Fur Elise

Again, this is a fingerpicking song. Have you learned to identify them yet by the tablature? 

Notice that the first bar is largely silent, simply including two notes to lead into the piece. We call these "pickup notes". If you repeat the piece as written, as you can see, we skip the pickup notes!

You may encounter a new challenge here regarding finger placement. For example, in bar 9, the instinct is likely to use the ring finger on the 3rd fret. But if you do so, you may have trouble forming the C chord for bar 10 smoothly enough. 

So, it may be easier to use the pinky finger on the 3rd fret in bar 9 instead.

For challenging pieces, making a note of these "trouble spots" and finding a solution for yourself will be important to mastering the piece!

Wondering about that "tempo rubato" note at the end there?

Tempo rubato is an instruction to alter the tempo at will to prove more feeling to the piece. That could mean playing quickly during exciting moments or dragging out certain notes where appropriate to provide dramatic tension. It's up to the interpretation of the musician.

In this case, I wanted to include it to indicate that it's perfectly fine (and actually sounds quite good) to slow down at that section as we jump up an octave. It's a bit of an unnatural movement for a guitarist -  this piece was originally written for the piano, after all.