Chris Squire Bass Transcription: Sweet Dreams (Corrected Pitch)

Audio may be a bit loud – apologies. Please read on for nerd stuff.

DISCLAIMER: No money owed to this comes to me

PDF available at https://tinyurl.com/SwDrBass

The issued audio of Sweet Dreams is down in pitch by nearly a semitone, whereas video shows the first chord as definitely F/G (Chris leading in with an open E string). Thanks to a great free tool at https://www.maztr.com/audiopitcheditor I was able to bring it up to approximately 440, so you can play along without having to detune your instrument.

Nice little radio-friendly song, and a real foreshadowing of Chris's later work in terms of arrangement, playing and, of course, tone.

The main theme key looks like C major – which arguably it is, finally finding home in bar 16 (00:36) – but you might call it G Mixolydian.

Bars 28 (01:05) and 63 (02:24) where the slide goes up from the G despite landing on the E below is, I presume, just a change of hand position

Bars 37-9 (01:25) Those grace notes are there, but I don't think they're intentional, more just a fingering thing.

Bar 56 (02:08) – the end of the triplet figure is what is played, but it seems like a fluff to me.

Some of the little variations at the ends of bars in the outro (from bar 78, 03:08) are approximations.