I’ve been trying to find accurate Bruce Cockburn tabs for you play. Unlike my Tommy Emmanuel Tabs post, it wasn’t as easy to find good tabs to find and I found many sites that were nothing but pop-ups and deceptive links, so beware because those types of sites are the kind you get spyware from. Here are a few for you to try and if you have any other recommendations, please leave a comment and share with us.
List of Cockburn Tabs: (updated Sept 2025)
Sunwheel Dance: I’m not a fan of ASCII tab but it’s fairly accurate/close to the version I have in my “All the Diamonds” songbook. This version has you tune to open E(EBEG#BE) but I believe it’s tuned to open D (DADF#AD). Both with the capo on the second fret. The song is surprisingly easy to learn but incredibly hard to master, especially at the correct tempo.
- Pacing the Cage: I couldn’t not find a free tab that was worth mentioning but I did find two versions that you can pay for. Both are very accurate and are in a tab/standard notation form.
Version 1: $5.50 to download from musicnotes.com
Version 2: $3.95 to download from freehandmusic.com - Foxglove: Tuned to open C, this is transcribed to power tab and is almost identical to my “All the Diamonds” songbook.
- Wondering Where The Lions Are: ASCII tab again but gives you the main motive pretty accurately which is pretty much 90% of the song.
- Dear Dancing Round a Broken Mirror and Water Into Wine: Very good transcriptions, one in Powertab. You will have to subscribe to the Bruce Cockburn musicians group in Yahoo groups and the tab can be found in the files sections. Many other good tabs and ideas that will set you in the right direction in learning other Bruce’s songs.
- Also found the All the Diamonds Songbook on Amazon. Expensive but if you really really want it, it’s there. However, I would recommend the following site: Granata Music. Better priced and a small biz you can support. I ordered a replacement one for me and it came pretty quickly.
- Since the writing of this post, I have found that Songsterr has some great transcriptions of Bruce’s work. Really nice that it syncs to the original recording (with paid sub). I highly recommend either version, it has helped me a great deal.
1 comment
Music is such an uplifting source of energy. My early memories of guitar music included selections by Liona Boyd and John Williams. its refreshing to branch out and explore many different ways love and positive energy are expressed with this instrument. Thank you for sharing these insights!