Queen - Love of My Life - Guitar Lesson

A Night At The Opera (Deluxe Remastered Version)

1975 3:37

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About Love of My Life

Few songs reward careful fingerpicking attention the way "Love of My Life" does. Brian May wrote the piece largely as a showcase for delicate single-note work and arpeggiated chord shapes rather than the power chords you might expect from Queen. The arrangement sits in C major, which keeps the open strings available as ringing bass notes underneath moving melody lines, so getting that harp-like sustain depends on clean left-hand position and deliberate finger placement. The chord voicings shift quickly in places, and maintaining the melodic top line while the bass moves underneath is the real challenge here. That independence between your melody finger and your bass-note thumb takes patience to build. Set the Practice Toolbar to loop those transitional bars at a reduced speed until both voices ring clearly without muting each other. The tempo is gentle, but sloppiness in the fretting hand is immediately audible at any speed.

• The signature part relies on fingerpicked arpeggios rather than a plectrum, so developing independent thumb and finger control is the central technique challenge.
• Playing in C major lets you exploit open-string resonance for a sustained, harp-like tone across the chord changes.
• The trickiest passage is keeping the melody voice clear while the bass notes shift underneath, something worth looping slowly before bringing it up to speed.