Say You Won’t Let Go Guitar Lesson – James Arthur

Genre:

Difficulty:
Length: 10:51

---

Wikipedia page
Artist website
Music video

• Capo
• Chord changes
• Chords
• Percussive slap
• Strumming patterns
• Strumming without a pick

Say You Won't Let Go is a really fun song to learn, especially if you are a beginner guitarist. It has really simple chords, a bit of strumming, and a simple fingerpicking pattern. Nice!

The song is played in the key of Bb, and to play it without using all sorts of weird chord shapes, we'll use a capo at fret 3. This way, we can use some very simple chords and play the entire song.

The chords are:

G - D - Em - C

As I mentioned, the song is performed in Bb, but because of the capo, we'll play as if we're in the key of G. The chord progression is I-V-vi-IV.

If you are not familiar with these chords yet, please refer back to the beginner lesson series on basic chords.

We'll start our Say You Won't Let Go lesson by learning the chord progression outlined above, and we'll practice changing in between those chords as well.

Next up, we'll strum the chords to Say You Won't Let Go, and I will teach you a very nice percussive strumming pattern as well. Learn it well and use it in other songs too!

Once we get a hang of changing in between the chords and strumming, we'll go ahead and learn to play the picking pattern. It is repetitive for every chord, and it's suitable for beginners as well.

And after you get a hang of everything, at the end of the lesson, we'll have a play-along, where we'll play the sequence of chords together.

Say You Won't Let Go song details

The song was released by James Arthur in 2016, on his 2nd studio album, Back from the Edge. It was also released as a single.

After it's release, sales of Say You Won't Let Go skyrocketed, making James Arthur the first X-Factor contestant to have 2 singles sell over 1 million copies in his home country.

Say You Won't Let Go charts and rankings

Besides the UK, the single topped the charts in New Zealand, Sweden, Australia, and Ireland. It peaked at number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US and reached the #1 spot in the Adult Top 100.

• Hungary (Single Top 40): #38
• Germany (Airplay Chart): #3
• Europe (Euro Digital Songs): #1
• Netherlands (Single Top 100): #1
• New Zealand (Recorded Music NZ): #1
• UK Singles (Official Charts Company): #1
• US Billboard Hot 100: #11
• US Adult Alternative Songs (Billboard): #16
• US Adult Contemporary (Billboard): #3
• US Adult Top 40 (Billboard): #1
• US Mainstream Top 40 (Billboard): #6

If you want to refine the skills you learned in Say You Won’t Let Go, check out these lessons on songs by clicking these links:
Capo / Chord changes / Chords / Percussive slap / Strumming patterns / Strumming without a pick

Please log in and revisit this page to download this song's tabs and backing track (along with hundreds more on the site).