Irving Berlin – Blue Skies

Blue Skies (Chords) – Blues Skies Intro (Tab)

After a few weeks of heavy duty rock riffs, I’m having a change this week and going with some old school stuff.

Blues Skies has been recorded by hundreds of people including Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald and Willie Nelson. But this tab is based heavily, very heavily, on Brian Hefferan‘s version because whenever I hear one of his arrangements, I can never think of a better way to play it.

The chords are fairly simple. Even when they get a bit jazzy in the ‘Blue skies…‘ section, all you’re doing is moving one string down a fret each time (although I’ve probably chosen completely the wrong chord names). There’s a nice variation on the B7 chord (2320) which replaces the B with a second seventh note – it makes for a very easy change from the G chord.

A slight change in naming policy might throw you though. I used to refer to major 7 chords as maj7, but from now on it’ll be 7M with a capital ‘M’ to distinguish it from a minor chord.

The intro is, obviously, a little trickier. I’ve tabbed it out quite sparsely with just the chords and melody notes so you’ll need to fill in with some supporting strums to keep things moving along.

UPDATE: LStrachey has posted his version of the tune. There are a few differences in his arrangement and it’s well worth checking out.

Requested by Rob