To the Mountains - Lizzy McAlpine

Hi everyone, and welcome to this new guitar tutorial! Today it’s time for the song by Lizzy McAlpine: To the Mountains. This track is especially meaningful to me, since it’s the one that inspired my Spotify playlist of the same name, To the Mountains – Acoustic.

The first thing that might make you raise an eyebrow is the tuning. It’s an open D, with one exception: the first string stays in standard tuning instead of being tuned down a whole step. This choice isn’t random. Indeed, if you listen carefully to the song, you’ll notice that the first string is never played, except for the very last chord (which I believe is a Dadd9). I also came across a live performance of Lizzy on YouTube where she used exactly the same setup. And here’s something even more interesting: the first string isn’t the only one that remains untouched; the fourth string never comes into play either. This actually simplifies the right hand, since you’ll only be using your thumb for the bottom two strings, your index for the third string, and your middle finger for the second.

As for the left hand, I strongly recommend following the fingering I show in the video, which I’ve borrowed directly from Lizzy herself. It’s hands down the most effective way to play this piece.

As always, you can find the tabs on my Patreon page. Have fun learning!