Easy Acoustic Guitar Songs: 5 Campfire Classics for Beginners
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5,0 / 5,0 | These easy acoustic guitar songs will help you learn new skills on guitar, as well as being popular with your friends. Guitar cheat codes inside!
Guitar Songs for Beginners:
Key Information on Easy Acoustic Guitar Songs:
- These easy acoustic guitar songs use simple chord progressions, which make them ideal for beginners looking for relaxed campfire jams.
- Classic campfire songs help new guitarists build rhythm, chord-changing confidence, and sing-along skills while learning recognisable tracks.
- Practising these core skills will help with aspects of your playing, whilst helping your enjoyment of the instrument.
Choosing the right guitar for you
So, you’re looking to get a couple of easy acoustic guitar songs under your fingers? What a great idea! There’s nothing more satisfying than putting the pieces of a well-known song together on guitar.
For outdoor playing, you need a guitar that is bright and resonant. Therefore, something like a *Jumbo acoustic could be perfect! However, they’re rather large. So, I’d recommend a classic *Dreadnought; combining playing comfort and maximum tone. You’ll also want something with a built-in tuner, as the outdoor humidity likes to mess with your guitar’s tuning.
If your current acoustic is looking a bit lacklustre, then why not upgrade? Or, if it just needs some love, get hold of some strings and guitar care products to reignite your love for the instrument.
Four Strong Winds – Neil Young
Our first pick for easy acoustic guitar songs comes courtesy of Neil Young in this 1978 hit. I admit, it doesn’t have the popularity of Harvest Moon. Despite this, it’s a great song to add to your repertoire.
What does Four Strong Winds teach on guitar? Comprising basic open chords, it allows players to improve their chord playing. Moreover, we can add a simple yet effective strumming pattern to bring the song to life.
Personally, I like to play this song with a DDU-UD (down down up, up down) strumming pattern. Overall, this encourages strumming practice and will aid your rhythm playing.
House Of The Rising Sun – The Animals
Jumping back to the 1960s, next to The Animals’ biggest hit. Led by the iconic arpeggiated guitar part, we’ll be looking at the chords that sit underneath it.
Similarly, this track works around a basic chord progression. What I like most is the opportunity to drop in an E7, which gives the song a great bluesy edge.
This is great for beginners to learn, as it’s in a 6/8 time signature. Whereby we’d count each bar as one two three, four five six. Rather than the traditional one two three four. Once you’re happy with the chords, why not try arpeggiating the chords? This is the process of picking the individual notes within that chord.
Runaround Sue – Dion
Once again, in our quest for easy acoustic guitar songs, we’ve got a fairly simple chord progression. Are you getting the theme yet? However, this hit from the swinging sixties has an unfortunate trick up its sleeve.
Runaround Sue has four chords for the verse, and then switches those up for the bridge sections. But that doesn’t sound so bad, right? Well, one of them is a dreaded barre chord!
Now, they’re honestly not as bad as they sound, as long as you introduce them gradually into your playing. On this occasion, this is a Bm, that we can play on the 2nd fret on the A string. Give it a try, you’ll get there.
Man I Need – Olivia Dean
Time for something different and a little more up-to-date now. Classic rockers, look away now! This Olivia Dean hit is all over my socials, and it’s really getting under my skin.
For such a massive sound, the bare bones of this song are so simple. This track falls into the whole easy acoustic guitar songs thing, but whilst adding a slash chord. Slash chords are where we change the bass note in the chord.
On this occasion, we’re playing C/E, pronounced ‘C over E’. Nothing scary, we just want to accent the open low E string when strumming the C chord, and it really makes the song. Don’t forget to add a capo to the 1st fret either; more of that in a moment.
This Is The Life – Amy Macdonald
Concluding our pick at campfire jams is this 2007 bop from Amy Macdonald. Country music is making a comeback, and this choppy tune goes down really well at my gigs. Let’s take a closer look.
This is a great opportunity to experiment with using a capo if you haven’t done so already. You’ll want the capo on the 4th fret. This gives it a higher sound and will make your acoustic guitar resonate wonderfully.
Just watch out for the fast pace and choppy strumming. However, get to the chorus, and you’ll have the audience singing along!
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