Thursday, May 23, 2013

How to read Guitar Tabs


Learning how to read guitar tab is quite easy, all but one problem. Unlike standard music notation, there is no real standard to how TABS are written. The differences aren't huge but you do need to get familiar with the various forms of guitar tab. Another major problem with guitar tabs is that there might be no indication of rhythm. This subject is a little bit misleading and really only affects guitar tabs that are created in ASCII, but even some ASCII tabs do have the rhythmic value included.


Guitar Tab Basic

We'll start off with the absolute basics of guitar tab, how to read the notes. Guitar TAB consists of six lines, each line represents a guitar string. The lines are laid out as though you had the guitar lying down face up on your lap and were looking down at it, presuming you are a right handed player.

Blank Guitar Tab

The vertical lines represent each bar and each bar is one measure. Because each line represents a guitar string, writing tabs is as simple as writing the fret number on each string. The horizontal axis equals time so you play each note on the fretboard from left to right.

Guitar Tab Chromatic Run

The numbers on the fretboard below show the exact note order in which you would play the above tab.

Fretboard chromatic notes

Because the horizontal axis equals time, chords will have their notes shown in the same vertical line. The Guitar tab below shows how an A minor chord strummed four times in one measure.

Guitar Chords Tab

So far so good, reading the notes from the guitar tab is easy enough, what we need to know now is the timing / rhythm information and how to read various guitar techniques such as slides, bends pull offs etc. This will depend on the various types of guitar tabs. Let's take a look at these before moving onto the more advanced parts of reading TABS.


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