This Love by Taylor Swift Tutorial/Lesson
This Love
C, Gsus4, Am, F, F(alt)
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Video transcript
do hey everyone my name is ellen and today i'm going to be showing you guys how to play this love by taylor swift taylor's version on the guitar so stay tuned if this is something that you'd like to learn and before we dive in i just wanted to take a second to fangirl with the rest of my sniffies out there how excited are we that 1989 taylor's version is just around the corner it's my favorite album of hers and this love has always been one of my favorite songs off of that album it's just beautiful and sounds great on the guitar so as soon as i saw her announcement this morning that she was going to have it featured in this amazon prime movie i wanted to get this tutorial for you guys out asap so here it is and with that being said let's jump into it came and brought you in all right so i'm labeling today's tutorial as a beginner slash intermediate for a few reasons but first of all let's talk about the basics you do want your guitar to be in standard tuning with your capo on the fourth fret to match the original key i only have four chords to show you today which can be used to play through the entire song unfortunately one of them is a bar chord which is our f chord but i will show you in the chord section and kind of alternate fingering that you can use to play through this song as well and after that i'm going to show you two different strumming patterns i like to use for the song as well as two different picking patterns that sound beautiful with it so with that being said let's go ahead and jump into the court this love is bad this love is alive all right guys so i've zoomed in a little bit so we can take a closer look at these cords like i said there are only four chord shapes you'll need to know for the entire song and we're going to start with our c chord which looks like this and sounds like this and by the way if you don't know how to read these chord charts that you're seeing on screen you can always check out my beginner series where i talk about how to read chord charts just like this one after that our second chord is our g suspended four chord which looks like this and sounds like this next is our a minor chord which looks like this and sounds like this and then the last chord is our bar chord which is our f chord which looks like this and sounds like this now as promised if bar chords are hard for you you can also do kind of an alternate fingering to make your f look like this and it'll sound like this but just keep in mind that if you're going to use this fingering the picking pattern that i'm going to show you today is not going to work with this so um just keep that in mind but for strumming this kind of alternate fingering will work fine all right so if you need to go ahead and pause the video and take a few minutes just to practice memorizing those chord shapes as well as transitioning between them transitioning smoothly between chords is always going to be the first step in order to play a song smoothly so make sure to take the time to do that but once you have that down we can go ahead and move into the strumming that i want to show you for this song so those of you who have been around on my channel for a while know that i usually start you out with a simple single down strum and you're going to do that for every chord change this is just going to help you familiarize yourself with the song you want to practice singing through it and doing just the single down strum if you're somebody who struggles with singing and playing at the same time or things like that if you need a printable version of how to play this song with all of the chords and lyrics and everything like that i do have that available on my patreon page so make sure to check that out i will link it in the description box below as well as in this icard up here but with that being said let's go ahead and jump into some of the strumming patterns that i would actually recommend for your cover alright so as you can see the first strumming pattern that i would recommend is a down down down down up pattern and it's going to sound a little something like this so now that you've heard the rhythm let's go ahead and pair that with a chord just so we can kind of hear it and practice it together so let's put our c chords on and all you want to do is go down down down down up all right that's the whole pattern and so what you want to do is throughout the song you're going to repeat this pattern through sometimes twice sometimes four times depending on what part of the song that you're in so let's go ahead and just go through the intro as an example i'm going to put the chord progressions here on screen so as you can see we're going from c to g to a minor to f and i want you to hold this pattern out two times for each of these chords so it'd look like this one two ready go down down down down is all right nice so believe it or not you can actually apply this strumming pattern for the entire song if you wanted to you will have to repeat it a few different times depending on what part of the song you're in so if you're playing the intro outro or the chorus which is what we just practiced through you would repeat through this twice but if you wanted to use this strumming pattern during the verses you would repeat this whole pattern through four times for each chord now with that being said the one place that i actually would recommend using this pattern is for the bridge and so there's going to be a little bit different because the chords are moving a little bit faster here so let me go ahead and put the chord progression here on screen we're going to go from g to a minor to f to c and what you're going to do is just play this pattern through one time for each of those chords so with our g sus4 on we're going to go down down up to a minor and that's how you play the bridge and that's where i would recommend using this first pattern so with singing it'll sound like this all right and so that is kind of like my favorite place to put this pattern but if you're somebody who is just wanting to you know start out with strumming i you can use this for the entire song you just have to repeat it a few different times depending on what part you're playing but with that being said let's go ahead and jump into the second strumming pattern alright so as you can see the second strumming pattern is much longer it's down down down down up down down down up and the whole thing is going to sound like this now those of you with a keen eye might have noticed that the first half of this strumming pattern is actually the previous drawing pattern so the strumming pattern one but what i wanted to do here is add a little bit more to the tail end so earlier with our down down down up pattern that's kind of like one measure if you think of it that way whereas with this strumming pattern we're going to be stretching this out across two measures so basically if we go back to the chorus progression we've got c g a minor and f now instead of having to repeat a pattern or anything like that we're just going to play this whole pattern through one time for each of these chords so on our c chord we would go down down up down up down all right i know it's super long so actually let's just stay on our c chord and practice that a few times i'll count us in one two ready go down down nice so definitely pause the video if you need more time to practice that and kind of get that rhythm down this is a really long strumming pattern so just make sure you kind of get the rhythm a little bit more under your belt but once you have that down we can put the chord progression back in so again we have c g a minor f and we're going to play this whole pattern through one time for each of those chords so on our c we have down down down up down up down down down up then you go to your g suspended four down down down down up down up down down up then we have our a minor down down down down up all right so again if you need to pause and like practice that a little bit more on your own please do so but once you put that all together without stopping you'll kind of hear how the song comes together a little bit more so let's practice that one two ready go see is so again as with strumming pattern one you could use this pattern for the entire song if you wanted to if you wanted to use this during the verses you would have to repeat this pattern through twice for each of those chords however what i actually like to do is use picking for most of the song so with that being said let's go ahead and zoom in so i can show you a few really cool sounding picking patterns all right guys so i've zoomed in again so we can take a closer look at some of these beautiful picking patterns i think that they sound pretty good and pretty close to the original song and they're actually not that hard to play so before we get started i just wanted to say that i do like to number my strings so my low e is my sixth string five four three two one all the way to my high e so for this picking portion i will be referring to these strings with their number but with that being said let's go ahead and jump in so starting on our c chord here what we're going to do is use our thumb on our right hand to cover the bass string which in this song is either going to be our sixth e string or our fifth a string then with your pointer middle and ring finger i want you to put those on the fourth third and second strings or d g and b strings all right so these three fingers are never going to move from these three strings they're going to be on there the whole time for all of the picking your thumb is going to move between your sixth and your fifth string depending on what chord you're playing so if we're starting with our c chord the bass note in that is going to be our fifth string so your thumb's going to pick the fifth string then you're just going to kind of go down the guitar thumb pointer middle ring five four three two and that's kind of basically the pattern so what you want to do is start like that then i want you to repeat your four three two four three two three times all right so the whole thing's gonna be five four three two four three two four three two and that's going to last over that whole chord nice not that bad right and so now let's go ahead and move to our next chord which is our g suspended four for this remember these three fingers are still going to be on four three two but we're gonna move our thumb to our sixth low e string then the pattern is the same so you're gonna go six four three two and then repeat four three two four three two three times so g suspended all is next let's go ahead and finish out our chords for a minor you're going to take your thumb and put it back on that fifth string and the pattern is the same so we have five four three two four three two four three 2 4 3 2. again that's all right and then the last chord in this song is our f chord and for this you're going to move your thumb back to that low e string that sixth string but the pattern is the same as all the others so we have six four three two four three two four three two so if you look at the pattern on screen right now you'll see that it's very repetitive we're basically following the same pattern of playing our d g and b strings over and over for each chord and the only thing that we're changing around is going to be our thumb so c g a minor f so hopefully you can kind of already hear how the song is coming together if you can repeat that for the entire song i do think it sounds pretty good i specifically like to use this for the verses so let me go ahead and just show you a little bit of how that would sound so on our verse we're going to start on our f chord and you just play this whole pattern through two times twice clear blue water high tide came and brought you in i could go on and on and on again all right so you can kind of see how you can apply that to the song and like i said it will match for the entire song if you wanted to stick to this picking pattern however there are a few little dressy things that you can add really easily to this pattern to make it sound even more beautiful so let's go ahead and take a look at picking pattern number two alright guys so for picking pattern two we're going to stick with exactly what we just practiced with picking pattern one so all of that is going to stay the same on screen but what i'm going to teach you is something really cool which you can do with your left hand which are called like hammer ons and i call them you know flick offs or liftoffs i'm not actually sure what the technical term for it is but basically you're going to be using your first finger or your index finger to kind of change up the way that this sounds so let me it'll be better if i just show it to you so let's put our c chords on so we just practiced this pattern as 5 4 3 2 4 3 2 4 3 2 4 3 2 right but notice if you lift off your first finger it kind of changes the cord a little right it kind of has a little bit of that like unfinished kind of sound we're gonna use that to our advantage so what i want you to do is on the first round of four three two while this is ringing i want you to flick off your first finger so if you do this you can actually make that sound without using your right hand at all you're just kind of flicking the string so if you go four three two and while it's ringing you want to kind of flick off with your first finger so you see how i did that just with my left hand all right if you haven't developed your calluses yet this is going to hurt a little bit so just remember to you know practice your guitar every day build up those calluses so again the first half is five four three two lift and then here on the next four three two we're gonna take our first finger and hammer it back on so if you get that while it's ringing you should be able to hammer that on in time so that you can hear the note difference so we're going four three two and then hammering on with our index finger all right so we've got all right so that's with it all strung together sounds like that 5 4 3 2 four three two lift four three two hammer all right and then you would just finish it out by that four three two one more time okay so the whole thing is going to sound like this all right that's one whole little round there i forgot to mention i like to use this picking pattern too for like the intro um anytime that it's kind of like a guitar solo like an instrumental break or anything like that is where i like to do this more dressy strumming pattern so um with that being said let's go ahead and look at our g suspended four chord what i want you to do for this one is we're going to start with our index finger lifted off already okay so that turns this into just a regular g all right what i want you to do is follow the same pattern but with your index finger started by lifting it off already so we're going to go 6 4 3 2 then on this next little grouping i want you to hammer on just like we did with c 4 3 2 hammer all right so we're using our index finger for that again all right so as it's ringing you want to hammer that on so that it makes a different tone and then once you're already on there on the next grouping you want to lift it off again four three two off like you're flicking it off right there okay so again for g suspended four we're gonna start with our index finger off six four three two hammer four three two lift all right six four three two hammer four three two lift all right and then again you just wanna finish it out with the other grouping four three two so g suspended four all together without stopping will sound like this all right again six four three two four three two hammer four three two lift four three two all right now let's go ahead and move on to our a minor chord so for this we have a little bit of dressing up to do as well so it's gonna start out the same as we played in picking pattern one five four three two and then this one's gonna follow the c chord so you're gonna start with your index finger and we're gonna lift it off on this second grouping four three two lift all right five four three two four three two lift and then we're gonna hammer back on the next one four three two hammer all right so a minor is five four three two four three two lift four three two hammer and then you finish out with that last grouping all right so without stopping a minor is gonna sound like this one more time all right so you can kind of see how that follows the c chord and then to finish it out your f chord is just gonna stay the same as picking pattern one six four three two four three two four three two six four three two four three two four three two four three two so um you don't have to add in all of these little dressy hammer-ons and flick-offs and things like that this is just optional if this is something that you wanted to explore i do think that it kind of adds a little bit more layering to the guitar makes it sound a little bit more beautiful so all together it'll sound like this without stopping do and then this is where the singing comes in and for that i would switch back to picking pattern one clear blue i think those are the wrong lyrics but anyways you can kind of see how these picking patterns um kind of complement each other but like i said totally optional to do all of this extra dressy stuff i do think that it just sounds a little bit better but if you're somebody who's struggling with picking in general then go ahead and just stick with the first picking pattern as it's a little bit easier all right guys but now that we've gone through all of the chords the strumming and the picking patterns that i would suggest for this song let's go ahead and put everything together to play through it king ships you showed up just in time this love is good this love is bad this love two ready go clear blue water want to have fun jamming out to the rest of the song with me then make sure to check out my patreon page where you can unlock access to this as well as all my other fast track and play-along tutorials i'll make sure to leave a link in the description box below as well as in this icard right up here all right guys but that wraps up my tutorial for today thank you so much for watching if it helped make sure to give me a thumbs up down below as well subscribe to my channel that way you never miss out on any other new tutorials a special shout out goes out to all of my top patrons over on my patreon page i will have all of their names listed on screen right now as well as a huge thank you to all of my patrons for making videos just like this one possible thank you so much for supporting my channel here are my social media sites in case you'd like to follow me on any of those that's just where i do fun things like behind the scenes looks at things coming up i'll pull you guys on what you want to learn next and i'll even do giveaways on there a few times a year so make sure to check that out but with that being said that does end the tutorial so thank you again so much for watching i really hope it helped and i will see you in my next video bye you