Bye Bye Love | TAB
Let’s start with the intro, it goes: A – C – D, the C chord is a bIIIx and the only chord that is played outside the key of A. Here’s the TAB:
You could potentially call the A chord an A/C# although I do feel slash chords need to have a low note, this feels more like an inversion with C# being the lowest note of the inversion.
The little rhythmic displacement of the A chord first being on beat 1, then 2 is what makes the riff.
Let’s move on to a hybrid way of how you could play the main chorus part using either an acoustic or electric guitar.
In the original recording, there’s one guitar using a capo, thinking in G, and the other mainly playing barre chords. The third guitar (Chet Atkins) plays licks, more on this later.
This means that no guitar is playing open A, D, and E chords, still, I think this is what you should mainly do if you’re the only guitarist:
That C-shaped A in bar two is imperative, make sure you play it!
For the verse, the one guitar part I would choose looks like this:
Notice how there are open strings at the end of a bar making it easier to transition to the next chord, every note matters!
Finally, let’s look at a few Chet Atkins licks. Here are three for the E chord.
Notice how example 2 is Major Pentatonic, and example 3 is Major Blues Scale (m3rd and maj 3rd). These are tiny differences that make it more or less country or blues. You need to blend them, not be exclusive for either style.
Here are three licks for the A chord. These are all Major Pentatonic. You could modify these by using an open A string, or change it from Major Pentatonic to Blues Scale.
Here are the D chord licks:
After playing all TAB examples along with the original recording, I’m sure you’ll find a way to come up with a part that works in a live band as the only guitarist.
Should you want to use the Chet Atkins licks, you need to make the strumming less intense. To achieve this, make the shapes smaller and remove some strums.
Bye Bye Love TAB | Related Pages
Bye Bye Love | Chords + Lyrics
You can learn to play Bye Bye Love by The Everly Brothers using chords, lyrics, chord analysis, a chord chart, and the original recording.
| D | A | D | A |
Bye-bye love, bye-bye happiness.
Five similar tunes | Chords + Lyrics
The Everly Brothers tunes
Starting out with their family as The Everly Family in the ’40s, The Everly Brothers were soon discovered by Chet Atkins.
Their best tunes include Bye Bye Love, Wake Up Little Susie, All I Have To Do Is Dream, and Cathy’s Clown.
The Everly Brothers on the web
About me | Dan Lundholm
This guitar lesson by Dan Lundholm featuring TAB covers Bye Bye Love. Discover more about him and how you can learn guitar with Spytunes.
Most importantly, find out why you should learn guitar through playing tunes, not practising scales, and studying theory in isolation.