• Song:

    My Name Is Emmett Till

  • Artist:

    Emmylou Harris

Tabbed by: maguri
Tuning: Standard

Emmylou Harris 
My Name is Emmett Till (2011)
(Emmylou Harris)

From: "Hard Bargain"

Sounds like Harris uses an open-D tuning here. If you don't want to retune 
so many strings: drop-D is close.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Drop-D CHORDS

       e-B-G-D-A-D
D      2-3-2-0-0-0
G      3-3-0-0-5-5
A      0-2-2-2-0-x
Bm     2-3-4-4-2-x

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 D  %  %  % 

D 
I was born a black boy
   G
My name is Emmett Till
A
Walked this earth for 14 years
G               D
One night I was killed
    D
For speaking to a woman
      ?G
Whose skin was white as dough
         D
That's a sin in Mississippi
    D            A
But how was I to know?

    D
I'd come down from Chicago
   G
To visit with my kin
   A
Up there I was a cheeky kid
  G              D
I guess I always been
        D
But the harm they put upon me
        G
Was too hard for what I done
    D
For I was just a black boy
  A             D
I never hurt no one

D        G     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
D        A     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh

     D
They took me from my uncle's house
G
Mose Wright was his name
        A                          G
He'd be later standing without hesitation
          D
Point the blame
       D
At the ones who beat and cut me
    G
And shot me with a gun
    D
And threw me in the river
           D                    A
Like I was trash when they were done

      D
I was sent back to my mother
         G
At least what was left of me
    A
She kept my casket open
        G                   D
For the whole wide world to see
    D
The awful desecration
        G
And the evidence of hate
    D
You could not recognize me
        A             D
The mutilation was so great


  Bm
Became a cry for justice then
      A
To be finally fulfilled
      G              D
All because of me, a black boy
   A               D
My name was Emmett Till


D        G     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
D        A     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh

D        G     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
D        A     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh


         D
Oh, that I had rather lived
           G
Till I was too old to die young
A
Not miss all I left behind
G                   D
All that might have come
D
Summer clouds above my head
    G
The grass beneath my feet
    D
The warmth of a good woman
    D               A
Her kisses soft and sweet

   D
Perhaps to be a father
       G
With a black boy of my own
A                            G
Watch him grow into a kinder world
           D
Than I had known
      D
Where no child would be murdered
        G
For the color of his skin
    D
And love would be the only thing
  A                  D
Inside the hearts of men

     Bm
They say the horror of that night
   A
Is haunting heaven still
      G             D
Where I am one more black boy
   A              D
My name is Emmett Till

D        G     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
D        A     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh

D        G     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
D        A     D
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
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