Last updated on August 15th, 2023

Fur Elise is a popular classical song written by Ludwig Van Beethoven. This song is less commonly known as Bagatelle No. 25.

In this post, we’ll cover how to play the guitar chords for Fur Elise, sheet music with guitar tabs, and a fingerstyle arrangement for this song.

How to read the guitar chord charts

To clarify how to read the chord charts, the top horizontal line represents the high E string and the bottom horizontal line represents the low E string. The vertical lines separate each fret. The numbers in the blue dots tell you which fingers to use on the fretting hand.

For example, on the E minor chord, you use the:

1st finger on the 5th string, 2nd fret

2nd finger on the 4th string, 2nd fret
Circles represent open strings
On some other chords, X means to avoid the string

You can check this link for more on how to read guitar notation symbols.

Fur Elise guitar chords

The chords for Fur Elise are E Major, A minor, C Major and G Major. Try the following chords one at a time until you feel comfortable switching between them. These chords will be written above the melody in the next section.

If needed, here are some resources on chords:

Fur Elise guitar tabs and chords

Here is an easy guitar tab of Fur Elise which has been modified and shortened for beginner level guitarists.

For the sheet music below, keep in mind that the chords and melody are meant to be played as separate parts. We’ll look at how to connect these parts later in the arrangement section of this post.

If needed, you can refer to this simple guide to understanding music symbols.

By the way, you can get all the PDF’s of this post below.

Fur Elise – PDF downloads

Fur Elise - Beethoven - melody with guitar tabs

Fur Elise fingerstyle arrangement

In this section, we essentially put different parts together using a finger picking style method of playing.

The numbers next to some notes on the top staff indicate which fingers to use on the fretting hand. You can check out this post to learn how to finger pick on guitar.

Fur Elise – PDF downloads