The chords for this one are very simple, and the melody fits nicely on the fretboard. But the way the vocals shift unevenly against the chords made this tricky for me to get my head around.
The other challenge is to keep the vocal melody distinct from the backing (both the chords and the piano runs e.g. bar 8) by giving the melody notes an extra-hard pluck.
Green Day’s American Idiot doesn’t require a whole lot finesse. Just blasting out the strums all the way through. The hardest bit is making sure the strum blocking is effective in the parts where there’s just a vocal melody.
The solo is just messing around with the chorus melody and chords. Lots of scope for you to come up with your own set of chord inversions here.
The Pinky and the Brain theme is a lot of fun to play. I always love a bit of strum blocking on the riff, i.e. strumming all the strings and muting all but one. It gives the tune a forceful, percussive sound that you can’t get from just picking.
Ray Charles’s Hit the Road Jack is tricky to play. Mostly because it’s so quick. I’ve slowed it slightly from the original. But it’s still a challenge.
Intro: This sets up two aspects that run through the whole song. First, the descending pattern of Dm-C-Bb-A7. And second, the liberal use of chnks.
Chorus: This continues the pattern from intro and adds the melody on top. There’s a trip up the neck for the “no more…” part that requires some quick and accurate jumps.
Verse: The melody here is quick and relentless. I’ve included a few bits of campanella playing to fit them all in. This is the section I had the most trouble with.
Solo: I went with a very ukulele-style solo. So it’s almost all chord strumming with a lot of movement all over the neck. Then finishing off with a quick run.