How to play Señorita by Shawn Mendes
Señorita is a 2019 hit song by singer Shawn Mendes with Camila Cabello. Initially released on Mendes’ self-titled third album, Señorita became a global hit and has since become one of the most streamed songs of the current decade. With it’s distinctive guitar solo intro and finger-style chord accompaniment it’s a perfect song for nylon-string acoustic players.
Chords : Am Cmaj7 Fmaj7 Em G
Pick or Fingers? Depends on the instrument you choose for this song. The sound of the original is finger-style and that is certainly the way to play it on nylon strings, but it could be adapted for pick playing on steel strings.
Acoustic or Electric? Acoustic guitar definitely and, unusually it best suits nylon-string guitar ; the jazzy South American/Spanish Pop style is typical of the nylon-string guitar sound but it will also work on a steel-string acoustic or an electric guitar with a soft, warm tone.
Timing stuff: This chart is notated in metered TAB - meaning you can interpret the timing correctly. A number with a single stem is a one beat note. If it is connected by a beam to another it is a half-beat note. The rests seen in the first bar are one-beat rests. The rests in the second bar are half-beat rests. Note that in the chorus there is a tie (a small curved line) connecting the last number in the first bar to the same number on the other side of the barline ; this directs you to sustain that note for two half-beats. Do not pick the tied note! The same thing happens every second bar through the chorus and this creates the light syncopation in the rhythm.
Bass note picking: In the verse, in every second bar there are bass-note phrases connecting to the next chord. Play these ‘bass runs’ with your thumb. This means your thumb is pretty busy throughout the song as it also plays all the chord bass notes. Taking the first bar of the verse as an example, your thumb plays the open 5th string bass note and then your index, middle and ring fingers play the three-string chord on the following beat. This happens again but with half-beat values and then you need to stop the strings on a half-beat rest. Do this simply by dropping the picking fingers back on to those strings. In the second bar there is only one chord, on the second beat. The rest of the notes in that bar are all thumb-picked notes.
Relevant pages in Modern Guitar Chord Styles 1 : To learn more about how to play the chords and rhythms in Señorita check out pages 5, 8, 13, 28, 43 and 45.
Need a bit of help?
Modern Guitar Chord Styles 1 is the perfect companion for our song guides- it is specifically designed to help beginners speed up their chord changes, master their strumming patterns, and many other techniques.