Let’s learn Here Comes The Sun on ukulele if you’re up for a challenge.
Today’s song is going to be ‘Here Comes the Sun’. This is a little bit more advanced than some of the other Beatles songs we’ve covered on the site. If you choose to stick with it though, you’ll find that it is a great song to play and will teach you a lot about the ukulele. Let’s get into it!
Here’s a free PDF download: Click here to grab a printable PDF containing the strumming patterns, chord diagrams, and lyrics to follow along with this lesson.
Tuning Your Ukulele
Firstly, if you’d like to be able to play with the original song, you should tune your ukulele up each string one half step or one semitone. So, instead of G, C, E, A, you’re going to have G#, C#, E# or F, (which may appear as F on your tuner), and A#.
This puts you in the right tuning to match George Harrison’s guitar, but if that feels like too much, don’t worry! You can still play everything in standard tuning, it’ll just sound a little lower.
Strumming Patterns for Here Comes the Sun
For the strumming pattern of this song, I want to try to emulate what the Beatles do in the original. You do, however, have two options.
1. Basic Down Strums
You could just go for basic down strums on each beat of the bar. I’m using a pick in this lesson so I can be a bit more precise and really dig into the melody. Plus, it sounds closer to the original.
2. Down-Up-Down-Up-Down-Up-Down-Up
Or you can do eighth notes, which is down up, down up, down up, down up. That’s about twice as fast as the previous pattern.
Personally, I prefer this pattern for this song—it handles the syncopation better and helps everything flow more naturally.
Two Ways to Play “Here Comes the Sun” on Ukulele
First Option
You can stick to playing the chords throughout the song, the first chord being G major.
Second Option
Your second option is to play the solo at the very beginning. If you don’t fancy yourself as a solo player or you’re a little intimidated by that, you can choose option 1.
Now, the solo section will sound a little bit like this, which is a bit simplified from the original.
In the original, you would strum and pick that part. This is a lot easier to play. Feel free to use a ukulele pick when you play this song to be a little bit more precise than using your finger.
“Here Comes the Sun” Solo – Simplified for Ukulele
Let’s go over the solo part now. You’re going to fret a G chord starting on the second fret. From there, you will be lifting and placing your fingers down whilst maintaining the chord shape to play the melody.
Check out the video at 2:13 for an example of how this sounds.
Once you’ve got the melody down, you’ll play through that two times in total for the intro.
Ukulele Chords Used in the Song
Let’s break down the chords used throughout the piece. This will give you a strong foundation whether you’re strumming or mixing it with the melody.
G Ukulele Chord
0–2–3–2 (I usually use three fingers here for accuracy, though you can also use a barre if that’s more comfortable.)
Gsus2 Ukulele Chord
Just lift your middle finger off the A string while holding G. This note shows up in the melody—“comes…”
C Ukulele Chord
0–0–0–3
A7 Ukulele Chord
0–1–0–0
The progression goes:
[G] Here…
[Gsus2] comes…
[G] the sun
[C] Here comes the sun
[A7] and I say
[G] It’s
[Gsus2] all
[G] right
That takes us up to this next fun part. Make sure to review that a few more times because it’s a little bit involved.
This part’s got a cool, dreamy feel. Here’s how to approach it:
- Emadd4: 0–4–3–0
- Slide down to Dsus4: 2–2–3–0
- Then C6: 0–0–0–0
- Return to Dsus4
- Lift the middle finger for D7sus4: 0–2–1–3
- Resolve to D7: 2–0–2–0
Play through this slowly. Once you get the hang of the finger shapes, it really starts to flow. This section comes back a few times, so it’s worth practicing until it feels smooth.
Bridge Chord Breakdown
Here we are at the bridge.
Our first chord is B flat and I don’t know if I’ve ever gone over this chord before with you, but it can take a little while to get down.
You’re going to do a half bar, which means you’re going to take a pointer finger and you’re going to flatten it down on the first two strings.
Then, you take a middle finger and you arch it on fret two of the string three and then, you’re going to take your ring finger on string four at fret three.
TIP: Now, if you need a shortcut on that, you can actually remove your ring finger. It will work. It sounds a little bit jazzier than a normal, boring B flat. But if you feel like you need to do that or you know you physically can’t make it to fret three there, that is okay. So, I usually teach that as a shortcut.
The bridge chord sequence looks like this:
[Bb]
[F]
[C] → quick [C] again
[G]
[D7]
[Bb]
[F]
[C]
[G]
(repeat five times)
Then we go into:
[D7]
[D7sus4]
[D7]
[D7sus4]
[D]
[D]
[G]
And just like that, we’re back to the third verse!
Playthrough
The next thing we’re going to do is we’re going to do a playthrough of the whole song. So, here we go. Do your best, and don’t worry if you need to slow down the playback speed at first. Keep practicing and you’ll get it
Parting Words
Well, I hope you had fun learning “Here Comes the Sun” on ukulele with me today. It is a challenging song.
Let us know what you want us to cover for our next tutorial. Until next time. Happy strumming!
John Allnutt
Writer & Ukulele TeacherJohn has been teaching music since 2008 and resides in Richmond, Kentucky with his wife Laura and dog Sam. In his spare time he enjoys growing and cooking food, roasting coffee, playing board games, and spreading joy through playing and teaching music.
