Pretty Woman

[Grandpa Markley]

Anybody played Pretty Woman by Roy Orbison? Looking for the riff. Be fun to jam out to seeing as everybody immediately knows it. Thanks guys.

[barney 59]

Problem with Orbison songs is that you gotta sing 'em and who on earth has the range of Roy Orbison besides Roy--Linda Ronstat maybe? Nah, not even her! I used to do "Running Scared" and your trying to start at the bottom of the Grand Canyon and progressively heading for the stratosphere. They sound bad if you don't pull it off---maybe a Tom Waits approach would work.

[Mandolin Mick]

The riff is based on an E7 chord. The notes are E, E. Ab, B, D, F#, E, D. Have fun!

[Willie Poole]

I have it on an old Orbison LP and will work on it and see if it is within my vocal range....

[journeybear]

Oh my! Are you sure about this? Why try to jam on a song as tricky as this? Sure, it's a great song, and a great riff, but what are you going to do when you get to the bridge? That alone is in two keys.

The song is in A, so the riff is on the V chord.

The riff is (almost) as Mick says

riff 1: E E G# B D ... / E E G# B D ...
riff 2: E E G# B D F# E D / E E G# B D F# E D etc
(just so you know - in a sharp key, the convention is that accidentals are notated with sharps, not flats)

Verse:
A F#m A F#m
D E (for a really long time, staying on it for riff 2
repeat
Bridge:
Dm G7 C Am
Dm G7 C
Dm G7 C Am
Dm G7 C A
F#m Dm E
A F#m Dm E
that E is where you're singing "be mine tonight" with the ascending line and riff 2 comes back in under it

At the end of the third verse riff 1 comes back in under "what do I see", and then riff 2, until it ends on "oh-oh pretty woman" on an A.

Now, this is a lot of arranging, and you may not be trying to replicate the original to this extent. But this is the way it goes. I haven't even mentioned the dropped beats. This is a lot to ask of back porch or campfire pickers! I'm just saying - look this stuff up. It's pretty scary!

[Grandpa Markley]

Sorry I didn't specify. I was thinking that messing around with the riff would be cool. Not sure if there was an easy way to convert the riff from guitar to mando. Thanks for everybody's input.