Last Christmas
- Þorkell Daníel Jónsson
- Dec 23, 2017
- 2 min read
Song and lyrics: George Michael
I would never admit that the Wham duo was one of my favorites but I have to admit that the song Last Christmas has been a part of the Christmas season since my wife and I started living together. The song was published before Christmas in 1984 but it is hardly accurate to classify the song as a Christmas song because the lyrics are mostly not about Christmas. Last Christmas became hugely popular but still did not reach number one on the charts. The song Do They Know It's Christmas prevented that. The popularity of the song is such that no song that did not reach number one on the charts has sold better.
Our daughter started playing the song for this Christmas on the piano so I thought it would be ideal for me to find a simple arrangement and try to play the song with her. I found one in C major on the goliathguitartutorials.com and to play it with the piano I raise the key with a capo to D major by placing the capo on the second fret. The arrangement ends strangely, but that's because it's part of a Christmas song medley that I plan to learn before next Christmas.
Below, I play the arrangement as an accompaniment to a video that is supposed to be an overview of what the family has been up to in 2017. The song I play with a capo on second fret which makes it in the same key as the original version. The playing is far from smooth. I didn't get to rehearse the song to the fullest, but I really wanted to get it on the web before the year was out. The sound recording is like playing. Not good enough because the bass is aggressive. Again, I ask for forgiveness and refer to the learning process. Then I noticed that at the end of the video, I make a spelling mistake. I dare not apologize for that because that error will not be forgiven. The fact that it is not corrected is laziness.
I've sometimes wondered if arranging songs for fingerstyle guitar is tricky. I have for a long time planned to see if I have the knowledge to make an arrangement. I've never gotten around to it until now in December when I sat down and arranged the song Last Christmas. I actually had part of the song arranged since my daughter and I played it together in 2015. I decided to sit down and arrange the rest of the song. With stubbornness as my main weapon, I was able to complete the arrangement you can hear here. Since this is the first and only song I've ever arranged, it's expected that some errors have slipped in. It must be forgiven because errors are an important part of the learning process. If anyone wants to play this arrangement, they are welcome.
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