Blank Space by Taylor Swift Tutorial/Lesson
Blank Space
D, A, G, Em, Bm, Em7
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Video transcript
hi my name is Ellen and today I'm going to be showing you guys how to play Blank Space by Taylor Swift on the guitar so stay tuned if this is something that you saw and my God look at that all right so this song is pretty easy for beginners there is one B chord which is B minor and you also need to have your Capo on the third fret if you want to sing it in the same key as Taylor of course if you don't have a capo you can just play this whole thing without one using the same chords and strumming and everything it'll just be a little bit lower than her original version but let's go ahead and jump into what these cords look like grab yourp and I can make the bad guys good for a weekend all right so let's jump into those chords there's only five in the whole song and we're going to go ahead and start off with d which looks like this and sounds like this all right after that you need to know a which looks like this and sounds like this you're also going to need to know G which looks like this and sounds like this you're going to want to know E minor 7 which looks like this and sounds like this if this chord is too hard to play then you can definitely just play it with the two fingers you can take those two off and I usually play it like this but this is just regular E minor and you can use that in this song instead of E minor 7 if you want to so that looks like this and it sounds like this and the very last chord you want to know is B minor which looks like this and sounds like this and again if bar chords are too difficult for you then instead of barring this whole first finger another way you can play B minor is just to take this finger and you're only going to be playing the top E string okay so your new fingering will look like this and it'll sound like this and that's another way to play B minor and then after that those are the only chords you need to know for the whole song All right so once you've practiced those chords and got them memorized and you can transition between them pretty easily let's go ahead and move on to some strumming patterns that we can use with this song got some great news for you beginners out there you can play this whole song with only two strumming pattern patterns and let me go ahead and show you what those are the first pattern is the same pattern I always show you guys we're going to go through the whole song and just play each chord once with a downstroke just so we know where to expect those chord changes so let's go ahead and start at the beginning and put our D chord on it's going to sound a little bit something like this nice to meet you where you've been I could show you incredible things Magic Madness Heaven Sin saw you there and I thought oh my God look at that face you look like my next mistake loves a game want to play and you're just going to go through the entire song and just play each chord once with a downstroke and once you realize where those chord transitions are going to be then good news is there's only one other strumming pattern you need to learn because we are going to be using this first kind of practice pattern through the song itself so let me go ahead and teach you guys the other strumming patter pattern for this song so here's the pattern and some of you might recognize it from some of my other tutorials Taylor Swift has a really great way of being able to use a lot of the same strumming patterns in her songs so just a little tip if you're a Taylor Swift fan then a lot of her songs can be played with this strumming pattern or similar ones so the basic portion of this strumming pattern is just going to be down down down up up down so the way we're going to play this in Rhythm Is Down down down down up up down down down up up down so why don't you go ahead and put your D chord on and play that with me we have down down down up up down down down up up down and if you're completely brand new to guitar what I'm doing between the double downs and the double upstrokes is when I'm already down here I'm going to circle my hand back up to the top and just play Down again same thing if I'm playing an upstroke I can just circle my hand back down to the bottom and play another upstroke so let's practice that one more time down down down up up down down down up up down now sometimes I like to add a little bit more into this pattern and so this is the new pattern you can see that the basic pattern is still there but I'm adding a few extra down and up Strokes whenever I play so this one's going to be down down down down up up down down up so all I'm really adding is that down up at the end there and also another downstroke at the beginning so we've got down down down down up up down down up down down down down up up down down up and I think that this just makes it sound a little bit Fuller and that extra down up at the end um leads into the next um round of strumming patterns and I just think that it kind of helps make everything flow together of course if adding all this stuff in is a little bit too confusing for you feel free to stick with the basic pattern that you see highlighted here and if that's too difficult also you can just stick with the first string pattern I showed you with just the one downstroke because if you're a complete beginner at Guitar a great way to start learning those striving patterns is just to stick with something really simple when you're starting out so go ahead and choose if you want to just stick with the basic pattern or if you want to add in some of those extra down and up strokes but whatever you choose we're going to play this whole pattern through twice for each chord so let's go ahead and see what that sounds like with some chord transitions if you put your D chord on that's the beginning we have down down up up down down up twice then we switch to B minor down down down up up down down up twice then we switch to E minor 7 or E minor down down down down up up down up twice and then right here if you're going to be playing this pattern through for the verses for for G and a which are the next two chords you're only going to play the pattern through once so for G we have down down down down up up down up and then a down down down down up up down nice to meet you where you've been I could show you incredible things Magic Madness Heaven s saw you there and I thought oh my God look at that face you look like the next mistake love good game want to play and of course you can use this pattern through for the chorus as well so it's going to be forever or it's going to go down in flame you can tell me when it's over if the high was worth the pain get a long list of EX lovers but tell you I'm insane cuz I got a blank space bab and I'll write your name so the very last strumming pattern I have to show you is actually exactly the same as this strumming pattern that I just showed you the only difference is now we're going to add in a palm mute so what I'm doing is I'm laying this side of my playing hand kind of over the sound hole of my guitar and whenever I strum now it's going to kind of prevent the strings from ringing so that's going to mute them a little bit so instead of ringing string I'm going to Pal mute it now remember not to do it too hard so that all you hear is like this um I don't know scratchy sound um if you hear that on your guitar what you're doing is you're probably pressing a little bit too hard with your palm so remember we're just lightly placing it over the sound hole you should still be able to hear the different chords all right it'll take a little bit of practice but once you get it all you have to do is apply it to this pattern that I just showed you and it'll sound like a completely different pattern even though it's exactly the same so where I like to use this is on the verses so if we put our D chord down and put our Palm Ute to it it sounds more like this nice to meet you where you've been I could show you incredible things Magic Madness Heaven s saw you there and I thought oh my God look at that face you look like my next mistake love the game want to play y all right and if you can hear while I'm doing that Palm mute what it's doing is it's actually more just muting whenever you play a downstroke whenever you play an up your Palm's going to kind of naturally lift off of those strings so that'll allow it to ring so when you strum down it'll mute and then when you strum up it'll ring so if you practice doing this pattern a little bit faster every day then eventually it'll sound kind of cool cuz you have your muted notes and then also your ringing notes all right this is just a skill that's going to take practice but if you can do it then I would definitely try using the Palm mute on the verses and then letting the pattern ring on the choruses all right so now that I've showed you guys the different chords you need to know as well as the strumming patterns that you can use for this song Let's go ahead and put those two things together and play through the entire song of blank Space by Taylor Swift good luck cherrys cryst nice to meet you where you been I could show you incredible things Magic Madness Heaven Sin saw you there and I thought oh my God look at that face you look like my next mistake loves a game W to play Hey new money suit and tie I can read you like a magazine Ain't It Funny rumors fly and I know you heard about me so hey let's be friends dying to see how this one ends grab your passport and my hand I can make the bad guys good for a weekend so it's going to be forever or it's going to go down in flam you can tell me when it's over if the high was worth the came got along with star lovers they'll tell you I'm insane cuz you know I love the players and you love the game so we're young and we're Reckless we'll take this way too far it'll leave you breathless or with a nasty star get along with st exls they'll tell you I'm insane but I got a blank space baby and I'll write your name Cherry lips Crystal skies I could show you incredible things stolen kisses Pretty Lies you're the King baby I'm your queen find out what you want be that girl for a month wa the worst CU Yet to Come Oh no screaming crying perfect storms I can make all the tables turn Rose Garden filled with thorns keep your second getting like oh my God who is she I get drunk on jealousy but you'll come back each time you leave cuz darling I'm a nightmare dressed like a Daydream so it's going to be forever or it's going to go down in flame you can tell me when it's over if the high was worth the pain got along with st lovers they'll tell you I'm insane cuz you know I love the players and you love the game cuz we're young and we're Reckless we'll take this way too far it'll leave you rless through or with a nasty scar got along L ofx lovers they'll tell you I'm insane but I got a blank space baby and I'll write your name boy only one love if it's torture don't say I didn't say I didn't warn you boys only one love if it's torture don't say I didn't say I didn't warn you so it's going to be forever or it's going to go down in flame you can tell me when it's over if the high was worth the pain along with st LS go tell you I'm in St cuz you know I love the players and you love the game cuz we are you Reckless we'll take this way too far it'll leave you breathless blue or with a nasty scar get along with st fls that tell you I'm in I got a blank space baby and I'll write your name all right thank you guys so much for watching my tutorial I really hope that this was helpful to you sorry if this was a little bit rough around the edges I keep moving back and forth so it's really hard for me to bring all my camera stuff all the time but um anyways this was really highly requested so I hope that this helped it's actually pretty simple right so I hope you have fun playing it make sure to check out one of these playlists if you want to learn more songs cuz you're in the mood to learn some more guitar and also feel free to follow me on any of my social media sites so you get in touch with me if you have requests or questions or anything like that and of course leave comments below if you have any questions and hopefully other people out there will answer it for you if I can't get to it in time and um please make sure to also subscribe to my channel down below if you are looking forward to more tutorials just like this in the future um thanks again for watching and I'll see you guys in my next video bye get along withs they tell you I'm insane I got a blank space baby and I'll write your name