Strangers | Lewis Capaldi Lead Sheet

Lewis Capaldi, a Scottish singer-songwriter with a voice that resonates with raw emotion, has captured the hearts of listeners worldwide with his soulful ballads. One such masterpiece is "Strangers," a poignant journey through the labyrinth of lost love.f

How to play Strangers by Lewis Capaldi on the piano

Strangers is actually a really easy song to play on the piano because the use of hybrid chords. Lewis is technically just playing 1 chord in the right hand the entire song and the bass (left hand) is doing all the work. Because of the nature of the chords he chose, this sounds so much more rich than you would expect. In the free sheet music below, I laid out the chords in a way that you can follow along as you move through the different sections.

Click on the leadsheet below, and we will share this free sheet music with you...

Wonderwall Diss

If you are interested in learning music check out our Music Lessons in Denton.

Before I dig into the musical aspects of this song, I just gotta say... Can you believe he basically starts out this song dissing Wonderwall?! Obviously Wonderwall is a commonly overplayed song, which really means that everybody loves Wonderwall, but he's gotta be careful! He's famous, and in the UK, he could easily end up at a party with Oasis... that would be awkward...

Anyway...

Deep Chord Analysis of Strangers

To be completely honest, a normal person would probably write out the chords of this song like this:

E B C#- A

or in other words (if you like reading the roman numerals):

I V VI- IV

But the way the song is played, he's actually keeping the E major chord going in the right hand the entire time, and just moving the bass which changes the function of the chord.

Let's look at the 2nd chord of the song: I wrote it as E/B. That means that the voicing will look like this:

E/B = B E G# B is the voicing he's playing, but you can also just play B major. Since it's the V chord, it woks either way because if you play the hybrid, you're basically playing Vsus4(13). It's up to you how you want to interpret, and since this isn't classical music, it's up to you how you want to voice it. Maybe you don't want it to sound exactly like Lewis plays it. That's why I share the REAL chords with you, so you can do your thing...

Then we have an E/C# = C# E G# B which is 1, b3, 5, b7, so it's a root pos VI-7, and then there's E/A which is A E G# B which is 1, 5, 7, 9 so it's a IVmaj7(9) no 3.

Confession: I'm not sure about the pre-chorus

I was hearing something the 1st time around, very subtle, possible it's something in the production, that im hearing a c#. the second time around the real bass comes in and shows that it's the same as the rest of the song, but I left in the C# for the first pre because its cool, and it's kind of what it sounds like. You can choose how you want to play it.

Who is Lewis Capaldi

Before the world knew him for his chart-topping hits, Lewis Capaldi was honing his craft in his native Scotland. Born in 1996, Capaldi burst onto the scene with his debut single "Bruises" in 2017, a soul-stirring track that showcased his powerhouse vocals. His ability to translate deep emotions into music quickly garnered him acclaim, and he has since become a household name in the realm of modern pop.

Where did Lewis Capaldi come from?

I was asking the same question. He came out of nowhere! But also Scotland. We're all glad he's around though.

Lewis was born and in Glasgow, Scotland, and moved to West Lothian at 4 years old. He now lives on the outskirts of Glasgow in a farmhouse that he bought in 2020. Lewis Capaldi got famous in 2019 with the release of his hit song "Someone You Loved." He's been going strong ever since.

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