How to play I’ve Got A Feeling, The Beatles
If you’ve watched the Get Back documentary recently, learning how to play I’ve Got a Feeling has got to be on your priority list! Or at least one of the songs from the rooftop concert is, but we’re not keeping score here. I thoroughly enjoyed the candidness of the documentary, and if you’re a die-hard Beatle fan it felt like that documentary was made for you.
I could make a blog post just on the documentary alone. It was so cool to see the Fab Four as The Beatles were coming to the end of the line as a band. OK, maybe cool isn’t the right word, but that’s as close to being in the same room with those guys as most of us will get. That’s something to appreciate. But this isn’t a discussion about the documentary…so I’ve digressed.
Below you’ll find the tablatures for John Lennon & George Harrison’s electric guitar parts. And I mean Every. Single. Note. Plus you get chord diagrams to help you strum along. If you need to see a demonstration, fear not! I’ve got a YouTube video covering all of the licks! And if you need to have the tablatures or you want to download the backing track and practice track, you access them by becoming a Patreon supporter https://www.patreon.com/smellytele. If all you want is the tabs you can also purchase them at SMP Press https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/22164468.
Gear Corner
Today’s gear corner is unique. We need to identify two electric guitars in order to replicate the sound of I’ve Got A Feeling and the sound of the Get Back documentary.
First, John Lennon uses a 1965 Epiphone Casino. Noted to be one of John’s favorite guitars, the Casino’s P90 pickups are naturally warm. Combined with a Fender Twin Reverb, the Casino gets a bit of that Fender brightness in the sound you hear from the rooftop concert. A great guitar. If you don’t have an Epiphone Casino, I find any Gibson or Epiphone humbucking guitar to be a good substitute. In today’s lesson video, I’ve used my Gibson SG with a relatively clean tone. I think the sound on the record is a bit more distorted than the sound I produced in the video lesson. But remember, less is more when it comes to distortion.
Now, onto George Harrison. When learning to play I’ve Got a Feeling, I’m very excited to say George used a *drum roll*…TELECASTER! Woohoo! Clearly using the bridge pickup, George’s bright shimmering sound comes combined with a Fender Twin Reverb. I think some of the best sounds on this song are when Geoge is playing along with the Fender Rhodes which has a very round electric piano sound. The two instruments together provide a great lead melody line.
The Chords
Learning how to play I’ve Got A Feeling is going to include some basic open chords. To get this sound right though, we need to expand a bit on these open chords. What do I mean? Well, we are going to use pieces of the open chords, and then we’re going to move to the next variation of that chord up the neck of the guitar. We’ll take some notes from these variations, combine these with the open chords, and then listen to the magic.
Nashville Numbers
OK, let’s start with simple open chords first. The song is in the key of A, and the main verses alternate between the I (1) and the IV (4) chords. To find the 4th note in the A major key, you simply count each note of the major scale in ascending order. The first note of the A major scale is A, the second is B, the third is Db, and the 4th is D. So to play an alternating I-IV (1-4) pattern, you need to know an A and a D chord!
Then there’s a bridge, where Paul sings (or more accurately, SCREAMS!) that insanely high part with an intensity that could cut paper. While George is playing those classic 50’s sounding early rock n roll inspired licks, John Lennon is hammering away on the V, VII, and IV (5, 7, and 4) chords. What are the V and VII chords? Let’s keep counting our major scale. We left off on D, or the 4, so the 5th then is the E, the 6th is an F#, and the 7th note is a G. Therefore, you need an E chord and a G chord. In this song, John is playing the bar chords, so time to show off your first finger strength!
Notice how there’s an added bass note on the D chord here. This note is an F# and is actually part of the D triad (it’s the octave of the note you play on your high E string). It’s not totally necessary to get that note in there, but it does fatten up the entire chord.
Electric Guitar Parts!
John Lennon Licks
It only makes sense to start with John Lennon’s parts since he’s playing the open riff. While John’s part is the simpler piece, this riff will stretch out your hand. You’re barring the open A chord with your 1st finger and reaching up with the pinky to get the 5th fret of the high e. Then you’re hammering on the D chord from this position with all fingers grabbing a note from each fret. If you’re finding that one or two notes get muted, practice playing each chord by itself, making sure you can hear each note in the chord. If you’re muting any notes, you’ll find it. Then work on switching between the chords and make sure each note is coming through. Finally, add the flat-picking (or fingerpicking if you prefer) and you should have this lick down in no time!
Then we’re into John’s bluesy lick that separates the first verse from the second. The simplicity of the lick and single strum of the following chords should make this easy for the beginner or intermediate player to pick up. After this, John uses the same chord shapes and simply strums along behind the band. If you practiced playing the chords as we did above, this part should be a piece of cake by now.
Bridge-Thingy
Like a lot of Beatles songs, there are some parts that could be called a bridge, a chorus, or a, “I don’t know what that was, but it sounded good.” That’s the best I can come up with for the next part after the second verse, but rather than typing all that out, I’m going to call it the bridge-thingy. In the bridge-thingy, John Lennon plays the 5 chord (E), goes to the 7 chord (G), then to the 4 (D), and finally back to the 1 chord (A). It’s a neat progression and sounds nice and full on the D chord if you can wrap your thumb around the back of the guitar and reach the 2nd fret of the low E string.
After John sings his verse, the blues lick we learned earlier comes back, but in a modified form. John’s going to start on the 2nd fret and work his way up to the 5th fret (and George will do the opposite starting on the 5th fret and working his way down to the 2nd fret). Musically, this should clash and create all sorts of problems, but it is surprisingly cool and makes this section of the song unique from anything I’ve covered on the site to date. At the end of the lick, John will come back in with the same intro lick and promptly go back to strumming for his last verse.
The last verse is pretty cool because John & Paul get a polyphonic melody going between Paul’s verse and John’s verse. It works great and combined with the melodies from George and Billy Preston, this leads up to the final climactic blues lick at the end. It’s the same lick we just learned above, but it repeats
George Harrison Parts
George’s parts to I’ve Got a Feeling are tons of fun to play! They are pretty simple licks, and most intermediate guitarists will be able to pick these up relatively quickly. If you play these licks for your friends and you don’t have a band backing you, they probably will not be impressed, but I think George’s playing here is fantastic. John’s intro makes this song pop, and George’s ability to play along with Billy Preston’s licks on the Fender Rhodes makes the song pop again!
George comes in with John’s bluesy slides by playing a similar lick up the neck. Then he plays a walk-up on the low E and A string.
Verse 2
In the next lines and during the second verse you’re playing along with Billy Preston and the Fender Rhodes! The sound of the Telecaster’s bridge pickup combined with the warmness of a Rhodes is immaculate. Did I mention I love Telecasters? Oh, and I love learning how to play I’ve Got A Feeling. Why?! Because Fender Rhodes and Telecaster, that’s why!
After the Fender Rhodes licks, you’re going to mute the chords and play them on the backbeat. On this backbeat, your chords should be quick and snappy (staccato). Playing on the backbeat was popular in the 1950s (and continues to be popular to this day), and it makes sense that George is using this technique for a song that is based on roots, blues, and soul music.
After the second verse, you’re going to play the first George Harrison lick you learned. Then you transition to the song’s bridge-thingy.
Bridge-Thingy, Georgie Style
After the second verse, George plays a few lead lines below the bridge-thingy. It’s not difficult to learn these blues bends. The last long bend is extremely cool as it starts with a full bend, then increases another half step, then George backs the half step off, holds the full bend a little longer, and finally slowly releases the bend giving you an Angus Young kind of AC-DC tease on the guitar. Friggin’ genius.
For the next verse, George goes back to playing with the Fender Rhodes. These licks should look familiar by now.
The last bluesy riff here is another cool part George plays. While John is ascending, George is descending. Then, George changes the lick slightly by using the high e string. Everything George plays in this song is just too dang cool.
That’s IT!
Now you know how to play I’ve Got A Feeling!! If you’re looking for more Beatles songs, check out our lesson for Day Tripper (smellytele.com)!
Remember, if you would like to support this webpage, please become a patron on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/smellytele! A perk of being a patron? You’ll be able to download the practice track, backing tracks, and tabs so you can follow along with the video lessons & our lesson posts!
Also, go and check out some of our other electric guitar lessons! We have rock n roll lessons for Fortunate Son (smellytele.com) and for Don’t Fear The Reaper (smellytele.com).
Like what you’re reading? Enter your email address below, and click Sign Up to subscribe to our email list. You’ll get the latest updates from The Smelly Tele the moment they’re published. We will never send you spam.
