[QUOTE=Carson O’Genic]
A portion of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody #2,something my father often played on piano.
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As a first piece? Man, the piano version is hard as an escaped con at the Playboy mansion. Did you just play out the melody line or was it a more full-bodied arrangement?
About a girl by Nirvana. Two chords (until the bridge)
The guitar part in “Is There Anybody Out There?” by Pink Floyd. Yes, I was an ambitious little runt. And the early intro to fingerpicking never hurts.
Once you learn the E-A-D progression, you’ve learned nearly every Neil Diamond song ever written, along with Gloria, as mentioned earlier. I think the first one I figured out for myself, though, was House Of The Rising Sun.
Wish You Were Here, Pink Floyd.
Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah.
[QUOTE=longhair75]
“Let me tell you a story about a man named Charlie on one tragic and fateful day…”
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Oy! Oy! Oy!
I already knew a few chords, but the first real song was Blackbird, which is hellishly complex for a beginner. It took me weeks to get it right, but by the time I’d finished, the learning curve had been so steep that I could then play pretty much anything I wanted.
“Hey Joe” (Hendrix).
Soon followed by the Stones’ “Honky Tonk Women” and Zep’s “Tangerine”.
Well, I started with ukulele. I went for as hard as possible right off the bat, kind of like jjimm above, so I chose Rondo alla Turka by Mozart. After I got that fairly well, I moved onto guitar, and never really learned any songs. I guess In the Aeroplane Over the Sea and a slew of Modest Mouse songs, which I know the ins and outs of but probably have never played them all the way through. Still working on it…
Needle and the Damage Done, by Neil Young. There are a lots of other, much easier songs to learn, though, so I wouldn’t recommend it to start off. Folk songs with just a bunch of strumming would be the way to go. Unless you hate folk songs.
Hard to remember but either English Rose by The Jam or Ripples by Genesis.
Oh the shame!
MiM
Peter, Paul and Mary had their version of the folksong A Soalin’… I could play it on two strings, and soon after, add the counterpoint with my thumb. And then the whole thing. I’m sure if I was cooler it would have been Led Zep, or Black Sabbath. That’s what I get for growing up in Boulder.
Youtube link.
I meant to link to this clip…
The first song I learned was Push The Little Daisies by Ween. I taught it to myself, after seeing that video on an episode of Beavis and Butthead. I found the tabs online. I think I was about 12.
To this day, that song is usually what I first play if I happen to pick up a guitar somewhere.
[QUOTE=amarinth]
. . . I can now make it from D to A and back without pausing overly long between them.
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You can now play practically all of Jonathan Richman’sRoadrunner 
First song I learned? Good grief that was over thirty years ago (some of us have been at it a long time) some Beatles song*. Closely followed by House of the Rising Sun because it uses practically all the open chords.
*probably in the wrong key, the only Beatles music books at the time seemed to pick the key at random :mad:
The first song I can remember playing all the way through was “Polly” from Nirvana. In fact, a lot of my early songs were Nirvana and NOFX. Power chords are my friend.
It was so long ago I can’t remember. Had to have been some folk song popular in the “Hootenany” heyday of the folk song genre in the early 60’s.
Probably “Lemon Tree” by Peter, Paul, and Mary.
[QUOTE=Astroboy14]
Wish You Were Here, Pink Floyd.
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Me too. I’m not sure if it was actually the first song I learned – I may have played some others off of sheet music – but definitely the first song I figured out for myself how to play, which was a really good feeling.
Most of Nevermind, by Nirvana. This was back in 1993 when Nirvana was known both as one of the biggest bands in the world, and having the easiest guitar parts ever to learn.
Oh, and I learned to play left handed on a right handed guitar.