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

In this lesson, we’ll cover how to play the guitar chords for Fur Elise, sheet music for the melody and a finger-style arrangement with tabs.

Grab your guitar and let’s get started!

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 Major chord, you use the:

• 1st finger on the 3rd string, 1st fret
• 2nd finger on the 5th string, 2nd fret
• 3rd finger on the 4th string, 2nd fret
• Circles represent open strings
• On 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 basic 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:

• Master the basic chords on guitar
• 6 tips to get better at switching between chords on guitar
  

Fur Elise guitar tabs and chords

Here is an easy guitar tab of Fur Elise which has been modified and shortened for beginner to intermediate 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 lesson.

If you’re not familiar with the time signature for this piece which is in 3/8, it means that three eighth notes make up the length of each measure. You can count each measure in 3 beats.

Note: The piece includes a “harm.” symbol, indicating a harmonic—a technique that produces a chime-like tone by lightly touching the string at a specific point (12th fret in this case) and plucking it without pressing the fret down.

The numbers next to some notes on the top staff indicate which fingers to use on the fretting hand. If needed, you can refer to this simple guide to understanding music symbols.

Next, try the finger-style arrangement of this piece below.

Fur Elise fingerstyle arrangement

In this section, we are essentially putting the melody and chords together using a finger picking style.

You can check out this lesson to learn how to finger pick on guitar.

If you like this style of playing, you can check out this lesson to learn how to connect a melody and chords on guitar.

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Want to learn more songs? Check out the sheet music with guitar tabs resource on this site.

JG

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