How to Play Falling Slowly on Guitar

‘Falling Slowly’ became my obsession when I was in Ireland on holiday last year. I didn’t really have access to a guitar initially, so it just kept haunting me with its beautiful and delicate intro circling around my head while I was cruising the gorgeous countryside of Ireland. I totally recommend the movie and the soundtrack to everyone… Glen Hansard is an amazing singer/songwriter and very handy guitarist. He plays and sings all through the movie as a struggling muso making his extra cash by busking in the streets of Dublin every day.

Often when it comes to guitar, the easiest thing to conquer is the nicest thing to play. We hear a piece of music so pretty and delicate, that we fail to see the simplicity of the actual song. We hear it and say “Ah that’ll be so hard to play”. When in actual fact, in just a few sessions with the perfect tutor (wink wink)… and you’ll have it mastered.

I recommend this guitar lesson to everyone, because it’s a very simple and effective little ‘finger-style pattern’ that can be learned in a short time-frame. The song is slow and calm, so speed is not an issue. It’s predominantly two chords, so there’s not a lot of moving parts to worry about. Those of you that are members of Jamorama, will find this real easy. Especially if you’ve gone through my more in depth and advanced ‘Finger-style course’.

The first bar is based on a C chord, but you’ll see you only need a few fingers to achieve the chord sound we want. The other thing to note is, every second note is the open G string. This applies to the whole intro.

Check it out… How to play Falling Slowly on guitar.

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Comments

  1. Donald Hughes

    Just joined , loved the song intro but really want to learn the rest , lets finish this one
    thanks , Don

  2. Philip Holland

    Brilliant that Mark. I’d heard the song but not of the movie and I’ll certainly be watching it. Great lesson!!

  3. Don

    Mark – Thanks so much for leading us s-l-o-w-l-y through such a beautiful song. Your Finger style lessons are coming in handy! EVEN I may be able to learn this song intro – thanks to you.
    PS: the DVD is next up on my Netflix queue and hope you’re right about how this song will melt my young lady. (Smile)

  4. Tony

    Absolutely love it. I would really love for you to do the rest of the song so I can learn the whole thing! I’m working on the parts from this video and just love it! Just want to be able to play the whole thing.

  5. william anderson

    Thankyou first of all things…. You’ve restarted my will to play again ! I’ve been out of the loop for guit sometime now.! But now coming to this site ! I’m excited now…. Now I make time to practice! Regardless of how tired I am coming home from work ! I’m zoning back into my songwriting again ! And gotta Thankyou for this ! I’m also letting new & old musicians know about your site…please keep on keepin on !

  6. Cameron Bautsch

    Loved the tutorial, would love the bridge sometime!

  7. Brian

    Hey Mark, great job, like the sound of your voice, sounds just a bit like Randy Travis, one of my favorites.

    keep up the great work bud, and thanks for the lessons.

  8. john

    lovely…any chance of tabs for us ‘visual’ learners?

  9. Mark the harp Carlson

    Great voice and guitar work. That was the first time I heard you sing. Excellent!

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