How to Play Michelle – The Beatles
As one of the great acoustic Beatles' songs, "Michelle" has become one of the most played of any in the Beatles' song catalog.
Released in 1965 on the Rubber Soul album, "Michelle" contains lots of interesting chord forms for us guitar players to get our hands on.
In this video guitar lesson, I will show you how to play Michelle in it's entirety step-by-step.
We basically have 3 different sections to focus on including the intro riff, chorus and bridge.
For starters, we have that really cool descending bass line progression in the intro. Every time this bass note descends it creates a new harmony. Even though it is chromatic is sounds very musical and works quite well.
It does require a bit of a stretch towards the end of the riff, so make sure you have your hand in a good position for that. The last chord will require a little bit of muting as well. Focus on holding that chord properly and muting that G string before working on the strumming pattern.
From there we go to the main chord progression of the track when the vocals come in. There are some really cool sounding chords here and the whole thing sounds great with just one guitar and no vocals. I know the guitar parts can be quite difficult to hear on the original recording, but the harmony (except for the diminished triads) is pretty obvious if you are trying to follow along with the original recording. Just use your ears and they will tell you when the chord changes should arrive.
In the bridge section we are introduced to yet another odd chord form at the 4th fret. Try to treat this chord form as just a regular barre chord shape. In fact, it is just a standard Ab7 chord shape with the addition of an F on the 2nd string (making it a Ab13 chord).
So take your time and master each section one at a time. Since you will probably run into some chord forms you are unfamiliar with, you may have to focus on them individually a bit at first.
Enjoy!!
Carl...
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