Time After Time - Iron & Wine

Hello everyone, and welcome to this new tutorial on another song covered by Iron & Wine! This time, I’m teaching his famous cover of ‘Time After Time’, originally by Cyndi Lauper.

I also want to introduce the guitar I use for songs with unusual tunings —let’s call it the “weird tuning guitar” from now on. For this tutorial, I’m using A# standard tuning, which is simply standard tuning lowered by three semitones (or one and a half steps). Don’t let this tuning throw you off; it’s easy to adjust to. The only challenge you might face is that the guitar can slip out of tune more easily, sometimes even while you’re playing! That’s why I like to use a separate guitar when learning songs with alternate tunings.

On the rhythmic side, the piece is quite manageable since most of the notes are eighth notes. For the right hand, you won’t need to use your ring finger much, and for the left hand, I recommend using the many open notes to “anticipate” the next chord. Start by focusing slowly on the first two measures of the first verse. Once you get the feel for this part, you’ll be able to play the whole song, gradually building up the speed.

Happy practicing!