The Neil Young Harp Key List

by Chris Lawrence

last update: july 5th, '99. New additions with help from the good folks on Rusted-Guitars! Note: I can't confirm all of the additions so if you find errors, please let me know.

Aloha, folks. This is a fairly simple page, it's not an in-depth Neil page at all. If that's what you're searching for, head to HyperRust and prepare to spend several hours lost in a sea of information. The sole purpose of this page is to offer a relatively complete, concise list of which harmonicas Neil Young uses on which songs. Simple! So if you're a guitarist who plays harmonica (or is thinking of picking it up, it's easy!), and you're looking to try out some Neil tunes.. head to HyperRust for the tabs, and here for the harp keys!

Now, before we get to the oh-so-exciting list, let me say that I'm aware this page is titled rather uncreatively, but I think that every decent Neil song/album title that can somehow be contorted into a clever web page title has been taken. However, let me offer you a list of some titles that were considered by my good friend Bjorn and I but ultimately were cast away (because they all, well, sucked).

Yes, they're all pretty bad, I know. Anyway, the following list is about as accurate as possible right now. I took the basis for this from HyperRust, but wasn't satisfied with the amount of omissions on that site, so I spent an hour or so going over every song I could think of that had harmonica, including album tracks, live unreleased songs, as well as live versions with harmonica added. Now, a small few of these may be slightly incorrect due to speed errors on live tapes, and I'll note my suspicions regarding those songs individually. Songs whose keys change for different performances are also noted as well. For the most part, this should be fairly correct, except where noted. Now, I'm far from having access to every live Neil Young performance, so there's certainly a large amount of songs missing. So, if you have any additions or corrections, please feel free to write me. Thanks for coming this far!

Harps are arranged in key from A thru G. Use the "find" function on your browser to locate specific songs.

A Harp

  • Are There Anymore Real Cowboys?
  • Depression Blues
  • Find Another Shoulder
  • Home on the Range
  • Let It Shine
  • Midnight on the Bay
  • Mother Earth
  • Oh, Lonesome Me
  • Out on the Weekend
  • Traces

    • Bb Harp

  • Ambulance Blues
  • Little Wing
  • My Boy
  • My My, Hey Hey
  • On the Beach (live '99)
  • Shots see comment

    • C Harp

  • A Dream That Can Last
  • After the Gold Rush
  • The Bridge
  • Bright Lights, Big City
  • Borrowed Tune
  • Country Girl
  • Crime in the City (Freedom Video version)
  • Helpless (Last Waltz/Unplugged version)
  • Jellyroll Man
  • Like a Hurricane (pump organ)
  • Long May You Run (pump organ '99)
  • Long Walk Home
  • Loose Change
  • Lotta Love (live piano '99)
  • Mellow My Mind
  • Motion Pictures
  • Out of Control
  • Payola Blues
  • Pocahontas
  • Rainin' in my Heart
  • See the Sky About to Rain
  • Such a Woman
  • Throw Your Hatred Down
  • Winterlong (piano)

    • D Harp

  • Albuquerque
  • Daddy Went Walkin'
  • Distant Camera
  • Helpless (CSNY version)
  • Human Highway (YOTH version)
  • Long May You Run
  • Love Art Blues
  • Roll Another Number
  • Silver And Gold
  • Star of Bethlehem
  • Sweet Joni see comment
  • Thrasher
  • Time Fades Away
  • Tired Eyes
  • War Song
  • The Ways of Love

    • F Harp

  • Rockin’ in the Free World see comment
  • Someday
  • Sugar Mountain (live 5/1/99)

    • G Harp

  • Amber Jean
  • Buffalo Springfield Again
  • Comes a Time
  • Cortez the Killer
  • Country Home
  • Cripple Creek Ferry see comment
  • Dance, Dance, Dance (live '99)
  • Days That Used to Be
  • Everybody Knows this is Nowhere
  • Farmer's Song
  • From Hank to Hendrix
  • Give Me Strength
  • Guilty Train
  • Harvest Moon
  • Heart of Gold
  • Hitch-hiker
  • Homefires
  • Homegrown (live guitjo '99)
  • I am a Child
  • Last Trip to Tulsa
  • The Losing End
  • Love is a Rose
  • Mideast Vacation
  • Mr. Soul
  • Natural Beauty
  • Old Laughing Lady
  • Ordinary People
  • Powderfinger
  • Railroad Town
  • Razor Love
  • Sail Away
  • Slowpoke
  • Southern Pacific (live guitjo '99)
  • Sugar Mountain
  • Tonight's the Night (piano)
  • Unknown Legend
  • White Line (live '99)
  • World on a String

    • Comments

    Shots - The harp in this song seemed to fit into the Bb key, but it seems like a strange choice over the chord changes. If something works better, let me know. A Boarding House acoustic performance was used to judge this key.

    Sweet Joni - Likely suffers from "sped up tape syndrome," so this was my best estimate.

    Rockin' in the Free World - I've never been able to decide whether or not Neil uses an F or a D on this song. HyperRust suggests an F for this and Someday, but I haven't heard a solo version of Someday yet, so again, I'm unsure. If anyone can shed more light on this, I'd appreciate it.

    Cripple Creek Ferry - The live version of this I have seems to be in F#, which is an unlikely Neil tuning/key, so it's entirely likely that it's slowed down a notch.

    drawers and blowers have been here since july 1st, '99.

    Send all comments/corrections directly to Chris Lawrence.