Greensleeves is a 16th century English folk song of unknown origin. The Christmas carol What Child Is This uses the same melody as Greensleeves. This lesson covers the chords for this song, sheet music for the melody including tabs, and a finger style guitar arrangement.

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 A minor chord, you use the:

• 1st finger on the 2nd string, 1st fret
• 2nd finger on the 4th string, 2nd fret
• 3rd finger on the 3rd string, 2nd fret
• Circles represent open strings
• X means to avoid the string

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

Greensleeves chords

The basic chords for Greensleeves are A minor, G/B, C Major, G Major, E minor, F Major, and E Major. You can click on the chords with links to learn different ways of playing that chord.

Try the following chords one at a time until you feel comfortable switching between them. You’ll see these chords written above the melody in the next section.

Here are some other resources on chords:

• What are the first chords you should learn on guitar?
• 6 tips to get better at switching between chords on guitar.
• How to play chord inversions on guitar 
  

Greensleeves guitar tabs and chords

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.

You can refer to this simple guide to understanding music symbols if needed.

Greensleeves guitar arrangement

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

The numbers near some notes on the top staff indicate which fingers to use on the fretting hand. If needed, 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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