learned way back when I was twelve, even though
I don’t remember all of my friends names or school teachers
names! So, let me tell you- I am aware that this is a really
great topic. People get really touched by songs and melodies
and chords and the first ones you learn will stick around in
your imagination for a long time.

My older brother showed me how to play Shocking Blue’s Venus.
It’s a fast strumming chord opening and then a constant back
and forth two chord progression -really, really simple but
really cool chords as well. Then a friend showed me “Hey Joe”
by Jimi Hendrix. I’m not sure if he wrote that or if he was
covering it but it rocked. (How can anything by Hendrix NOT
rock?)

Next up was another fairly basic chord sequence: the
all time classic Purple Haze. Then of course, another
classic: The Animals House of the Rising Sun, the song
supposedly about a house of ill repute in New Orleans.
Although in their version, the chords are picked not so much
strummed (with a pick, not your fingers) I just strummed
them. Later on, I moved on up to some power chords and the
all time greatest power/bar chord song: Smoke on the Water
(Fire in the Sky) by Deep Purple. These are all about as
basic as you can get and I gobbled them up as I know you
will.