Song dissections: House of the rising sun

House of the rising sun is about as well known as the les paul so often used to play it by so many bands since its release. It’s a song in the Key of A minor, and this lesson will take you through not only how to play the song, but how to understand the theory behind it.

Firstly, here is a basic tab of the entire song so that you can get a feel for it.

INTRO
                         Am                                     C
E---------------0------------------------------------0-----------
B-----------1--------1-------------------------1--------1--------
G--------2----------------2--------------0-----------------0-----
D-----2-------------------------------2--------------------------
A--0------------------------------3------------------------------
E----------------------------------------------------------------

                   D                               F (bar top 2 strings)
E------------2---2--------------------------------1---1----------
B---------3----------3-----------------------1------------1------
G-----2------------------2---------------2--------------------2--
D--0---------------------------------3---------------------------
A----------------------------------------------------------------
E----------------------------------------------------------------

                  Am                                            E
E---------------0------------------------------------------------
B-----------1--------1---------------------------------0---------
G--------2----------------2----------------------1--------1------
D-----2--------------------------------------2----------------2--
A--0------------------------------------2------------------------
E------------------------------------0---------------------------

                  Am                                            E
E---------------0------------------------------------------------
B-----------1--------1---------------------------------0---------
G--------2----------------2----------------------1--------1------
D-----2--------------------------------------2----------------2--
A--0------------------------------------2------------------------
E------------------------------------0---------------------------


The rest of the verse is using the same chords as shown above but puts them in a different order.

Am    C    D    F    Am    C    E    E

Am    C    D    F    Am    E    Am   C

D     F    Am   E    Am    E

Now here’s the thing that may puzzle some of you; if you play each chord just on its own without resolving to the others, you’ll find that only one truly has a sad overtone to it.

If this is the case then why is the song still a sad sounding one? It’s because although the chords may mostly be happy the key of the song is A minor, so the chords are part of a scale that is sad sounding. This same scale can be used to solo along with the song as well.

Here is the A minor scale in two octaves on your guitar when you’re in standard E tuning.

E||------------------|------------------||-----------------|-----------3---5-|
B||------------------|------------------||---------------3-|--5----6---------|
G||------------------|-----------0---2--||--2---4---5------|-----------------|
D||---------------0--|-2----3-----------||-----------------|-----------------|
A||-0---2----3-------|------------------||-----------------|-----------------|
E||------------------|------------------||-----------------|-----------------|

Notice that a lot of these notes appear in the chords of the song as well. Obviously the scale extends out much further than just the notes that I have shown as it is a repeating pattern, so every time it reaches an A note it starts again. So why does it sound sad? It’s kind of musical psychology; for example if I say “I got a brand new Ferrari last week and took my daughter to her prom in it, she was smiling all the way there” it’s a happy sentence. But if I say “I got a brand new Ferrari last week and took my daughter to her prom in it, she was smiling all the way there. Then we hit a truck I didn’t see, and I’ll never see her smile again” It’s suddenly a very sad statement because this man has lost something very dear to him. Music is the same. If the song continually resolves to a sad chord then you can put all the happy chords you like in and it will still sound sad overall.

So which notes in the scale are making it sound sad? In this scale it’s the third and sixth notes in the scale that give it most of its sound.

E||------------------|------------------||-----------------|-----------3---5-|
B||------------------|------------------||---------------3-|--5----6---------|
G||------------------|-----------0---2--||--2---4---5------|-----------------|
D||---------------0--|-2----3-----------||-----------------|-----------------|
A||-0---2----3-------|------------------||-----------------|-----------------|
E||------------------|------------------||-----------------|-----------------|

And that’s pretty much all there is to this song, it’s very simple but very effective piece of song writing. As a rule of thumb, almost every note in a scale can be used as a root for a chord to be played in that scale. For example, this scale contains an A note, a D note and a C note, so A chords, C chords and D chords of certain types will fit this song. It really is that straightforward most of the time. It’s just a case of trial and error if you aren’t aware of the I, IV V theory, but that’s easily learnt from books and the inter-web anyway. I’m certain there’s lessons on this website for that as well.

I hope that this has helped some of you out there. Take care and I’ll see you next time!