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Need Help Learning How to Read Guitar Tabs?

by: \'GuitarDan\'Adkins
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You've decided to learn to play the guitar and are very excited about this new endeavor. You've picked out a few tabs to begin practicing with, but you've realized that you don't have any idea how to read guitar tabs! Fortunately, it's not hard to read guitar tabs; they are made with the novice in mind and once you learn how, you'll have no trouble whatsoever using tabs. They are far easier to begin using than sheet music.

Reading guitar tabs is easy once you get to know the layout of the tabs. Tabs are the preferred method of music for many beginning guitar players, because it allows you to start learning how to play guitar before you even learn how to read sheet music. There are many differences and similarities between traditional sheet music and guitar tabs. First, guitar tabs show you where each note that is to be played is and how to play it.

Traditional sheet music and guitar tabs share some similarities; but there are many important differences. Guitar tabs, unlike sheet music denote where each note is played by demonstrating the proper placement of your fingers. When you are learning how to read guitar tabs, the first thing you will likely notice is that each tab has six lines as opposed to the five seen in sheet music - these six lines represent the six strings of a guitar. The dots shown on guitar tabs show you where to put your fingers. So you will need to become familiar with the six strings of your guitar before you start reading guitar tabs.

There are six strings on a guitar, E, B, G, D, A, and E again. The first E, is a high E, with the last E being the low. When learning how to read guitar tabs, you will need to know the placement of these strings on the tab itself. The lines go from top to bottom, the higher E will be on top, which is then followed by the B, G, D, A, and lower E on the bottom, in that order.

The strings on your guitar correspond to the following notes: E, B, G, D, A and E. The first E is the high E string and the sixth string is the low E. When you are learning how to read guitar tabs, you need to know how the tabs translate to your guitar strings. The lines on these tabs are directly related, with the top line being your high E string and so on down.

You will find numbers in accordance to the guitar frets on the guitar tab; however, you might find a zero on the tab as well. This will mean that the string indicated will be openly played, instead of pressed. A good example of frets is if you were to see the number three on the A tab line, you would play the A note on the third fret.

These numbers correspond to the frets on your guitar, numbered from top to bottom; you will also see when you are learning how to read guitar tabs that there are also zeros on the tabs - this tells you to play that string "open", that is, with no fret being pressed. For example, if the line corresponding to the A string in your guitar tab says 6, then you would place your finger on the 6th fret and so on.

Other symbols have the following meanings: H means hammer-on, R means release, T means tap, PM means palm mute, and the / symbols means slide. Learning how to read guitar tabs means understanding the frets, tabs, and symbols as they pertain to that particular song.

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