What was the first song you learned to play?

[jfrog]

Along with 10,675,413 other guitarists, it was "Smoke on the Water" and then "Iron Man".

Last year my son then a 5th grader, took his acoustic guitar to school because for a few of weeks (once a week)they were learning guitar ... The only song I think he learned was "smoke on the water". Ah, yes, classical music! More recently he's taught it to his 8 year old sister, who also now plays the riff on one of those cheap whistle flute things....It sounds like the Japanese garden version. I don't think either of them have ever actually heard the original version of the song.

My first song was Neil Young's "Heart of Gold". I borrowed my sister's acoustic, looked at her songbook - the kind with the chord diagrams and thought..."How hard can this be?...they show you how to do the fingering and everything!"

 

[Mr. C]

Well it could have been "Smoke on the Water", but I know definetly "Rock and Roll All Night" including parts of the solo. Kiss kicked butt in their early years, straight ahead rock and roll.

 

[glimmer_doll]

the *MASH* theme song!!...well it wasnt much of a song...

I like that song, the lyrics are...i dunno...i recommend another listen though. the song is called Suicide is Painless (i forget the artist)

anyway, the first song i really learned how to play was Something In The Way by Nirvana...because it's like, only 2 chords...and it was also the first song i could sing and play at the same time.

 

[cellardweller]

Grinder - judas priest
War Machine- kiss
God of Thunder- kiss
Yngwie Malmsteen- I am a Viking

 

[cellardweller]

"one of these things, is not like the other, one of these things says Cd's full of shit"....

 

[Mikey likes it!]

Smoke On The Water, naturally. Try playing it backwards sometime.

 

[Rokket]

I went totally the other way. The first song I learned how to play was "Wild Wood Flower" by June Carter Cash. Nice blue grass stuff.

Later on, the first song I could play all the way through was "Rock You Like A Hurricane" by Scorpions...

 

[honedawg]

China Grove

My first tune on guitar was The Doobies China Grove.
I'm still trying to learn a song I can sing and play at the same time.

 

[David Artis]

The first I learned was Gloria by the Shadows of Night.

This was before I heard the THEM version years later.

 

[dvon1981]

gylcerine by bush...what's with some of you playing fingerpicking and seriosu blues stuff as a FIRST song....come on lets be real...or back in black for that matter? yeah it's pretty easy..but not so easy you can pick up a guitar for the first time and play it.

 

[apl]

...what's with some of you playing fingerpicking and seriosu blues stuff as a FIRST song...

I guess someone needs to define "first song". I used the first song I knew all the way through. Of course I played the Smoke on the Water riff long before that, and a three chord version of Jingle Bells.

 

[gvarko]

Smoke

On the water..

 

[Kevin Deschwazi]

Mine was the Ukranian folk song when I had a few classical lessons to start.

First thing I learned that I actually wanted to know was Black Dog by Led Zeppelin.

First song all the way through with singing I think would've been all along the watchtower.

I still reccommend Dylan songbooks to people who are just starting to play. (Along with the Complete Beatles, naturally).

 

[relaxandreflect]

Every rose has it's thorn by poison

 

[gr8teful]

First song - "Wish You Were Here". But first song I could actually sing and play "Hide Your Love Away".

 

[MadAudio]

I can't remember, but I'll bet anything it was a Beatles song.

 

[jhughs]

Grinder - judas priest
War Machine- kiss
God of Thunder- kiss
Yngwie Malmsteen- I am a Viking

Hey nobody took CellarDweller's challenge.

I'm going to say that "I am a Viking" was NOT one of the first songs you learned on guitar - unless you started that day with 20-30 bottles of Red Bull. What do I win?

 

[kq300325]

Teenage Kicks by the Undertones. What a riff!!

 

[Birdhouse]

Well I play bass and when first started in about 92 I used to put on Dada's Puzzle and play along.

You can get a little snippet of it here...
http://music.msn.com/album/?palbum=10154611&album=10054634

 

[SHEPPARDB.]

A passage to Bangok,from Rush 2112.