Hey, how’s it going this is Jon McLennan with Guitar Control, hope you’re having a great day, I’m bringing you this video lesson on a song called “Let it Be” by the Beatles. I’m going to break it all down for you step by step. We’re going to learn the Intro, how to take that Classic Piano part and Play it on the guitar and we’re going to learn the whole song, the verse, the chorus, and the interlude. I’m going to break down the guitar solo so be sure to check the image above to follow the chords and tabs, and let’s zoom in and get started.
This is an interpretation of the piano part basically, how you can do it on guitar just a couple of chords we’re going through and the strumming pattern is basically a quarter notes going one, two, three, four, all on down strokes.
I’m going to start out on a c chord three, two, zero, one, then move to a g chord and play this three, two, zero, zero, three, three, a lot of times I play it without my first finger because, that’s the sound that I like, and then a minor, zero, two, 2, 1, 0, and then f major 7, and the way you play that is like a c, but these fingers have shifted down one string, so I’ve got all on adjacent strings three, two, one, and then got the open e in there.
Now, try and strum from the fourth string down, I’ll be using my thumb to mute the sixth string and use my third finger to mute the fifth string. There’s a lot of dampening going on and then you add your pinky on the third fret second string, you get that little melody. If I try those first two bars you’ve got this one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, so the chords are c, c, g, g, a minor, a minor, f major seven, f six, and it’s cool to have a little walking melody in there and it’s also cool sometimes between the chords like one, two, and three.
I’ll play open strings to fill in the gaps a little bit as I change chords, you can experiment with that it’s kind of nice, and then c next two measures goes. So what I did there is a c chord, g, and then f. This time I’m not doing the major seven, I’m just playing these three notes three, two, one, and then walking down two zero, c chord. I’m getting this little walk down and it’s going from the four chord half down to the c, basically you could keep doing that for the intro then at that point we’re going to kick into the chorus, but basically the intro and the verse are the same chords.
This is the first section of the tune, you want to know, keep it steady and strum along here we go, one more time starting from the intro one, two, three, four, then he comes in singing.
Next up is the chorus and interlude we’ve played the intro and we’ve gone through the verse playing that chord progression twice and now we’re going to kick into the chorus and it starts with Paul McCartney singing, it’s basically a four bar chord progression and it starts on an a minor, let me play it for you.
You’ll notice I kind of play a minor a little weird, most people don’t play it this way, I only use two fingers these notes that I’m playing is an open fifth, second fret, second fret, first fret open, so let it be, two strums one, two, then you could just go to a, g, for an easy version but I like this chord g6, which the Beatles, used a lot of six chords. The way I play this is putting my thumb on the third fret of the sixth string, and then skipping a string fifth fret, fourth fret, fifth fret, it’s g, g6 is that chord so let it be and g6 one, two, then f major seven, which is what we played earlier.
I like putting my thumb, kind of a thumb guy from that Hendrix School you can just play the top part if you want that’s easier, like this. If you really want to fill it out reach over and get that thumbnail, so that’s a little f triad three, two, one, and then two, zero, back home to c.
Let’s do the whole chorus one, two, three, then we go into an interlude after the second chorus, and this sort of the Billy Preston where the organ comes in and you hear this, then we kick into the guitar solo from there. The way I play this, I mean the easiest way would be f then to c, then to g, f, c, but what I like to do is, do a little harder. I go to this f chord up, eight, seven, five, six, five, and then I walk down nice little thirds there, fifth fret, third fret, then the third fret, first fret, then a c chord, then three, three, on the second, and third strings.
You could play it like one, three, three, two, one, and then go to a c, with a g in the bass, which is like this chord, but you take your third finger put it up one string, put your pinky underneath and then goes twice, so here it is slowly. Then we’re going to go into the verse c, which is a guitar solo, George Harrison takes it away.
Next up, is my favorite part the guitar solo in the style of “Let it Be”, I dialed up a little Leslie sound. It sounds like the guitar is being played through a Leslie Organ Cabinet, which is a pretty cool sound and there’s also two different guitar solos depending upon what version I think you listen to, so you’re going to compare whatever version you have. I think there’s one on the anthology and then there’s one on “Let it Be” and then the story apparently is like John Lennon or Paul McCartney, didn’t like the original guitar solo and they re-cut it, but on top of the same track . Most of this solo is in c pentatonic and I’m going to go through it slowly for you, here c major pentatonic starting on the third fret you’re going to hammer to five, and then you play three, three right below, then you do a little slide so that’s five up to seven back down, to five, three, five, five, and then a three, five, three, five, seven, five, seven, five, seven slide, down to five three.
Next phrase, that’s five, slide to seven five, five, five, seven, five, seven slide to nine, eight, ten, eight, nine slide back, down to seven, five, seven, five, seven, five, seven, five, three, then it goes back down to this. That would be three, five slide to seven, back down to three, seven, five, nine, seven, five, seven, seven, then five, seven, seven slide to nine, then five, seven, five, seven slide to nine, eight on the first string, love this part ten pull off to eight, nine, ten, bend ten, eight ten pull off to eight, nine, ten, nine, slide to seven, five, five.
That last phrases is going on over the verse which is playing c, g. The first part we went over this kind of noodling around improvising with c major pentatonic. I hope this lesson inspires you to keep playing and practicing guitar. Make sure to subscribe on our YouTube Channel and we’ll see you in our next video lessons, thanks for watching.
