Let It Be Guitar Lesson – Beatles

About this lesson

With our guitar tutorial on Let It Be, you will learn these guitar skills: Open chords, Slash chords.

Let It Be is one of my favorite songs, and known by probably everyone around the world. If you can sing, feel free to sing along after you’ve learned to play it.

You’ll be learning several guitar chords in this song, and will be introduced to slash chords as well. Actually, the song uses only chords, so you’ll have to get the hang of changing smoothly in between them to be able to play this song nicely. But don’t worry, it's easy, just takes a bit of practice.

The most popular version of the song was played on the piano by Paul McCartney, and in our guitar version, we’ll be using fingerpicking, to simulate the piano keys and rhythm. It uses a very interesting picking pattern that you’ll need to get a hang of, but everything is explained in the guitar lesson. You’ll basically be arpeggiating the chords you’ll learn at the beginning of the lesson, so it’s really important you learn the chords well right off the start.

So to sum it up, in our beginner guitar lesson on Let It Be, you’ll be learning to play a really terrific song through practicing chords and a fingerpicking pattern unique to this song.

Let It Be song details

Let It Be by the Beatles was released in 1970 as a single and the title track of the album, Let It Be. This was actually the last single released by The Beatles while they were still active. It was written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, but since the video features McCartney singing and playing the piano, most people credit it to McCartney. The song reached the top of the charts in several countries, but interestingly enough, not in the UK.

The song is about Paul’s mother, who died of cancer when he was 14. He had a dream about her one day, which gave him the inspiration to write the song. Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr sang this song at Paul’s late wife’s memorial service in 1998.

Let It Be awards and chart rankings

• Rolling Stone’s Magazine 500 Greatest Songs of All Time: #20
• US Top 100: #1
• Australia Top 100: #1
• Italy Top 100: #1
• Norway Top 100: #1
• Switzerland Top 100: #1
• UK Top 100: #2

Skills you'll learn