A Hard Day’s Night Chord Simplified

A Hard Day’s Night’s opening chord, has got to be the most debated chord argument in history. There are people who have invested plenty of time and money into identifying these 2 seconds of musical magic. I do not claim to be the end all be all, nor do I boast a prestigious Ph.D from Blowhard University, I’m just a guy who wants a close enough reproduction so I can jam with with my friends and make intoxicated folks at bars dance!

Recently Randy Bachman of Bachman-Turner Overdrive and The Guess Who fame was able to listen to the individual tracks at Abbey Road Studios. He came to the conclusion which is shared by others that George is strumming an Fsus9/G chord on his Rickenbacker 360/12 12-string guitar, Paul is playing a D note on his Hofner 500/1 Beatle bass and John Lennon is playing a Dsus4 chord on his Gibson J-160E acoustic guitar.

That stacked together will look and sound like this:

Now that to me sounds like the ticket to ride! (pause for my terrible Beatles pun) Then my next question is can I play this all on just one guitar? …strung way down low.

I’ve built a hybrid chord that I will call Gsus9/D. To hit the bass note D I fret it with my first finger on my strumming hand and strum the chord with my remaining 2nd, 3rd and 4th finger of my strumming hand. Before you get all “Why’d this guy just go all Van Halen on me” realize this is a technique borrowed from flamenco guitar, which well trumps the Beatles in age dating back to the 16th century.

By chance you’re new to right-handed tapping it’s a simple skill acquired through practice, focus on getting a clean and accurate tone while your right hand stays completely relaxed. Want your brain to explode? Listen to some Stanley Jordan!

Here’s “my” chord or rather my theory of how to do it on one guitar

The rest of the song speaks for itself with more traditional chords like G C F D Bm and Em. Hope you learned something, if you’d like more lessons like this let me know below. Thanks!

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