Faded Love – Free Fiddle Lesson

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Hi I’m Vi Wickam here with another lesson for myTalentForge.com.

This tune is called is Faded Love. It is a classic two-step dance fiddle tune that was made popular by Bob Wills. The melody from this tune was appropriated from the melody from the A part to My Darling Nelly Gray, which is a beautiful civil war tune.

New words were put to it and it was given a new name called Faded Love. Interestingly both of them are very sad songs. We’ll post the lyrics to Faded Love below, so you have access to those as well.

But it’s really a classic fiddle tune, it’s a classic twin fiddle tune. So I’ll do a twin fiddle lesson on this as well for the harmony.

Here is Faded Love. […]

That’s our melody- let’s start off at the beginning. We start off with two chops- D and A open. And 2nd finger on the D, open A. That’s when you want to check your intonation. And then 4th finger open drone. 3 down bows in a row…

So you can slide into that 4th finger just a little bit, makes it sound a little “fiddly” as you want.

[0, 0, 1, 0, 2, 1, 0, 3, 3, 4, 3…]. So that’s our first half of the A-part- [0, 2, 0, 0, 1, 0, 2, 1, 0, 3, 3, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0, 0, 1, 0, 2, 1, 0, 1, 1, 2, 1].

Now we know it’s not the real ending, we know that’s the fake ending, or the 1st ending. Because we end on the 1st finger, which is an E note. We’re in key of D. So when we hear an E note, we know it’s part of an A-chord, not a D-chord, and we only end a D song on a D-chord.

Then we go back to our beginning, we repeat. We’re going to have a second ending this time.

[…]

So here’s where we go into our second ending… […]

We end on a D note. That ends the A part. Now the B part is pretty much the same as the A part, just up an octave. So, there’s not too much complicated here, you already pretty much have the melody down. […]

There’s our first, so you hear how it’s almost note for note exactly the same as the A part. […3, 4, 3, 1, 0, 3, 1…].

That’s the variation on the A part that the B part has, that makes it a tiny bit different. […].

One more time through the B part- [3, 1, 3, 3, 4, 3, 1, 0, 3, 1, 3, 4, 3, 3, 1, 3, 3, 4, 3, 1, 0, 3, 4, 0, 1, 0, 3, 1, 3, 3, 4, 3, 1, 0, 3, 1, 0, 1, 2, 3, 2, 1, 0, 3, 1, 0, 0, 1, 2, 3, 3, 3…].

So that’s our B part. And that’s really it for this song, it’s not a complicated song, but it sure is pretty! And it sounds great with some swing rhythm chords behind it.

I’ll play it for you one more time. This time I’m going to throw in just a little bit of improvisation and I’m going to have a little fun with it. Stick around, or come back to see the twin fiddle part- if you have someone you can play music with, you can do twin fiddles.

Here we go… Faded Love.

[…]

Thank you for tuning in to this lesson on Faded Love, brought to you by myTalentForge.com, and I will see you next time for the twin fiddle lesson.

Lyrics:
As I look at the letters that you wrote to me
It’s you that I am thinking of
As I read the lines that to me were so sweet
I remember our faded love

I miss you darling more and more every day
As heaven would miss the stars above
With every heartbeat I still think of you
And remember our faded love

As I think of the past and all the pleasures we had
As I watch the mating of the dove
It was in the springtime when you said goodbye
I remember our faded love

I miss you darling more and more every day
As heaven would miss the stars above
With every heartbeat I still think of you
And remember our faded love