Count On Me - Bruno Mars

One thing that I really dislike is a lyric sheet with the chords put in on top of each line. Sure, if you are an experienced player and are already familiar with the song in question, this can be somewhat helpful. If, however, you are less experienced or just starting out, I would recommend steering clear of this type of chart when attempting to learn a new song. The reason is that these charts take mostly simple and straight forward chord progressions and make them much more vague and complicated. This occurs because these charts give no indication of how many beats and bars each chord lasts. Most of the time when a student attempts to play a song from a chart like this, he or she will play the chords in a free flowing, no meter kind of way basically with no groove. This, as we all know, is not how music (at least most popular styles of music) is supposed to sound.

When I teach a song to a student, I begin with the chord progression and the strumming pattern for each section. Once the individual sections are sounding good, we learn the song structure. After the student has learned the chords and structure for a song, only then can he or she begin to attempt singing it and playing it at the same time. I create chord and structure sheets for all the songs I teach. Here is a recent song I charted for a student - Count On Me by Bruno Mars(click on it to download it). Next to it, there is a version with lyrics and chords together (the kind of chart I despise). You be the judge. If you would like the chords and structure for a particular song, add it in the comments section and I will post it in my weekly "Song Of The Week" post.