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Canon in D

First page of the manuscript of the Canon in D by Johann Pachelbel (Mus.MS 16481/8); public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
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Johann Pachelbel's canon for three violins and continuo, composed around 1680 and built on a repeated D major ground bass.

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Sat 07 Nov 2026 11:05:40 AM CET
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Joe <jjbigorra@gmail.com>
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Guitar tab guitar
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Numbers are frets and 0 is an open string. Standard tuning (E A D G B E). Each group of six lines is one system; read left to right, one column at a time. This is a multi-section arrangement of the public-domain melody.

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[Ground: D - A - Bm - F#m]
e|2-------2-------|0-------0-------|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|
B|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|
G|2-------2-------|2-------2-------|4-------4-------|2-------2-------|
D|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|4-------4-------|4-------4-------|
A|----------------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|4-------4-------|
E|----------------|----------------|----------------|2-------2-------|

[Ground: G - D - G - A]
e|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|3-------3-------|0-------0-------|
B|0-------0-------|3-------3-------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|
G|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|
D|0-------0-------|0-------0-------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|
A|2-------2-------|----------------|2-------2-------|0-------0-------|
E|3-------3-------|----------------|3-------3-------|----------------|

[Ground repeated: D - A - Bm - F#m]
e|2-------2-------|0-------0-------|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|
B|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|
G|2-------2-------|2-------2-------|4-------4-------|2-------2-------|
D|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|4-------4-------|4-------4-------|
A|----------------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|4-------4-------|
E|----------------|----------------|----------------|2-------2-------|

[Ground: G - D - G - A]
e|3-------3-------|2-------2-------|3-------3-------|0-------0-------|
B|0-------0-------|3-------3-------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|
G|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|
D|0-------0-------|0-------0-------|0-------0-------|2-------2-------|
A|2-------2-------|----------------|2-------2-------|0-------0-------|
E|3-------3-------|----------------|3-------3-------|----------------|