Would you like to play Elvis Presley’s famous song “Love Me Tender,” an easy ukulele song for Valentine’s Day? We’ve created a ukulele video lesson for you. And it uses just a few chords. We have C, D7, G7, E7, Am, C7, F, Fm and A7.

For the strumming, you can do all down strums for the whole song and it would work great because the song is a slow ballad. In the video, Jenny shows different ways to play the song. First, she does an all-down strum in the first verse of the song. In addition, she does a couple of different strums – a “down, down-up-down, down-up” flow for the second verse. Also, she plays finger-picking or plucking for the third verse. We’ll leave you to pick which strumming method works best for you.

So, click the video to watch Jenny play this beautiful love song and learn more about the strums and the chords.

DOWNLOAD LEAD SHEET

Click here to download a lead sheet of Love Me Tender, an easy ukulele song for Valentine’s Day.

SONG HISTORY

“Love Me Tender” is a song written for a film initially entitled “The Reno Brothers.” It was recorded and released by Elvis Presley in 1956 a few weeks before the movie was shown.

Before the release of the single, Presley performed the song on the popular TV series “The Ed Sullivan Show,” which created early buzz and anticipation. Advance orders reached one million and “Love Me Tender” was a gold record even before it was officially distributed.

With the sales of Presley’s “Love Me Tender” single reaching enormous proportions, the film studio changed the title of the movie to match the theme song.

The music of “Love Me Tender” was adapted from an old song called “Aura Lee,” composed by George R. Poulton in the early 1860s. Ken Darby penned new lyrics to this despondent tune. Actual credits to the lyrics though were attributed to Vera Matson, who is Darby’s wife, and Presley for his adjustments to the song to fit his style.

LEARN “AURA LEE” AS A CHORD MELODY

Do you want to play an easy and full-sounding version of “Aura Lee”? It’s in our book 21 MORE Songs in 6 Days as a solo ukulele chord melody. You’ll learn to play both melody and chords at the same time in this version of the song. It’s easy and beautiful!

ELVIS PRESLEY AND LOVE ME TENDER

The “Love Me Tender” single was a huge hit, placing #1 on the Billboard list for several weeks. It was even more remarkable as “Love Me Tender” succeeded another single by Presley – his bestselling “Hound Dog,” which topped the charts for eleven weeks.

In total, Elvis Presley stayed at #1 on the Billboard charts for sixteen weeks – a record at that time and the first time for a single artist.

Elvis Presley not only recorded the song “Love Me Tender,” but he was also one of the actors of the movie. The re-titled motion picture was his film debut.

Certainly, the film was a financial success. It was released late in the year (November) but it was among the 25 highest-grossing films of the year.