Sunday, March 1, 2009

How to play "Margaritaville" by Jimmy Buffett on acoustic guitar

Today's lesson will show you how to play Jimmy Buffett's classic tune Margaritaville.

I really enjoy Jimmy Buffett's music. Jimmy's known for writing fun, catchy, crowd-pleasing songs, and most of them are relatively simple to play. In the case of Margaritaville, it's very simple to play; your classic "three chord hit."

Margaritaville is usually played in the key of D, using the D, G, and A chords. Alternatively, it can be played using the A, D, and E chords with the capo on the 5th fret. In fact, if you are ever playing this song in a band or ensemble with another guitarist, try having one guitarist play D, G, and A with no capo and the other play A, D, and E with the capo on the 5th fret. This will give the song a much fuller, richer sound.

Here's a short video of me playing Margaritaville. In this video, I'm actually playing it in the key of Eb, with the guitar capo on the 1st fret, which is a better fit for my vocal range:



Enjoy!

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