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  #1  
Old 05-28-2015, 03:31 PM
wildbill1962 wildbill1962 is offline
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Default sweet baby james

Howdy again everyone. I am looking for a plain and simple version of sweet baby james. My chord hand was damaged in an accident, so not able to barr or do funcky 5th, 7th, etc. Most of the songs I do are 3 chord open chords in A or D
Tried it in A, D and E and the off would be F. But it just doesnt sound right to me.

My wife loves this song and would like to learn it for her.

Thanks in advance
Bill
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  #2  
Old 05-28-2015, 03:40 PM
Rick Shepherd Rick Shepherd is offline
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Lets see. The only barr chord in the song is Bm, so just use the non-barred variation like you do with the F barr chord. Hope that helps.
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Old 05-29-2015, 04:12 AM
wildbill1962 wildbill1962 is offline
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Thanks Rick. I had tried that progression, but it didnt sound right. Thought I had it wrong. Prop just my old deaf ears messing with me...lol

Thanks again !
Bill
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  #4  
Old 05-29-2015, 05:44 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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The original key is D, and needs two barre chords: F#m and Bm.
In C, of course, you need F.
To get only one barre chord (Bm), you need to be in G (you can of course use a capo to get these shapes to a key that suits your voice):

|G |D |C |Bm |Bm |
|Em |D |G |Bm |Bm |
|Em |C |G |Bm |
|C |G |D |Am |Am |D |D |

|C |C |D |G |
|Em |C |G |D |
|C |C |D |G |
|Em |C |G |G |
|Em |A |D |D |D |D |

|G |C |D |G |
|Em |C |G |G |
|Em |C |G |G |
|Em7 |A7 |D7sus4 |D7 |
|C |D |G |G |

There are a few non-barre versions of Bm:
-2---2---x-
-3---3---3-
-4---4---4
-4---0---4-
-x---2---2-
-x---x---x--

But then there are non-barre versions of F too, if you want to do it in C. If you're OK muting the outer strings, this is a good enough F:

-x-----(mute with index)
-1------
-2------
-3------
-3------
-x-----(mute with thumb - or fret 1 with thumb)
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Old 05-29-2015, 07:58 AM
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VJP5 VJP5 is offline
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Thanks JonPR - nice of you to go thru the work of transposing this song for the OP
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Old 05-29-2015, 05:32 PM
wildbill1962 wildbill1962 is offline
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Wow ! You really went above and beyond jon. Thank you very much for the help.

Bill
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  #7  
Old 06-01-2015, 05:13 AM
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SprintBob SprintBob is offline
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My favorite version of this song is the live version JT did on his 1994 live album. It's got a mellower groove than the original which is brighter and perhaps a bit more "waltzy". Lovely song for sure and like you my wife really likes it.

As a beginner, I have mostly strummed the song picking the root note for the majority of chords. Lately, I've been experimenting with some Travis style fingerpicking patterns. I think JT uses a combination of fingerstyle and strumming when he plays it. The Bm is the hardest chord for me to get cleanly and sometimes I find it works pretty well as long as I get the Am chord shape form down and play the top four strings. I do have to get that F#m barre but for me that one has never been too hard.

Good Luck! A lot of JT's songs seem to a beginner like me to be fairly complex and it's nice to find one like this that is fairly straight-forward to play and sounds so good too.
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