Little Child by The Beatles

Overview

Key: E major · Chords used: 7 · Sections: 9

Form: Intro → Verse → Verse → Bridge → Verse → Break → Bridge → Verse → Outro

Where these chords come from: an expert transcription of the original recording made for the Isophonics reference annotations (Centre for Digital Music, Queen Mary University of London). This page shows that transcription as-is: the analysis below is generated directly from it by code, not written by AI. Consecutive repeats of a chord are shown once, and the piano voicings are our playable arrangement of each chord symbol, not a note-for-note transcription.

Section by section

Intro

• E – A – E9
  I – IV – I9

Verse 1

• E – A – E – B – A – F♯9 – B
  I – IV – I – V – IV – II9 – V

Verse 2

• E – A – E – B – A – F♯9 – B – E
  I – IV – I – V – IV – II9 – V – I

Bridge 1

• E – B – E – F♯ – B
  I – V – I – II – V

Verse 3

Same chords as Verse 2.

Break

• E – A – E – B – A – F♯ – B
  I – IV – I – V – IV – II – V

Bridge 2

Same chords as Bridge 1.

Verse 4

• E – A – E – B – A – F♯ – B – E – C♯
  I – IV – I – V – IV – II – V – I – VI

Outro

• F♯ – B – E – C♯ (×2)
  II – V – I – VI
• F♯ – B – E
  II – V – I

Chord vocabulary

Harmonic highlights

• F♯9 acts as V/V: it resolves to B.
• F♯ acts as V/V: it resolves to B.

Sources & accuracy

• Chords and sections: the Isophonics reference annotations (Centre for Digital Music, Queen Mary University of London). Expert chord and structure annotation of the original recording (CC BY 4.0 via ChoCo).
• Not verified: only one expert transcription of this song is available so far.
• Rhythm and chord durations aren't shown; each step is one chord change.