Chords for How to Play "Sunny" The Most Played Song of All Time!

I don't know about you guys, but if I have to pick a song that puts together
a beautiful chord progression, meaningful lyrics, an interesting arrangement, excellent singing,
and undisputed popularity, Sonny by Bobby Hebb would be my number one choice.
_ [G] _ [C] It was written in 1963 and from 1965 to now we can find [Em] hundreds of musicians and singers
playing and covering the song in many different styles.
The song features an interesting R&B
chord progression in the key of E minor.
If we have to play the most basic chords, we will have
E minor, [G] G major, [C] C major, F sharp minor, [B] and B7.
Chord progression that will change key
five times [E] throughout the song.
_ _ [G#] _ [Am] The [B] structure is very [F#] simple.
We only have 16 measures that are repeated over and over again
in different keys.
So how do we even get started with this song?
First things first,
we can play the bass line, the popular bass line that opens the song, like [E] this.
_ [G] _
_ [C] _ _ _ [B] _ [E] _ So we are only
playing the bass note of each chord.
This is from bar one to bar four.
We have the E minor,
we're going to play the low E string open.
_ _ [G] For the G we play the fret three. _
[B] For the C we play the
fret three on [C] the A string.
_ And for the F sharp minor and [C#] B7, we're only going to have to play
the chord twice.
So F sharp on fret two on [F#] the sixth string.
[F] And for the B, we have the [B] A string
fret two.
_ So it's a nice intro, [Gm] but Bobby Hab is already [E] singing on this bass line.
_ [G] _ _ [C] _ _ _
[B] _ [G] For the second verse, we can already [C] add chords to this bass line, [Em] like this.
_ [G] _ _ _ [C] _ _ [B] _
Bear in mind that
we are keeping things very simple.
I'm just playing open chords.
I'll show you how to add
more color to these chords in a moment.
So when we add the chords, we're gonna strum it lightly
after the first bass note and after the [Em] third bass note.
So we have bass, strum, bass, bass,
strum, bass.
Same thing for the other chords.
[G] _ _ _ [C] _ _ Be careful with the F sharp minor and [F#] B7.
We have
bass, strum, [B] bass, bass, strum, bass.
So far we already [F] covered the first eight bars.
We started
with the bass line and then we added the chords.
The second section, from bar 9 to 16, is played
with more [G#] or less the same chords.
We are just kind of changing the structure slightly.
[Em] We have
the E minor chord for one bar, G major [C] for one bar, C major for one bar, and be careful [F] here,
an F major for one [F#m] bar, F sharp minor for one [B] bar, B7 for one bar.
I will finish [Em] with the E minor
chord for two bars.
And of course we can combine the bass line with the chords _ [G] and G and [C] C [F] and F.
[F#m] F sharp minor, [B] _ B7.
[Em] _ _ _
_ _ I know that you noticed this [E] lovely color on the E minor [Em] chord.
_ _ _ _ This is called
line cliché, which is a chromatic line played [C] within the chord.
In this case we are playing _ _
the [C#] line cliché on the A string, fret number two, fret number [C] three, [C#] fret number four,
and fret number [C] three again.
Of course [B] we have to add the E minor chord.
So [Em] we have two, two,
zero, and zero.
I'm using the Pima.
So I have thumb, index, middle, ring, [C] thumb, index, middle,
ring, [C#] and thumb, index, middle, [C] ring, and thumb, index, [Em] middle, and ring.
This is the whole structure played with the bass line and [E] basic chords.
_ _ _ [C] _ _
_ _ [Em] _ _ [G] _ _ [C] _ _
_ _ [Em] _ _ [G] _ _ [C] _ _
[F] _ _ [F#m] _ [B] _ _ [Em] The chords are still missing some color.
So how do we do that?
Well we're going to have to change
the chord family.
We need minor seven, dominant seven, and major seven chords.
So this is how we're
going to do it.
For the E minor we're going to play an E minor seven chord.
For the G we're going
[G] to play a G7 chord.
And for the C, a C major [C] seven chord.
[F#m] F sharp minor seven [B] and B7.
We're going to
do the same thing for the other chords.
Now the awesome thing is that we can [E] add the bass line as
well as the strumming with these new chords like [Em] this.
_ [G] _ _
_ [C] _ _ _ _ [Em] Again, _
[G] _ _ [C] _ _ [Em] _ _ [B] _
the second section will have slightly
[Em] different chords.
We still have the E [G] minor seven and the G7, [C] C major seven, but for the F we're
going to play an [F] F7 chord.
We can also add the first string fret number three if you want.
[Cm] Beautiful sounding [Gm] chord.
[F#m] Then F sharp minor seven [B] and B7.
[Em] So we have_
_ [G] _ _ [C] _ _ [G] _ _
[F#m] _ _ [B] _ _ _ [C] _ _ _
[Em] _ _ [C#] _ _ [C] _ [Em] _ Now I know that we are playing
[C#] a lot of bar chords, but trust me you are going to need them.
Since we are playing the same 16 [D#] bars
in five different keys, the same chord progression played in five different keys, [Em] we're going to start
with the E minor and then we're going to [Fm] have the F minor, F sharp minor, [Gm] G minor, G sharp minor,
[Am] and we'll finish with the A minor chord.
So you can play the same [E] chord shapes without
having to learn new chord shapes.
So we start with the E minor.
[Em] Now on bar 16 we're going to
play the dominant chord of the new key.
In this case it's the C7 [C] and [Fm] we change key and we play the F minor. _
[G#] _ _ [C#] _ _ [G] _ _ _ _
[G#] _ _ _ _ _ [Gm] _ _ _
[G#] _ _ [C#] _ _ [F#] _ _ [Gm] _ _
_ _ [F] _ [C#] C sharp seven and F sharp minor.
[A] _ _ [D] Of [G] course you don't have to learn all the [F#m] five different keys
if you [A] don't have to sing the song.
I [F#m] think it's a great exercise to play the same chord progression
[C#] in different keys, [F#] but at the same time you also want to keep things simple and if you want you
can just practice the chord progression in the key of E minor.
It's pretty interesting to have
the bass line and then add some chords and some strumming to even playing the simple chord
progression.
So it's up to you.
Enjoy this