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Home ❯ Songs ❯ Jerry Jeff Walker ❯

Mr. Bojangles

by Jerry Jeff Walker • Lesson #307 • Jun 21, 2020

Licensed Song Sheet 2 pages

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About this lesson

Hey friends - here’s a guitar lesson teaching you how to play Mr. Bojangles, originally written and released by Jerry Jeff Walker in 1968. This tutorial will give you the chords, strumming patterns, and chord progressions that will also work for the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s 1970 cover, if you’re more familiar with that one. This song is in the key of C, and uses a very common descending bass-note walkdown in 3/4 time. Nothing too complicated – but even for the more difficult chords (F and D7/F#), I’ll show you some hints to simplify things. I hope you enjoy!

  • 0:00 Lesson overview
  • 2:10 Capo & chords shapes
  • 8:59 Strumming patterns
  • 14:41 Chord progressions
  • 18:46 Full playthrough (capo 2)
  • 23:49 Jerry Jeff Walker, Jimmy Buffett, and Key West

Lesson Discussion

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Get My Practice Guide

If you’d like the grab-and-go practice guide that shows the chord voicings, strumming patterns, and additional notes & guidance to help you capture the nuance of this song, you can download it here. It requires membership to Song Notes Premium. Note, this does not include the full lyrics for the whole song – if that’s what you want, get my licensed song sheet (linked above).

Slow Playtrhough

Here’s a video of me slowly playing each section of the song, in order (intro, verse, pre-chorus, chorus). I include tabs on screen so you can follow along. My first playthrough is without singing, and then I’ll repeat it all and include singing for context. The video begins with me counting in four full measures (to help you get into the groove). Enjoy!

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Hear Jerry Jeff Play It

Live in New Orleans:

Live on TV (1969):

Live in a Van (2014):

Album recording (1968):

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