Break Away II

Learning how to read and play guitar tablature is a first step that all beginners get excited about.

Guitar Tabs are the fastest way to learn to play a familiar song, solo and particular guitar lick. The majority of us decide to learn guitar because we want to play our favorite tunes, because if this it makes sense that beginners should learn to read tabs quickly.

I’m going to share with you how to use and read guitar tabs with 3 tips: First, how to read and understand guitar tab, next some examples and finally tips to break a song down so you can learn quickly.

Understanding Tab

Compared to reading music, which might feel like learning a second language to some, understanding guitar tabs is simple.

Example of Basic Guitar Tab:

e——–

B——–

G——–

D——–

A——–

E——–

Each one of the lines on tab matches up with one of the 6 strings on your guitar. The top line corresponds to the bottom for first string on your guitar (the high e), while the bottom line of tab corresponds to the top or 6th string on your guitar (low E).

Reading Tab

Guitar tabs are simply a mix of numbers and symbols placed on different lines. Here’s a very simple tab for the E chord.

e—0—-

B—0—-

G—1—-

D—2—-

A—2—-

E—0—-

The number correspond to the fret you press down on that particular string. For this tab you would be playing: 2nd fret A string, 2nd Fret D string and first fret of the G string. The other 3 strings (E, B and e) are strummed open which is what the 0 means on the tab.

You would know this is a chord because the numbers are all on top of each other in a line. If you say something like this:

e———–

B———7-

G———–

D———–

A—–5—–

E-3———

You’d be playing just one string as apposed to strumming all 6. In this case it would be the 3rd fret of the low E, followed by the 5th fret of the A string and finally the 7th fret on the B string.

While there are other symbols you can run into this is the basics of how to read guitar tab.

Quickest Way to Learn Songs with Tab

This might seem straight forward but I have met many beginner guitar players who don’t think of this basic technique.

When you’re beginning to learn a song you should break that song down into sections.

If a given guitar tab has the chorus, verse and bridge of a particular song tabbed out then start with the verse first. Learning a song in parts, first slowly, then adding speed next and finally piecing all the parts together makes it far more manageable then trying to just play through the entire song first time.

What if you’re a complete newbie and as of yet haven’t learned your basic guitar chords I’d suggest getting a good guitar lesson dvd or learn guitar dvd to help you along the way. These courses can be almost as good as private lessons so long as you find one created by a quality guitar teacher and that covers all the right materials so you’re not left with any gaps in your learning later on.

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