APT. – ROSÉ – Fingerstyle Guitar Arrangement
My solo fingerstyle guitar arrangement of the song ‘APT.’ by Rosé (featuring Bruno Mars).
I’ve kept this arrangement in the original key of C Minor by using a Capo on the third fret. This then allows for open chord shapes to be used throughout, as though the song was being played in Am, using mainly the open chord shapes of ‘Am’- ‘G’-‘F’-‘C’.
I found this song much more challenging for the right hand because the melody falls within the open chord shapes. This means there isn’t any big jumps or much playing further down the neck for the left hand (in my arrangement). As such, it is a great song to play for working on rhythmic technique and working on combining picking with strumming patterns with the right hand.
The structure of my arrangement is the same as the original song, apart from the first few lines of speaking. I thought about trying to put something in for this, but in the end decided to just come in where the drums and lead vocals do in the original song. Tempo wise, I tried to play it at a similar speed to the original but at a pace which also felt natural, making sure it worked for fingerstyle method. I thus did not use a metronome when recording (as is the case with almost all my fingerstyle covers).
This performance was recorded with an SM81 mic pointed directly at the soundhole and an Aston Spirit mic a bit further back, slightly offset to the neck end of the guitar. I also included a very subtle synth pad behind the guitar in the mix which is playing the root note of the chord. This is an idea I got from recording with my Godin MIDI guitar. I had to add the part after recording on this piece though because I was using the Taylor acoustic (rather than the Godin). The synth part is very quiet to the point that it is barely audible, which I did intentionally to add a very slight ambience without detracting from the guitar performance.