PlaysoloistStringsGuitarSongsGod Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen

guitar song · Strings

God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen Guitar Tab

Composer
Traditional
Year
Key
Am
Time
4/4
Tempo
116 BPM
Difficulty
Easy · ★★
First note
A3

God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen on guitar

The full melody, rendered as six-string guitar tab in standard tuning you can read on screen or print for the stand — free, and never truncated.

Tuning: E A D G B e (standard) · Strum: D - DU

eBGDAEAm2Am2003Am1020Am2013E702eBGDAEAm2003Am1020Am2013E700Dm1301eBGDAEEm7E73503Am1201G313CF010E70310eBGDAEAm2102G313C0135E70310Am2

Trad. English carol, 18th c. — public domain.

How to practise this on guitar

God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen is in Am and the tab opens on A3 — find that fret, settle your hand there, and notice how little it has to move: the arrangement is worked out with a fret-hand position economy, so consecutive notes stay under your fingers instead of leaping up and down the neck. Read the numbers, not the note names: string line plus fret is the whole instruction, and an open string costs you nothing.

Play it well under around 116 BPM with a metronome and let each note ring into the next — the tails under the numbers show you how long. When your take review marks a bar, loop just that bar until the fret-hand shift inside it feels automatic, then rejoin the line. Speed is the last thing you add, never the first. By the numbers, this setting runs 67 notes across 20 bars, from G3 up to A4 in 4/4 time.

Also playable on

The same melody is graded across 6 Playsoloist instruments. See every version, with difficulty and provenance, on the God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen cross-instrument hub.

Keep exploring

Free on the App Store

Play God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen — and hear every note graded.

Soloist Guitar reads this six-string guitar tab in standard tuning under the notation and grades your take on-device, note by note — free on iPhone, no ads, no account.

Get Guitar on the App Store