Rhythm / Lyrics / Chord Sheets

A different format of chord sheets can be accesed from here. Sheets contain chords, rhythmic phrases written in the numbers format as explained in Rhythmic Patterns lesson page, the same one used in Bossa Nova Guitar YouTube lessons, and the lyrics written with the rhythm of the melody. You can select what is shown on the page with the checkboxes in the top left corner.

Chords are shown in 4-fret chord diagrams as elsewhere on this site.

Rhythmic phrases are written as 4 numbers combinations, every one of them represent a sequence of 2 measures (bars) in 2/4 time signature. Therefore a single number represents one quarter note. As a rule of thumb the bass is played on every quarter note, while in general the chords are played on other beats. Sometimes the chord is played together with the bass, this is indicated by the underline below the number. If the underline is solid then the phrase is played by legato, if it's dashed then it's played by staccato, while red underline indicates a ghost note transition.

Lyrics are written with syllables above the exact beat in the rhythmic phrase. Every underline below the syllables correspond to a single 16-th note beat of the rhythmic phrase. Every line of text contains 16 beats so a single line represents a single bossa nova rhythmic phrase. If the underline is brown then that beat is also played on a guitar, while if it's gray then it isn't. You will see that many times the lyrics are shown above the beat that is not played on a guitar, this is very common in bossa nova. Number ③ in lyrics indicates that the previous 3 beats should be sung as a triplet.

These sheets are also designed to be printed directly from the browser (you may need to resize the browser window as well as adjust the margins in print preview), so there are no banner ads or any other unnecessary data. If you use those sheets please donate through PayPal or Patreon.

Rhythm / Lyrics / Chord Sheets