Stuff That Works

by Guy Clark • Lesson #516 • Sep 14, 2023

Hello, friends! In today’s lesson I’m excited to teach you Stuff That Works, the Guy Clark classic from 1995. I’ll show how to strum your way through the verse & chorus sections, in addition to teaching the amazing intro riff (which I’ll play a few different ways). For strumming in particular, I’ll demonstrate a couple options for how you approach things. This will allow you to use the pattern that works for you, in both the intro and the sung parts. This is a fun one… let’s get into it!

0:00 Overview
1:28 Chords
2:02 Verse
5:18 Chorus
7:38 Alt. Bass Note Strum
8:43 Intro Riff: Basics
13:53 Intro Riff: Strum #1
15:58 Intro Riff: Strum #2

Licensed Song Sheet 3 pages

Follow along with my print-friendly guide for this song! It’s available for purchase at Musicnotes.com, the web’s leading provider of licensed sheet music.

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Lesson Discussion

Play-Along Cover

Here’s a beginning-to-end playthrough of the entire song, where I demonstrate how to combine everything I teach in my main lesson. Feel free to play-along with me, if you wish!

Here’s a few lessons I mention in my main tutorial, which will help when learning this song.

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Stuff That Works

Licensed Song Sheet 3 pages

Lesson Discussion

Play-Along Cover

Related Lessons to Help with This Song

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Fingerstyle & Travis Picking

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Using a Capo

Walk Ups & Walk Downs

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Fun & Helpful Tools I've Made

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Recent Lessons