Mr. Tambourine Man | TAB
As The Byrds released their cover version of Bob’s classic, Mr Tambourine Man, it inspired Dylan to “go electric” only a few months later with Like A Rolling Stone.
This places Mr. Tambourine Man as the pivot when pop/rock bands started performing tunes with serious lyrics.
As Dylan was still equipped with the acoustic on his version, let’s stick to that and study how he played the song that inspired perhaps the greatest change in popular music history.
Here’s the intro (which later comes back at the end of the choruses in various variations).
Play along to the original recording (tune down to 434Hz) to get the right feel for this part.
Here’s the first chorus.
As you can see, I’ve put in A/E and D/A here but with chords and lyrics, I didn’t. This is because it’s just too many chords and looks messy.
As we are in a drop D tuning, the E is found on fret 2, not the open string. Again, you must play to the original recording to get it right.
Here’s the first verse.
This is basically the same concept, just with an Em and some more strums on the A chord.
Let’s look at choruses 2 and 3.
There are only two changes here, in bar 4 we play more, and the final two bars are without that 6/4 bar.
Here’s the last line of verse 2, it’s that 5/4 bar.
5/4 sounds complicated but all that’s happened here is another beat of Em. This is to fit the lyrics.
If you practice all TAB examples, you can easily play Mr. Tambourine Man from beginning to end. The trick will be to stop thinking and just follow the lyrics.
Mr. Tambourine Man TAB | Related Pages
Mr. Tambourine Man | Chords + Lyrics
You can learn how to play Mr. Tambourine Man by Bob Dylan using chords, lyrics, chord analysis, a chord chart, and the original recording.
| G/B A | D G/B |
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me…
Five similar tunes | Chords + Lyrics
- Blowin In The Wind chords by Bob Dylan
- Brown Eyed Girl chords by Van Morrison
- The Joker chords by the Steve Miller Band
- Me and Bobby McGee chords by Janis Joplin
- Stuck In The Middle With You chords by Stealers Wheel
Bob Dylan tunes
Widely regarded as the most influential artist in popular culture, Bob Dylan has been covered and copied by almost everyone who ever attempted to write a song. There are so many of his famous tunes, that it’s impossible to pick just a few.
Some say Dylan invented modern songwriting.
Bob Dylan on the web
About me | Dan Lundholm
This guitar lesson by Dan Lundholm features TAB and covers Mr. Tambourine Man. 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.