Lost In Japan

Summary: Lost In Japan

This Shawn Mendes track is a great one to transpose from piano to guitar, as it gives us some really cool interesting guitar chords to play around with. Simone takes you through all the chords and the cool percussive groove that you can play through the tune.

The Chords: The main loop

For the whole track we can use just 4 chords, all of which are 7th chords. These give the tune a really nice, relaxed feel. The 4 chords are as shown here.

The Rhythm: Fingerstyle

To get the very specific part correct in this song, you need to use your fingers with the picking hand. Simply follow along with Simone's instructions and remember to get that percussive sound in there are well, to really make the song sing! We also have a really cool set of passing chords that we can use in the rhythm. These are minor 7th chords and they are played like this (after the Emaj7 chord in the verse).

The Rhythm: Strumming

In the chorus we pick up the plectrum and start strumming! The full strumming pattern, including the ghost notes (as Simone walks through in the video) is as follows:

Keep Learning: Fingerstyle!

If you love the sound of this track but struggle with the arpeggio sections, you may want to take a look at our Travis picking course, where we introduce you to fingerstyle playing. It's a full course, and totally free (As is everything on the site). You can find it here: Travis Picking Guitar Lesson Course.