 Hi guys, so let's learn 7 years by Lucas Graham. It's quite an amazing song and it's basically a very simple chord progression which goes on throughout. However, the rhythm patterns are quite interesting. So I've divided the song study into three parts. First of all you have the intro right and so on and then you have the worst part where you should not be playing that tune and you basically have simple chords which you play. And then there's a kind of a breakdown where the entire energy of the song drops and then it really gets heavier and heavier where he says soon I'll be 60 years old so it really goes on. That's like at the end of the song and that pretty much ends the song. So let's start with the intro. So I'm going to show you the right hand first and the scale of this song is B flat major or G minor. I guess G minor would be the correct way of saying it because the entire sequence starts on G minor. If you see the verse or the chorus G minor is the first chord. So B flat major scale relative minor G minor and how do you build G minor? It's the sixth B flat C D F G. So let's get started. So I'm just going to play the melody. Let's learn that first. I'm sure you can also hear it and figure it out. It happens at the intro. It happens as a hook over all the choruses. So whenever he says I'll be once I'll be 20 years old, whenever he something years old that sort of part you're going to want to play that hook and that's the chorus. So let's get started. Got that line one and line two is also the same and it goes on. Now when it goes to the chorus you keep doing this the third time fourth time. And I've written it down here you can go through the notes and also circle there are the chords for every note. You have a G minor B flat E flat and then an F here which I've written. And the timing of those chords is with that melody. So at the time of hitting D you play a G minor here G minor then you have that D F here and then you go to B flat here D F G minor B flat major and another new chord which is E flat major written here E flat. So whenever you are not starting the phrase you have an F chord here. But when you start the phrase you don't play any chord when you start you don't play any chord. So that's why I wrote it in a different color. So you start with G minor B flat E flat and then you add the F till the entire phrase ends. Let me show it again and I'll call out the chords now that I've told you the melody. G minor B flat major E flat E flat F major G minor B flat major E flat stay on E flat. Okay let's do that again B flat E flat F major G. So the chords which go along with this are the same chords which happen in the verse which I'm going to show you. So the verse and the chorus chords I've written down here and the reason why I've sort of combined verse and chorus because they are the same thing is just that the chorus in the second line of the chorus you don't have an F the E flat just goes on in the verse you have the F only you just have this and when it comes to the chorus at the end of the the bar two and so at every and one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four and one and two and three so at the end of the two you have this interesting chord which I've written in that blue color there which is F over A okay so it's essentially like playing F major in the right hand and A bass in the left hand. So let's see how it goes and for the verse the way we play it is if you look at the voicing this is how I'm playing G minor G D B flat so you want to go low in the keyboard or you can even go higher so it adds a very very interesting flavor as opposed to playing G minor like this which can be very cluttered so this is how I'm hearing G minor or all the chords the way he's voicing it is root fifth and then the third the third is not in the middle as you would expect it's up there so I'll just play you the verse but the formula for every chord or the position voicing for every chord is root fifth third the third is not here it's played here okay and it has a swing feel so you have to keep that okay so let's go through the chords that'll be G minor F with A bass this is how I'm playing it so you can even play it higher depending on what you like if the song's heavy you can go low if the song's a bit more mellow you can play high how am I counting that one and two and three and four and repeat G minor F with A bass B flat major E flat major for three counts as I've written here E flat two three F at the one or rather at the four fourth count G minor F with A bass B flat G sorry E flat major F and if you want to make it deeper and then when you end the verse two three ideally in play to hook to the chorus part which I talked about earlier so whatever you do in the intro the hook also continues for pretty much every chorus so verse you keep it simple just play those spread chords and again on in the video description we're going to link you up with some videos most more particularly a spread voicing video which you guys should definitely check out okay so let's get cracking now with the breakdown so the breakdown basically happens after the second chorus the entire song breaks down and you just again play hold chords okay so the chords I've pointed out here so that's G minor B flat E flat two three F major G minor B flat major E flat major two three B flat with D bass let me show you that so that's like playing D in the left hand and playing up a B flat chord in the right hand or you can play B flat without D because you're already playing D here okay let's do the first two lines of the breakdown three now you can play full chords like from here onwards so I'm just going through the chords E flat F G minor F is a passing chord E flat F G minor F major D flat with D bass D flat F G minor D sus D major so D sus is D G A and D major is back let's do those two lines where he says soon I'll be 60 years old really soon I'll be 60 years old again I'll repeat those two lines E flat F G minor F and a B flat with D bass E flat F G minor D sus D major and continues F G minor continues F major B flat with D bass D flat to this last part and at this last part is essentially the chorus hook which you can with a passing F over A which you can try G minor F with a bass B flat and the song sort of fades out with the same hook and the vocal line and you just play that and I think it ends somewhere in the middle of the bar like ends at the B flat with the vocals so whenever you're not doing the piano hook try to play these spread voicings right more on spread voicings in the description where I've exclusively talked about that so I would urge you guys to please watch that video and then the breakdown section you just hold the chords down and then as it builds up where he starts singing more aggressively and higher in pitch you can probably look at spicing things up by playing full chords in the right hand let me just show you one final technique which you can use on the piano to just make things sound a bit heavy and have that swing groove at the end which I'm not hearing that clearly from the piano but I guess you could do it let's see how that goes how am I doing that hitting this extra E flat octave just adding some excitement by playing those additional swing notes so that's basically about the song guys seven years by Lucas Graham hope you found the lesson useful and as always I'll see you in the next one cheers