Wonderwall Chords: The Ultimate Guide

Wonderwall Chords: The Chorus & Ending Progression

After the buildup, the chorus of Wonderwall does everything a chorus should do:

It’s anthemic, it’s as loud as the song gets, and it’s fun to sing,

You already know all the Wonderwall chords you need for the chorus. The progression is simple:

C  Em G  Em

C  Em G  Em

C  Em G  Em

C  Em G  Em

This is the last progression you’ll need for the song.

At the end, there’s a vamp, which is when you repeat chords over and over while other things happen.

In the case of this song, the chorus repeats, and there’s a little keyboard part that is easily adapted for inclusion into your arrangement.

This simple and pretty riff doesn’t happen in the song until the conclusion of the lyrics. It’s a nice way to let the song coast to an end, and you can sing it or play it on the guitar.

You can play this on the B and E strings of the guitar. If you are not yet familiar with reading tablature, you can try to pick it out by ear.

Alternatively, you can check out this lesson we’ve got for you on Reading Guitar Music.

It’s simple enough to figure out: the horizontal lines are the strings, and the numbers are frets. Where you see a zero, that’s an open string.

Lots of guitar players improve their musicianship by practicing singing the notes that they play. This easy little riff is a good start. Give it a try!

Wonderwall Chords: The Rhythm

The single most satisfying and fun thing about guitar is being able to comfortably strum through a chord progression with a groovy syncopated rhythm.

• Due to these Wonderwall chords being fairly simply, this song is a great way to work out some strumming patterns that you can use across many different songs.
• The complexity of a chord progression and the complexity of a song’s rhythm are often in an inverse or opposite relationship: the simpler the chords, the more intricately you can get away with strumming.
• With jazzy songs, for example, that have a lot of chord changes, it’s best to keep things simple so that the busy harmonic movements can shine.
• In “Wonderwall” we do not have that issue. There’s a great two-measure strumming pattern used in the recording that you can duplicate here.

To emulate the groove of Oasis’s recording, you’ll be strumming in a quick four. Make sure that you maintain the constant down-up motion so that you can strum the proper accents without losing the beat.

• If your arm motion stops when the sound stops, you run the risk of dropping or adding beats, and it becomes more difficult to maintain the rhythm over time.
• Tapping your foot and counting also helps!

The bold words are where you hit the strings. This pattern is over two measures.

Down-up, down-up, down-up, down-up, down-up, down-up, down-up, down-up

If this is confusing, try saying the bolded words while keeping a steady strum. Once you are comfortable with that, begin accenting the strums by hitting the strings a little harder while you say the bolded words.

With practice, you’ll get this funky pattern down, and it may become a favorite!

If you’re still developing some basic rhythm skills, practicing these Wonderwall chords is a great way to practice!

• One way drive the rhythm more simply is by playing straight eighth notes with a constant down-up strum.
• Strumming straight eighth notes does wonders for your ability to keep the beat and increase your strumming speed.

You can also modify that and shape the rhythm a little more this way:

Down, down-up, down, down-up

Again, hit the strings a little harder on the bolded beats to accent them.

Wonderwall Chords: Learning The Structure

Now that you’ve got the Wonderwall chords and rhythm together, you’re ready to blast through the entire song!

Knowing each piece of the song separately helps you to remember the entire structure of the song, because as with most popular music, the pieces of the song all repeat.

All you really need to remember, then, is the order of the song parts, and you’re ready for the open mic!

Here is a summary of the structure of Wonderwall:

Intro: Em  G D A7sus4 (x4)

Verse 1: Em  G D A7sus4 (x3); C  D A7sus4  A7sus4

Verse 2: Em  G D  A7sus4 (x4)

Pre-chorus: C  D Em  Em (x2); C  D |G D|Em D| A7sus4  A7sus4 A7sus4 A7sus4

Chorus:  C Em  G Em (x4)

Verse 3: same as Verse 2

Pre-chorus

Chorus, repeat, vamp out with riff

You’ll have a great time working up your arrangement of Wonderwall with any of the above rhythms, and you can always invent your own or change it up.

The Ryan Adams arrangement is an interesting version to take inspiration from

If you’d like a complete Wonderwall chords and lyric chart, we’ve got one for you here.

To match the key of the recording, you’ll need a capo on the second fret. If that’s not a great key for you or your singer, you can always move or eliminate the capo.

Capos are simpler to use than you think! Maybe there’s one gathering dust in your guitar case, and if you’ve been hesitant to try it out, we can demystify the whole thing for you with this lesson below:

How to Use a Capo in 3 Easy Steps

Eliminating The Wonderwall Of Confusion!

We hope that our exploration of the Wonderwall chords, structure, rhythm, and background has helped you to master this huge hit.

The best way to learn and deeply understand a song is to teach it to others, so take it along with you to your next jam session or singalong and share it with your friends!

Recommended Resources

If you’ve enjoyed this lesson, we have other places for you to go next! Continue on your path with these lessons:

• Guitar Basics
• Best Beginner Guitar
• Easy Songs On Guitar
• Guitar School
• Music Theory For Beginners