Santa Bring My Baby Back to Me by Elvis Presley

Overview

Key: C major · Chords used: 5 · Sections: 5

Where these chords come from: an expert transcription of the original recording made for the Uspop2002 chord annotations (Music and Audio Research Lab, New York University). 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

Part 1 (0:01)

• C – F (×2)
  I – IV
• C – G7 – F – G7
  I – V7 – IV – V7

Part 2 (0:22)

• C – F (×2)
  I – IV
• C – G7 – F – G7 – C
  I – V7 – IV – V7 – I

Part 3 (0:42)

• F – F7 – C – D7 – G7
  IV – IV7 – I – II7 – V7
• C – F (×2)
  I – IV
• C
  I

Part 4 (1:02)

• G7 – F – G7 – C – F – F7 – C – D7 – G7 – C
  V7 – IV – V7 – I – IV – IV7 – I – II7 – V7 – I

Part 5 (1:23)

• F – C (×2)
  IV – I
• G7 – F – G7 – C (×2)
  V7 – IV – V7 – I

Chord vocabulary

Harmonic highlights

• D7 acts as V/V: it resolves to G7.

Sources & accuracy

• Chords: the Uspop2002 chord annotations (Music and Audio Research Lab, New York University). Chord annotation of the original recording (Elvis Christmas Album), time-stamped by researchers; CC BY 4.0 via ChoCo.
• Section names: this annotation doesn't name verses or choruses, so they aren't guessed. Instead, code used the chord timings to find the bars and cut the song into 8-bar parts. Each part is labelled with the time it starts in the annotated recording (Elvis Christmas Album), and a part with exactly the same chords as an earlier one says so.
• The key was estimated by code from the chords; this annotation doesn't state it.
• 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.