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Learning How To Read Guitar Tabs

By: \'Guitar Dan\' Adkins

So, you have decided that you are ready to learn to play the guitar. You have chosen a few tabs to help you get started, but now you are wondering how to read guitar tabs. The good news is that guitar tabs are designed to help the beginner and are extremely easy to read once you get the hang of it. In fact, they are far easier than the alternative, the traditional 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.

When learning how to read guitar tabs, you will also notice that the tab has six lines, whereas a piece of sheet music only has five. Again, when reading guitar tabs, you will notice that it shows you the placement of your fingers. Therefore, because the guitar has six strings, the tab will have six lines, with each line designated as a guitar string. Therefore, it is most important that you learn the strings on a guitar before you begin reading guitar tabs.

As you are learning how to read guitar tabs, you'll probably notice that unlike sheet music, guitar tabs feature six lines as opposed to the five seen in sheet music. That's for a good reason - these six lines represent your guitar's six strings. Once you know this, things should be much clearer to you.

See those metal lines on the neck of your guitar? Those are the frets and on your tabs, they are indicated by the vertical lines you see there - your fingers are placed in between (not on!) the frets while playing. When you're reading guitar tabs, there will be numbers - these tell you which fret your fingers should be on.

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.

When learning how to read guitar tabs, you'll see a lot of other symbols on the tab - these include X,B,R,H,P,PM,T and /. These symbols all have a different meaning. An X, for instance means that that string will not played during that particular chord or note. A B means that the note should be bent, the P a pull off.

To briefly run down the other symbols, an H denotes a hammer-on, R release, T is for tap, PM means to palm mute that note or chord and a / means to slide. When you are learning to read guitar tabs, you will gradually become with all of these parts of playing and reading tabs - frets, symbols and everything else.

Article Source: http://directoryjam.com

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