Guitar Tab Influx

How to learn to read Guitar Tabs

By Gene Petty

Copyright © 2013 by Gene Petty

All rights reserved

Table Of Contents

Chapter 1.  Starting At The Bottom

Chapter 2.  Adding The A and D Strings

Chapter 3.  All Six Strings

Chapter 4.  Chords

Chapter 5.  Adorned with Arrows

Chapter 6.  Rhythm Breakdown

Chapter 7. Review

Chapter 1.  Starting At The Bottom

As the title of the chapter says, we are going to start at the bottom and work our way up.

“Hold on a second”, you say. “What do you mean by ‘bottom’?”

A very good question that has not one, but two answers:

1.        The bottom of the Tab itself

2.       The bottom pitches or lowest tones of the guitar

Assuming that you can hear the difference between high and low pitches; you will find that the lowest note that you can sound will be produced on the thickest string. That string is called the low E string. Here is a picture of the guitar neck or fret board showing the Low E string all the way to the left.

I know that most of you probably know that already, but I am setting this up so you can see the relationship between the fret board and the tab.

As you will notice in the next figure, the guitar neck is turned sideways:

The Low E string is at the bottom. This is actually how the tabs are presented visually. There is one difference: on the tabs, the frets are not shown visually but represented as numbers. More of that in a few seconds.

Before I totally erase the frets, I want to pull the E string away from the other strings to simplify things. Here is the Low E string gaining some independence.

We are going to leave the other strings [A,D,G,B,and high E] for later.

Let’s look at the Low E string all by itself:

The frets are still there, but they wont do us any good like this. We can’t point to each fret with an arrow and say “play this fret, now play this one, now go way to the right of the picture and imagine here the 9th fret is and play that.” Kind of ridiculous don’t you think?

The solution is easy. We assign numbers to the frets. From now on, instead of pointing to the visual fret, we call out the number of the fret to be played.

So, lets get rid of the images of the frets since now we have the algebra of numbers to replace them.

What we have as a result is a straight line with numbers below.

Since we need to be specific about which string the fret is being played, we simply put the numbers on the line representing the string.

This is what you would call a tab for just one string. It could be any one string, but we know that this is for now, the Low E string. This tab is telling you to play the first, second, third and fourth frets in that order. This just happens to coincide with the order of frets. However, melodies are not restricted to chromatic scales, which is what this order of notes amounts to. We can put them in any order, depending upon which notes are being played:

In this sequence of notes on the Low E string, we would first put our finger on the 2nd fret move down to the 1st, move up to the 4th and back down to the 3rd.

While visually this motion looks linear or horizontal, you probably think that I should have said move “right” instead of “up or down”. By “up and down” I am talking in terms of pitch, or higher and lower tones.

There is reading music and hearing music; reading music always moves from left to right, hearing music is always moving up down or stationary. Stationary motion is hitting the same note repeatedly. Keep in mind that we ‘read’ tabs left to right, but we ‘play’ music up [ascending], down [descending], or stationary.

If you have never read notes and are suddenly curious, you can learn how to read by checking out the series “Music For Kids and Adults”.

What if we want to play the string open without pressing any frets?

It’s as easy as putting a zero on the tab.

This sequence of notes ends with the Low E string open.

You might be wondering, what about the rhythm?

Most professional books on tabs will show you the rhythm and the notes on a line above the tabs called a Staff. The reason guitarists read tabs is because they already know how the song moves rhythmically.

From what I have gathered, most guitarists outside of Classical and Jazz just don’t want to bother learning to read notes. Most of what they pick up is taught or learned aurally. Guitar is different from band instruments where they usually learn as an ensemble and need to play specific notes together. There seems to be more of an aural tradition when learning guitar in the realms of folk, blues and rock related genres.

So, keep in mind that in order to learn how to play the notes of a song from tabs, you really need to have heard the song and maybe tried plucking the notes out even before you read a tab. The tab merely offers you a shortcut in learning where to play the notes you have already heard, on the guitar neck.

We have all heard ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb’. Here is what the tab would look like if it were played on the low E string.

I would like to present this in a more professional looking tab to show what is going on with the rhythm. Every knows there are some longer notes and shorter notes: Ma Ry Had A Lit Tle LAAAAAAAAMB.

If each of the shorter syllables are one beat, then the word “Lamb” will be held for two beats. Here is how it would look on a full tab.

Notice that the top line is written on a staff [5 lines] indicating the notes and the rhythms. The black notes are called quarter notes and they are each one beat. The other notes are called half notes; each of them has two beats duration. The last note is called a whole note, worth four beats.

The bottom section is the full tab. It is telling you by number, each fret to play on the low E string.

I believe that most guitar players ignore what is written on the staff because of the lack of interest in learning notes and rhythms. However, some are more curious than others are.

If you are curious about learning to read notes, there are oodles of beginners method books out there that start with note learning and never even mention tabs. Most of us started with Mel Bay for general note learning, or for classical, we used the Shearer method. Again, let me suggest “Music For Kids And Adults” which is fun to read because it is in comic book form.

As you learn to read from the tabs, you might benefit from looking at the actual notes occasionally.

Now that you have the basic idea of how a tab works for one string, get ready to add the next lowest string, called the A string or 5th string.

Chapter 2.  Adding The A and D Strings

In our last example, I purposely showed the simpler version of Mary Had A Little Lamb so that it would not complicate matters going to higher notes.

You can do two things when reaching beyond a five-fret span:

1.        Stay on the same string and move up the frets

2.       Move to the next string staying in the same five-fret span.

In This second version, I have circled the two notes that are different:

Notice that the higher pitched notes which could have been played on the 7th fret on the low E string, are played on the A string on the second fret.

The Chromatic Scale

If we were to play every fret in order on the Low E string, the tab would read:

This is commonly known as a Chromatic Scale. It includes all the notes in succession.

Rarely is the chromatic scale played on one string. Guitar is generally played in what are called positions. The idea is to be able to play musical phrases without having to interrupt the flow by constantly moving the hand unnecessarily. If you can stay in the same position, then it is recommended you do so. If you watch guitarists play, you will see they stay in one position for a while, and then move to another position for a few more notes and then to another. They do not constantly move all over the frets unless they are doing a sliding-zoom type of effect.

In order to facilitate position playing the guitarist will simply move over to the next string [A]. Compare the tab below to the one above and see how it switches to the adjacent string after it gets to the 4th fret.

Still, unless we have good reason to change position [which is highly probable], we need to amend this tab to accommodate us. Now the D string will come into play.

Notice that the tab makes use of three lines now. The third line from the bottom represents the D string.

Adding more strings at this point might cause some confusion. In order to avoid being overwhelmed with too many strings, you are now going to try some exercises to get you to be comfortable with what you know so far.

Exercise 1. Easy Bass line.

Most everyone has heard this bass line. It was popularised in the Rock and Roll of the 1950’s and has its roots in the ‘Boogie-Woogie’ of the 30’s and 40’s. It’s a great introduction to learn how to use your bottom three strings.

Notice that an open string has not been used and the 5th fret is used instead.

This is so you don’t become dependent on only locating patterns with open strings. If you learn how this pattern looks visually on your fret board, then you can transpose to different keys by moving the same pattern to different frets.

Exercise 2. Transposition of Exercise 1

This is the same pattern starting on the 5th fret.

To be sure you understand this:

First Measure:

Play the E string 5th fret.

Play the 4th and 7th frets on the A string.

Play the 4th fret on the D string.

Second measure

Play the 5th fret and the 4th fret on the D string

Play the 7th fret and the 4th fret on the A string

Third measure is the same as the first.

Fourth measure is the same as the second.

Exercise 3. Transposition to Open E

Let’s say we had to do the same notes in the key of E.

In this case we would approach a different visual pattern with open E and open D:

The more you play familiar types of melodies from tabs, the easier it gets to read them. One of the most familiar melodies that everyone has heard is the Major Scale. Let’s explore the different Major Scales that you can play with your bottom three strings. (By the way, learning Major scales is the basis for learning technique. Once you learn these scales, you should incorporate them into your practice every day.)

Exercise 4. The E Major Scale

Did you notice that funny bar line at the end with the dots? That means REPEAT.

Normally I would put a 10x at the end to repeat it 10 times. I will leave it up to you. The more you repeat the exercise, the more proficient you will become. I shouldn’t even have to mention that correct repetition is the key to learning. Notice I said “correct repetition”. If you practice it incorrectly with wrong or uneven notes, your playing will sound uneven and wrong.

I can’t stress the importance of practicing scales repeatedly.

Now try the G scale. Start with your second finger on the third fret.

Exercise 5. The G major Scale

That is what we call open position. When the open strings are used, we can call it open position. Make sure that you hear a Major scale correctly.

Everyone knows how “Do re me…” is supposed to sound. You may have issues if you are tone deaf. If that’s the case, then you need to listen to a major scale played over and over until you can tell when a wrong note is played. I believe that some tone deafness can be overcome with constant repetition of pitches.

Now you are going to learn the G scale in second position.

When I say “second position”, I mean that the lowest finger “position” plays on the second fret. Don’t let this confuse you since the lowest note is on the third fret.

Exercise 6. The G Major Scale Second Position

Now the same pattern for the Ab Major Scale followed by the A Major scale.

Exercise 7.  The Ab Major scale in third position

Now move up to the 4th position and do the A Major scale. For now keep your eyes on the tab as much as you can. What’s going to happen is that you are going to eventually look at your frets and see the pattern that is used to play these major scales. Once you see the patterns, you are no longer going to want to read the tab any more. You will memorize the way the pattern looks on the guitar. In the beginning however, it is better to keep your eyes on the tab so that you get used to reading the tab.

Exercise 8. The A Major scale 4th position

Now you should now be ready for some single note tab reading on all six strings.

Chapter 3.   All Six Strings

Since you have already read the tab for the three bottom strings, you should now be ready to add the remaining upper three strings.

In open position play every note between the lowest string [inclusive] and the highest string [inclusive] up to the 4th fret. Remember that we don’t want to play any of the same notes two times in a row. So pay close attention when you come around the B string.

Exercise 9. The E Chromatic Scale 2 Octaves

Ascending

Descending

Congratulations, you just read a tab that used all six strings.

Now we can use any, all or just some of the strings. In the earlier exercises, you played the Boogie-Woogie bass line. It was limited to just one section, or key center, namely, the key of G. Now armed with more strings, we can play the complete bass line that employs the key centers of C and D as well. Here is an exercise with all 12 bars.

Exercise 10. The Complete Boogie Woogie In G

Did you notice that in the last four bars that you changed position?

This was so that you could consistently use the same pattern in different positions.     To understand what I mean, try playing the same last 4 bars that you just played and use different frets as shown in the tab below.

Slightly awkward, isn’t it?

Exercise 11. E Major scale Ascending and Descending Two Octaves

The G Can Be played with this same pattern when in Third Position.

Exercise 12. The G Major Scale Third position Starting with the First Finger

Ascending

Descending

There is one slight difference in the G scale pattern. Can you find it?

Now we will revert to the other way to play the G scale starting with the second finger on the third fret.

Exercise 13. G Major Scale Second Position starting with the Second Finger Third Fret

Ascending

Descending

Chapter 4.  Chords

Once you have learned the basic idea about how tabs work, the rest is almost self explanatory. However, there may be a problem when Chords appear. This is because while the tab is showing the chord notes to be played, there is a chord diagram shown as well.

Chord diagrams look like this:

They are usually accompanied by a name such as “A Major” or “BMinor” or “C Minor 7th” or “A7”.

The problem is that they show a fingering that may not correspond with what is actually being played. If you choose to play the chord diagram, you may end up playing the correct notes in the wrong order. Or you may end up playing notes that are not supposed to be played.

Take a D Chord for instance. Here is what you might see above the stave:

On top of the diagram it may say “D Major”.

Viewing the tab for this chord and finger position will give you this:

The problem arises when the artist does not play the chord this way.

Many guitar players prefer to play the D major chord in a bar type formation.

In that case the tab will look like this:

Notice that all the numbers are piled up one above the other.

Also notice those three 7’s. That makes for an easily recognizable chord if you get used to spotting it.

What this means is that you need to learn chords in all positions and formations, so that you can readily identify the correlating tab numbers.

To get a better understanding of chords: Guitar Chords Methodology.

Chapter 5.  Adorned with Arrows

Bends

Now that you know the basics of tab reading, you are going to need an arsenal of non-note symbols that are common to guitar performance.

Probably the most important symbol is the bend. Earlier tabs used a “b” or a “^” for bends, but a more modern symbol is a curved arrow with instructions “Full”, “1/2” or “1 ½”.

The notes in the first diagram are G to A. The bend is a full or “whole” step. A whole step is two frets apart, so you bend from fret 8 to fret 10 on the B string.

The second diagram shows a lesser bend which amounts to a ”half step”.

This note only stretches, or bends up to the note that is only one fret above.

The third diagram stretches furthest to the third fret above.

Other Tab Symbols

To learn lead licks and riffs and effects, check out one of these two books:

Guitar Instruction For The Not So Serious Guitar Player

Learning Lead Guitar

h = hammer  - A hammer is when you slap your fret finger down hard enough that you can make a sound without picking.

p = pull off – Pull offs are kind of the opposite of hammers. You pluck a note and then effectively play a lower note by “pulling” the string with your fretting finger.

/ = slide up – Sliding is just what you think it is. The trick is to slide to the correct note from a number of frets below.

\ = slide down – Sliding down is less definite. The idea is to release the slide not too early  and not too late. If you let go too soon the effect is cut off. If you release too late, you will end up playing in a different key.

v or ~ = vibrato – Vibrato is something to be learned over the long haul. In the beginning, practice vibrato as if you were turning a doorknob. Slowly back and forth moving the wrist without moving the elbow.

PM = palm muting I am a big fan of palm muting as you will see in these books:

Guitar Improvisation In 7 Minutes

Guitar Instruction For the Not So Serious Guitar Player

Chapter 6.  Rhythm Breakdown

Quarter Notes

Tabs have advanced in the last few years to the point that they actually place the rhythms in the tab staff.

It would be good to make a quick study of rhythm, even if you don’t learn to read notes.

Much of what I am about to tell you here can be found in my Music For Kids and Adults series.

The “C” on the top line means two things:

4 beats to each measure

Quarter note gets one beat

As much as you see the “C” symbol you will also see 4/4 as the time signature. They both mean the same thing.

The top number represents how many beats in a measure [4]. The bottom number tells you what kind of note gets ONE beat [4 means “quarter note” in this case.

This tab is telling you to hit the open E string 4 times evenly with the beat.

Half Notes

Half notes are twice as long as quarter notes. With the time signature of 4/4, they get two beats each.

Notice that you can’t tell immediately from the tabs that they are two beats.

If you know how to read half notes you can look at the top line and know how many beats to hold them.

Whole Notes

Here is one whole note in one measure of 4/4 time:

Looking at the tab one can’t really tell how long to hold the note.

Understanding that in 4/4 time a whole note gets 4 beats, one will then know how long to hold the note.

One whole note = two half notes = four quarter notes.

8th, 16th and 32 notes

You are probably wondering what those funny notes with the beams are.

We can break down notes even further by adding beams connecting the notes.

One quarter note can be broken down into two 8th notes. An 8th note can be broken down into two 16th notes.

How many 16th notes then, would equal one quarter note?

Answer: 4.

How many 32nd notes equal one quarter note?

Answer: 8

How many 32nd notes will equal a whole note?

Answer: 32

Chapter 7. Review

The first thing a beginner needs to do is listen. Listen to the guitar part that you want to play. Try to pluck out notes if you can.

Listen to the song many times. Repeat listening one hundred times.

Try different chords to see if they fit. Try to copy the solo riffs and licks by ear.

After you have done the above, get hold of the tabs to the song.

At this point be forewarned that there are tabs out there that people put up online that are poorly written.

There is also a problem of getting hold of tabs in the wrong key.

Be ready for mistakes.

If you find a good tab, see if it matches the recording. Try out a few of the first notes and see if they match.

When you approach the actual learning of the tab, go slow. You will never learn by trying to get through it fast.

Build up speed in small areas of the song. Piece it together after you have worked on one section at a time.

Compare it too the recording to find if you have learned the wrong notes or not.

If you are confused, go back and read this book from the beginning and approach the tune one string at a time. Start with the lowest string you see used in the song. Just try that string and jump to the next section that uses the lowest string.

Add one string at a time and eventually the whole song will come together.

Last Word

I hope this book has shown you what tabs are all about.

There are more tab symbols and more complicated rhythmic tabs out there that I have not included here.

What I hope to have accomplished is a mere introduction to the tab process and the student can move on from there to learn more with other tab instruction on websites and other books.

I can’t stress enough, the concept of listening over and over to the recordings and playing along where possible. That is the best way to learn.

I have hinted here and there about my other learning books, but just incase you glossed over them without clicking on the links, here they are again:

Guitar Improvisation in 7 Minutes

Guitar Instruction For The Not So Serious Guitarist

Guitar Chords Methodology

Learning Lead Guitar

How To Play Guitar Trilogy A 3 In 1 Learn To Play Guitar Course

Music For Kids and Adults Book 1

Music For Kids and Adults Book 2

Music For Kids and Adults Book 3

Downloadguitarlessonsfree.com

Have fun and thanks for your purchase of this book.

If you like, please leave a review where you found this book.

above all,

KEEP PRACTICING,

Gene Petty

Table of Contents

Chapter 1. Starting At

Chapter 2. Adding The A and D Strings

Chapter 3. All Six Strings

Chapter 4. Chords

Chapter 5. Adorned with Arrows

Chapter 6. Rhythm Breakdown

Chapter 7. Review