Mr. Tambourine Man | Chords + Lyrics (capo 3, drop D)
Intro
| D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) | D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
Chorus 1
| G/B A | D G/B |
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
| D G/B | A (Asus4) |
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to.
| G/B A | D G/B |
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
| D G/B |2/4 A | 6/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
In the jingle jangle morning, I’ll come following you.
Verse 1
|4/4 G/B A | D G/B |
Though I know that evening’s empire has returned into sand.
| D G/B |
Vanished from my hand.
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
Left me blindly here to stand, but still not sleeping.
| G/B A | D G/B |
My weariness amazes me, I’m branded on my feet.
| D G/B |
I have no one to meet.
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
And the ancient empty street’s too dead for dreaming.
Chorus 2
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to.
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
| D G/B |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) | D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
In the jingle jangle morning, I’ll come following you.
Verse 2
| G/B A | D G/B |
Take me on a trip upon your magic swirling ship
| D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
My senses have been stripped. My hands can’t feel to grip. My toes too numb to step.
| D Em | A (Asus4) |
Wait only for my boot heels to be wandering.
| G/B A | D G/B |
I’m ready to go anywhere, I’m ready for to fade.
| D G/B |
Into my own parade.
|5/4 D G/B Em |4/4 A (Asus4) |
Cast your dancing spell my way, I promise to go under it.
Chorus 3 (as chorus 2)
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to.
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
In the jingle jangle morning, I’ll come following you.
Verse 3
| G/B A | D G/B |
Though you might hear laughing, spinning, swinging madly across the sun.
| D G/B | D G/B |
It’s not aimed at anyone. It’s just escaping on the run.
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
And but for the sky, there are no fences facing.
| G/B A | D G/B |
And if you hear vague traces of skipping reels of rhyme.
| D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
To your tambourine in time. It’s just a ragged clown behind. I wouldn’t pay it any mind.
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
It’s just a shadow you’re seeing that he’s chasing.
Chorus 4
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to.
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
| D G/B |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
In the jingle jangle morning, I’ll come following you.
Solo
| G/B A | D G/B |
| D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
| D Em | A (Asus4) |
| G/B A | D G/B |
| D G/B | D G/B |
| D Em |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) | D (Dsus4) |
Verse 4
| G/B A | D G/B |
And take me disappearing through the smoke rings of my mind.
| D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
Down the foggy ruins of time. Far past the frozen leaves. The haunted frightened trees. Out to the windy beach.
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow.
| G/B A | D G/B |
Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free.
| D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
Silhouetted by the sea. Circled by the circus sands. With all memory and fate. Driven deep beneath the waves.
| D Em | A (Asus4) |
Let me forget about today until tomorrow
Chorus 5
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to.
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me.
| D G/B |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) |
In the jingle jangle morning, I’ll come following you.
Outro
| G/B A | D G/B |
| D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
| D G/B | to fade
Mr. Tambourine Man Chords: Learn the progressions
Bob Dylan’s Mr. Tambourine Man is full of strange variations in bar lengths and even different time signatures, all serving the same purpose; to follow the lyrics.
The main concept of the chords is to move from G/B (IV/3) to A (V), then between D (I) and G/B (IV/3). This second movement is repeated in many different ways.
If we are playing a chorus, we always do it twice before we go to an A (chord V) again, like this:
| G/B (IV/3) A (V) | D (I) G/B (IV/3) |
| D G/B | A (Asus4) |
When repeated, the end is played in different ways, this is almost impossible to memorise, here’s the second half of chorus 1.
| G/B A | D G/B |
| D G/B |2/4 A | 6/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
This looks weird, why would you write a 2/4 bar, then a 6/4?
The answer is that the A chord is always a 2/4, but what comes after changes, like this:
- Chorus 1 |2/4 A |6/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
- Chorus 2 |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) | D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
- Chorus 3 |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) | D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
- Chorus 4 |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) (Dsus2) |
- Chorus 5 |2/4 A |4/4 D (Dsus4) |
I’ve designed TAB detailing how to strum all this, here’s a link to that part of the lesson: Mr. Tamourine Man – Guitar Lesson with TAB.
The verse is also changing, but now it’s the amount of times we repeat the D – G/B. This is somewhat easier to follow although you need to learn the lyrics!
This is verse 1‘s chord progression:
||: G/B A | D G/B | D G/B |
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) :||
That Em is chord II, the rest is the same as the chorus. The D – G/B is repeated once.
In verse 2, things get weird, here’s the chord progression:
| G/B A | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
| D Em | A (Asus4) |
| G/B A | D G/B | D G/B |
|5/4 D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
The only way I could get that right would be to listen to the lyrics! The D – G/B is first repeated 4 times, then only two. The last 5/4 bar is nuts! Again, you need TAB to nail this (follow link above).
For verse 3, we again change the amount of D – G/B. First, it’s three times, then 2. There is now no 5/4 bar. Again, follow the lyrics!
Here’s Mr Tambourine Man’s verse 3‘s chords.
| G/B A | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
| G/B A | D G/B |
| D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
Finally, in verse 4 we play this:
| G/B A | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
| D G/B Em | A (Asus4) |
| G/B A | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B | D G/B |
| D Em | A (Asus4) |
Both times we repeat D – G/B five times, madness!
What Bob does here is fit the music to the lyrics. Back in the day, blues and folk musicians did this all the time, they’d drop a beat or repeat chords if that’s what the lyrics required.
Can you imagine trying to do that today on some guy’s laptop where he is staring at the screen, it would blow his tiny mind!
Another thing they did in the ’60s was tune to a nearby piano, meaning we are rarely at a perfect 440Hz, in the case of Mr. Tambourine Man, Bob is tuned to 434Hz, just two cents away from the magical frequency of the universe, 432.
Use my online tuner to get to 434 Hz and it’ll feel great playing along with Bob using the recording in the playlist at the top of this page.
Here’s a chord chart I made for you, it took me two days to work out how to get this to a place I felt happy about!
Mr. Tambourine Man Chord Chart | PDF + iReal Pro
It was such a challenge to get this to an acceptable place. There was no way I could fit Mr. Tambourine Man’s chords onto one page.
Should you want to download this chart, here’s a PDF for page 1: Mr. Tambourine Man Chord Chart PDF page 1. And here’s a PDF for page 2: Mr. Tambourine Man Chord Chart PDF page 2.
This chord chart was created using iReal Pro, here’s a link to that file: Mr. Tambourine Man iReal Pro page 1, and here’s Mr. Tambourine Man iReal Pro page 2.
Using this and the iRealPro app, you can change the key although I don’t think that’s a good idea as the sound of Mr. Tambourine Man really is in the chord shapes.
Mr. Tambourine Man covers
Bob Dylan‘s original Mr. Tambourine Man was released in 1965 on the album Bringing It All Back Home.
It wasn’t a single but has gained popularity over the years and become a standard in his live repertoire, especially in the early days.
There have been many covers recorded of Mr. Tambourine Man. Most famously, The Byrds recorded their version of Bob’s Masterpiece using a Rickenbacker 12 string without a capo, so in the key of D.
They released it only a month after Dylan which must have been down to the fact that they were on the same label (Colombia).
The Byrds even named their album after the song and released it as a single, hitting the #1 spot in Ireland, South Africa, the U.K., and the U.S.
Some even claim Dylan’s switch to electric was inspired by The Byrds’ version of his song when he later that year recorded Like A Rolling Stone and to his folk audience’s dismay “went electric”.
You could go as far as seeing Mr. Tambourine Man as the pivot in music history where serious lyrics were fused with bands playing pop songs.
There are other versions of Mr. Tambourine Man, Stevie Wonder did his version in 1966, and my favourite, Helios Sequence as late as 2010.
I’ve included all these versions in the playlist at the top of this page.
Mr. Tambourine Man Chords | Related Pages
Mr. Tambourine Man | Guitar Lesson + TAB
With this guitar lesson, you can learn to play Mr. Tambourine Man by Bob Dylan using TAB and chord analysis.
| G/B A | D G/B |
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me…
Five similar tunes | Chords + Lyrics
Bob Dylan tunes
Widely regarded as the most influential artist in popular culture, Bob Dylan has been covered and copied by almost everyone who ever attempted to write a song. His famous tunes are so many it’s impossible to pick just a few.
Some say Dylan invented modern songwriting.
Bob Dylan on the web
About me | Dan Lundholm
This was a guitar lesson about Mr. Tambourine Man chords, by Dan Lundholm. Discover more about him and how you can learn guitar with Spytunes.
Most importantly, find out why you should learn guitar through playing tunes, not practising scales, and studying theory in isolation.
