The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald Chords

Gordon Lightfoot - The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald
Chords By: RT237
 
 
[Intro]
 
*Bass plays a D in the recording
 
 
[Verse 1]
 
    D*
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
 
Of the big lake they called "Gitche Gumee"
 
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
 
When the skies of November turn gloomy
       Dm
With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
 
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty
 
That good ship and crew was a bone to be chewed
 
When the "Gales of November" came early
 
 
[Verse 2]
 
    Dm                          Am
The ship was the pride of the American side
       C                        Dm
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin
       Dm                         Am
As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
       C                          Dm
With a crew and good captain well seasoned
  Dm                         Am
Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
          C                     Dm
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland
    Dm                         Am
And later that night when the ship's bell rang
         C                             Dm
Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin'?
 
 
[Interlude]
 
e|----------------------------------------------|
B|--3--5-3-------------------3------------------|
G|---------5-2-2-2---2-h3-h5---5-3-2---2--------|
D|-----------------------------------5----------|
A|---------------------------------------5------|
E|----------------------------------------------|
 
 
[Verse 3]
 
    Dm                        Am
The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound
      C                   Dm
And a wave broke over the railing
    Dm                      Am
And every man knew, as the captain did too
          C                      Dm
T'was the witch of November come stealin'
    Dm                     Am
The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait
         C                      Dm
When the Gales of November came slashin'
     Dm                     Am
When afternoon came it was freezin' rain
       C                   Dm
In the face of a hurricane west wind
 
 
[Verse 4]
 
     Dm                        Am
When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck
         C                         Dm
Sayin’, "Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya."
   Dm                Am
At seven P.M. a main hatchway caved in'
         C                       Dm
He said "Fellas, it's been good t'know ya"
     Dm                     Am
The captain wired in he had water comin' in
        C                         Dm
And the good ship and crew was in peril
    Dm                         Am
And later that night when 'is lights went outta sight
         C                       Dm
Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
 
 
| Dm       | Am     | C     | Dm   |
 
 
[Verse 5]
 
     Dm                      Am
Does anyone know where the love of God goes
         C                         Dm
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
    Dm                             Am
The searchers all say they'd have made Whitefish Bay
          C                        Dm
If they'd put fifteen more miles behind her
     D                           Am
They might have split up or they might have capsized;
     C                           Dm
They may have broke deep and took water
    Dm                      Am
And all that remains is the faces and the names
       C                           Dm
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters
 
 
[Verse 6]
 
     Dm             Am
Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings
       C                      Dm
In the rooms of her ice-water mansion
    Dm                      Am
Old Michigan steams like a young man's dreams;
    C                        Dm
The islands and bays are for sportsmen
    Dm                    Am
And farther below Lake Ontario
      C                     Dm
Takes in what Lake Erie can send her
        Dm                    Am
And the iron boats go as the mariners all know
         C                   Dm
with the Gales of November remembered
 
 
[Verse 7]
Bass returns to the D
 
     Dm                   Am
In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed
        C                   Dm
In the "Maritime Sailors' Cathedral."
    Dm                               Am
The church bell chimed till it rang twenty-nine times
         C                    D*
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald
 
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
 
Of the big lake they call "Gitche Gumee"
N.C.
"Superior", they said, "never gives up her dead
 
When the 'Gales of November' come early!"
 
 
[Outro]
 
e|----------------------------------------------|
B|--3--5-3-------------------3------------------|
G|---------5-2-2-2---2-3-5-----5-3-2---2--------|
D|-----------------------------------5----------|
A|---------------------------------------5------|
E|----------------------------------------------|
 
e|----------------------------------------------|
B|----------------------------------------------|
G|----------------------------------------------|
D|--5-3-2---------------------------------------|
A|--------3----------------5~-------------------|
E|----------------------------------------------|
 
 
 
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| h  Hammer-on
| ~  Vibrato
 
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