How To Play Take Me Home Country Roads On Harmonica (A Step-By-Step Lesson Guide)

LEVEL 1: The Tabs, LEVEL 2: Add Hand Wahs, LEVEL 3: Add Bends
0:00 Introduction
0:59 Harmonica Tabs to Take Me Home Country Roads
3:08 Playing it with the Jam Track
4:00 Hand Wash - The Closed Cup Grip
4:44 Left Hand Technique
5:05 Opening the Closed Cup Grip to Make Wah Sound
5:49 Where to Add Hand Wah to Take Me Home Country Roads
7:18 Playing Hand Wah with the Jam Track
7:58 Where to Add Bends
9:11 Playing Hand Wah and Bends with the Jam Track
9:46 Conclusion
10:21 Blooper Reel

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Thanks so much for watching this free harmonica lesson on how to play the song Take Hey Home Country Roads, by John Denver on harmonica for beginners. The song was originally recorded in the key of A, so you'd need an A harmonica to play along with it. But I'll teach it to you here on a C harmonica.

Okay, here are the harmonica tabs for Take Me Home Country Road:

Take me home, country road, to the place I belong
4 -4 5 5 4 -4 5 -4 4 5 6 -6
West Virginia, mountain mama, take me home, country road
-6 5 6 5 5 4 -4 5 5 -4 4 4 -4 4

The first note is 4, and the easiest way to find hole 4 is to start on 1 and count as you slide over.

You’ll notice as you play this melody that you never have to move more than one hole to the left or the right, which is one of the reasons that this song is so fun and easy to play. There is some coordination to work out with when to blow and when to draw, but once you get it worked out, this is a nice melody that can bring joy to you and those who hear you for years to come. Once you’ve nailed the melody with single notes, then it’s time to add some expression to your playing...

Level 2 - Adding Hand Wah
In this level, we are going to add some hand wah to shape the tone of the notes. In order to do this, you will have to understand what we call “The Closed Cup Grip.”

You’ll notice a pattern in the phrases of this song: 2 short notes followed by one long note:

“Take Me Home” 4 -4 5 = Short Short Long
“Country Road” 5 4 -4 = Short Short Long

So what we’re gonna do with the hand is one wah per short note, and then a flutter on the long sustained note.

And then we get to “West Virginia” and “Mountain Mama” it’s 3 short notes followed by one long note.

Level 3 - Adding Bends
Bending adds soul to melodies because it emulates the way the human voice can wail and cry. On holes 1-6 we can only bend the draw notes, and the best place in the melody to add bends is on the long notes. There are two places in this melody where we have a long draw note, on “road” and on the second half of the word “belong.”
Like this:

Take me home, country road,
4 -4 5 5 4 -4’ -4
to the place I belong
5 -4 4 5 6 -6’ -6

So here are the harmonica tabs in C for Take Me Home Country Roads by John Denver with those 2 bends included:

Take me home, country road, to the place I belong
4 -4 5 5 4 -4’-4 5 -4 4 5 6-6’-6
West Virginia, mountain mama, take me home, country road
-6 5 6 5 5 4 -4 5 5 -4 4 4 -4 4

Congrats on learning how to play this awesome melody to Country Roads like a total country boss. If you have any questions, drop a comment below. Keep that melody flowing, yee haw!

Rock on,
Luke
Harmonica.com