I’ve Been Working On the Railroad

by

“I’ve Been Working On the Railroad” is the first song I learned how to play on the ukulele. My grandfather, who actually worked on the railroad, taught it to me when I was just six years old.

This song is a great song to learn if you are just beginning to play ukulele. The chords are simple to play (scroll down farther for the chords). For a strumming pattern, I recommend just starting out with down-strums at first. As you get more comfortable, add some up-strums.

Chords Used in “I’ve Been Working On the Railroad”

C major
C major ukulele chord

C7
C7 ukulele chord

F major
F major ukulele chord

G major
G major ukulele chord

G7
G7 ukulele chord

D7
D7 ukulele chord

E7
E7 ukulele chord

“I’ve Been Working On the Railroad” Chords

C
                        
C7
       
I’ve been working on the railroad 
F
                
C

all the livelong day
C
                        
C7
        
I’ve been working on the railroad, 
        
D7
             
G7

just to pass the time away
G7
                         
C
         
Can’t you hear the whistle blowing?  
F
                       
E7

Rise up so early in the morn
F
                          
C
         
Can’t you hear the captain shouting, 
 
C
     
G
         
C

“Dinah blow your horn!”

C
                     
F

Dinah won’t you blow, Dinah won’t you blow,
G
                         
C

Dinah won’t you blow your horn, your horn?
C
                     
F

Dinah won’t you blow, Dinah won’t you blow,
G
                         
C

Dinah won’t you blow your horn?

C

Someone’s in the kitchen with Dinah,
C
                          
G7

Someone’s in the kitchen I know,
C
                             
F

Someone’s in the kitchen with Dinah,
C
                
G
      
C

Strummin’ on the old banjo

C
                    
Fee fi fiddle-y-i-o, 
C
                 
G7

fee fi fiddle-y-i-o-o-o-o,
C
      
F
             
Fee fi fiddle-y-i-o, 
C
                
G7
      
C
  
G
 
C

strummin’ on the old banjo

Not sure where to go next? Join the free video lesson course.

Discover how to make music on the ukulele even if you've never played an instrument in your life with the free Learn To Play Ukulele Today video lesson course. Learn:

  • How to properly tune, hold, and strum your ukulele
  • The most essential "must-know" ukulele chords
  • How to play 3 extremely versatile strumming patterns
  • How to play four songs on ukulele

Join the course and get four lessons with 14 step-by-step videos that have helped thousands make music for the first time. Enter your details:

62 Comments


  1. Fatal error: Uncaught Error: Call to undefined function genesis_before_comment() in /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-content/themes/ukuleletricksresponsive/functions.php:207 Stack trace: #0 /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-includes/class-walker-comment.php(179): custom_comment_callback(Object(WP_Comment), Array, 1) #1 /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-includes/class-wp-walker.php(145): Walker_Comment->start_el('', Object(WP_Comment), 1, Array) #2 /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-includes/class-walker-comment.php(139): Walker->display_element(Object(WP_Comment), Array, '5', 0, Array, '') #3 /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-includes/class-wp-walker.php(387): Walker_Comment->display_element(Object(WP_Comment), Array, '5', 0, Array, '') #4 /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-includes/comment-template.php(2174): Walker->paged_walk(Array, '5', 0, 0, Array) #5 /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-content/themes/genesis/lib/structure/comments.php(210): wp_list_comments(Array) #6 /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-includes/class-wp-hook.php in /home/forge/ukuleletricks.com/wp-content/themes/ukuleletricksresponsive/functions.php on line 207