How to play Solitary Man, Neil Diamond
If you’re in the mood for another great song, or you have the blues, induced by a girl named Belinda or Sue, then you will love learning how to play Solitary Man. I learned this song last year for my summer “gun for hire” gigs and enjoyed it so much, that I had to share it with you. This is a classic from Neil Diamond, and it is a simple strum-along song. And if you’re looking for a challenge, don’t worry. The song’s intro has got you covered.
Below, you’ll find the tablature for the intro and chord diagrams for the whole song. If you’re intimidated by tablature, fear not! I have a YouTube lesson to accompany this post, so you can see how the song is played on an actual guitar. Want to download the tabs?! No problem. You can access them by becoming a supporter of The Smelly Tele on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/smellytele. Or if you prefer one-time purchases (rather than a subscription), you can also purchase the tabs at Sheet Music Direct: https://www.sheetmusicdirect.com/en-US/se/ID_No/1295788/Product.aspx.
Gear Corner
Today’s Gear Corner post is going to be short. I’ve seen Neil using many different types of guitars in several live performance videos. In these videos, we see a range from a young long-haired hippy Neil to a more mature short-haired “get off my lawn” Mr. Diamond. Hard to say exactly what you’re going to need to sound like the famed crooner, but this should not stress us.
For today, we’re going to use any old acoustic guitar we got. That’s right! ANY GUITAR! “But Smelly, you gotta give some kind of recommendation!” No, there is no recommendation for Solitary Man. Get a guitar, and let’s get excited to learn. I’m using a Martin Custom D if that means anything to anyone. And to Neil Diamond, if you’re reading this, I hope you like Martin guitars, and I hope you haven’t found my guitar lesson because you’ve forgotten how to play this song…and I’m sorry about the “get off my lawn” joke. I really like you Mr. Diamond, and I’m sorry my ball went over your fence. I just want my ball back, and it won’t happen again.
The Chords
Nashville Numbers
“Oh NO! Not the Nashville Numbers again! This is so academic. I just came here to learn how to play Solitary Man.” If this sounds like you, go ahead and skip past the Nashvill Numbers section. If not, you’re probably curious about music theory, or maybe you’re trying to improve your overall musicianship and musical understanding.
I like to think of Solitary Man as being in the key of G. “Hey, wait a second! This song starts off with an E-minor chord!” You are correct, ever vigilant & detailed reader! But, if we look at the song’s chorus, you’ll see that it leads off with a G chord, and this makes our Nashville numbers super tidy and neat. Starting with a G chord, we are going to need the I, II, IV, V, & VI chords (that’s the 1, 2, 4, 5, & 6 chords for all of you who died with the Roman Empire).
So how do we get those chords? Easy. First, you will assign number to each note of your G major scale in ascending order. Check out the chart below. If we start on G, then this will be our first note. The second note will be A, the third is B, fourth is C, fifth, is D, sixth is E, and we don’t care about 7 for this song. Sorry 7. And now we have our chords! We’ll need to know a G, Am, C, D, and Em chord!
Chord Diagrams
Chord Progression
Learning Neil Diamond’s Solitary Man will take some work because these chord progressions are not straightforward. We already mentioned that the song starts with the minor 6th chord, and then Neil moves to the minor 2nd chord before he gets to our root G chord. Then he’s going to alternate between the root and the minor second, before dropping back to the minor 6th when he starts singing about his run around Sue. And just when you think you’ve got it figured out, you’re into a straight I-IV-I-V progression (almost…Neil had to make sure this I-IV-V wasn’t normal either).
Verse
Ok that last paragraph was a mouthful, and if you’re lost, so am I. If I’m trying to make this easy to understand, then I want to point out that Neil is using two extremely popular chord progressions in the verse. Neil brings these two progressions together in this song, picks and chooses the chords he wants, and he creates a progression that is unique. The two progressions I’m talking about are a I-VI-IV-V (1-6-4-5) progression and a I-VI-II-V (1-6-2-5).
The 1-6-4-5 progression is extremely popular and can be heard in anything you listen to from 50’s do-wop to almost every pop song on the radio today (and by today, I mean around March 2023). The second progression you hear in the verse brings a 2 chord in, and that leads me to the 1-6-2-5 chord progression which is popular in jazz and gospel songs. Both have similar sounds, but it’s interesting that Neil Diamon chose to take the minor chords from both progressions, and use them together in his verse. You might say it was genius?
Chorus
In the chorus, Neil uses what perhaps could be the greatest (or one of the top selling) chord progression of all time. This progression is I-IV-V. This progression has been mixed up and turned around so many different ways, you might think there’s no way to be creative with it. But Neil Diamond will surprise you again with an interesting twist on this progression.
Neil is going to start off with the traditional I chord, or a G, and then head to his IV chord, C, back to G, and then to the V, D. This 1-4-1-5 is a popular movement, but instead of returning to the 1 chord, Neil sits on the 5 chord. He then follows with a predictable 4-1-5. To end the verse, he will drop you back to the minor 6th chord, and then alternate between the minor 6th and the 5 chord. Pretty cool!
Acoustic Guitar Intro
Yeah, how about that sweet acoustic guitar intro. It’s a great little lick, and as long as you have your bar chords down it should be easy to pick up. First, you want to fret your Em, barre chord on the 7th fret. You’ll be using the Am shape at this location, and you’ll do a nice little finger picking exercise to pick out the note. Your right hand can be pretty lazy up until you drop to the open strings, and you’ll have to get down to the nut of the guitar pretty quick!
Strum Along
“That’s enough talking, Smelly! We want to play the song!” Love the enthusiasm, dedicated reader. Let’s do just that.
That’s It!
Now you know how to play Solitary Man by Neil Diamond! If you’re looking for something else “classic rocky”, check out our lesson for Fortunate Son (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 guitar lessons! We have country guitar lessons for Billy Joe Shaver like Georgia On A Fast Train (smellytele.com) and for You Just Can’t Beat Jesus Christ (smellytele.com).
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