Thinking Out Loud Guitar Lesson – Ed Sheeran

Genre:

Difficulty:
Length: 13:02

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Wikipedia page
Artist website
Music video

• Percussive slap
• Picking patterns

If you enjoy doodling around on your guitar, you are going to love today’s lesson. The groove you learn with Thinking Out Loud along with the special strum technique can really take you places.

The guitar chords to Thinking Out Loud are simple open chords, nothing special. There is just 1 barre chord.

If you are just starting out with the guitar, you can actually just play the chords, slap the guitar on the backbeats, and it’ll already sound good since the chord progression is really nice. Watch the rhythm, it uses syncopation.

If you are at an intermediate level, you’ll be able to take things further. During the lesson, I’ll show you a very cool slap-mute-pluck strum technique, which you’ll be able to use in this, and lots of other songs as well. We’ll go over each step of the technique in detail, and it will take a lot of practice before you perfect it. Stick with it, keep on doing it, and soon, it’ll sound right. It took me a few days to get it sounding good as well.

The video tutorial will cover every part of the song, including the intro, verse, chorus, pre-chorus, and bridge. It sounds like a lot, but don't worry, the intro, verse, and chorus are the same 🙂

Once you can, make sure you play along with the original song as well. One thing to keep in mind is that when Ed Sheeran plays this song live, he usually has all the strings tuned down 2 semitones. This means that if you want to play along with a live version, you’ll have to tune down your guitar as well. And that’s exactly why you’ll just play along with the original 😉

We will be playing in the key of D major by the way. I really think you’ll have a lot of fun with this one since it has such a great vibe to it.

Thinking Out Loud song details

Thinking Out Loud was released by Ed Sheeran on his album titled X in 2014, and quickly reached the top of the charts around the world. Not only that, it stayed on the charts for months, which is rare. But hey, it is a great song.

Thinking Out Loud charts and rankings

The song topped the charts in Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Denmark, Slovakia, Portugal, South Africa, and the United Kingdom.

It didn’t reach the top position but got to the top 10 in several other countries including the US, Canada, Germany, Italy, Norway, Belgium, Spain, Austria, France, Poland.

If you want to refine the skills you learned in Thinking Out Loud, check out these lessons on songs by clicking these links:
Percussive slap / Picking patterns

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