
Tablature, or tab, is a notation method used by stringed instruments to learn a song quickly.
#GUITAR MUSIC NOTES HOW TO#
This lesson will show you how to read the pitches of the notes and how to read basic tablature. When combined with tablature, it is even more powerful. It tells a musician which notes to play, when to play them, and how to play them. Standard notation is a very important form of written musical communication.

#GUITAR MUSIC NOTES FREE#
And if you're not a member yet, sign up for a free Fender Play trial.Although, we love to listen to music, we need to be able to read and write it. If you'd like to learn more skills on your guitar, bass or ukulele, take a look at Fender Play's lessons here. You can access tabs for all of our songs, and we also include the traditional sheet music so you can switch back and forth, learning at your own pace and in your own way.
#GUITAR MUSIC NOTES TRIAL#
If you want to make sure you’re putting your time into learning an accurate tab that supports artists, check out a free trial of Fender Play. Unfortunately, they aren’t always reliable (a waste of your time) or legally licensed (musicians gotta eat, too!). If you know what the song sounds like, you can use a tab to learn a riff in minutes and skip the sheet music! Think of the iconic intro from “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” by The Rolling Stones, the contagious riff from “Pumped Up Kicks” by Foster the People, the badassery of the bassline in “Push It” by Salt-N-Pepa.Ī final note: tabs are really popular and easy to produce, and you’ll probably see tons of free options online. Tabs are incredibly useful, whether you’re a beginner or a more advanced player. Learning a riff with sheet music requires you to be able to read music - but tabs don’t. If all of that sounds foreign to you, don’t worry. If you know how to read music, all that detail is great. It will include the notes on bass and/or treble clefs that indicate both pitch and precise rhythm.

It will tell you the time signature, key signature, tempo, and dynamics. Traditional sheet music is much more detailed than tablature. The examples above are in standard tuning. Tabs should also tell you what kind of tuning is being used. The notes themselves will sometimes be spaced apart from one another in a way that helps you understand if they should be played closer together or farther apart. That said, some tabs will give you additional info to help you with timing, such as the tempo (communicated in beats-per-minute) and time signature (is it a 3/4 waltz or a 4/4 rock beat, for instance). Here are some more commonly-used symbols:Īs a rule, tabs don’t provide a ton of direction on rhythm it’s important that you’ve heard the song before and can use a combination of the tabs and your ear to get it down. The “h” means that you should do a hammer-on from the 3rd to the 5th fret to get that folky sound. For instance, in the beginning of the iconic “Man of Constant Sorrow” from O Brother, Where Art Thou?, you’ll see “3h5” on the 5th string. When it comes to incorporating techniques into tabs, there are some commonly-used symbols to keep in mind. These stacked numbers show you which notes you have to play all at once in order to form a chord - like the A7sus4 chord - that makes you feel feelings when you hear this song. If you’re learning “Wonderwall” (you know you want to), you’ll see multiple numbers stacked-one on each line. Playing chords using tabs: In addition to playing single notes and riffs, tablature can also be used to show you how to play a chord.

If you’re playing a melody, like the riff of “ Ring of Fire” shown above, you’ll see one number at a time, left to right. As you read and play the tabs from left to right, you begin to string together the song (pun intended). The second note is the 1st fret on the 5th string.

In the example above, the first note is the 0 fret on the 5th string (a 0 means that you play the open string). Playing single notes and riffs in tablature: Each number on a line represents which fret you should play on that specific string. In standard tuning, the lines of tabs represent these notes: In standard tuning, they represent the high E and low E notes, respectively: The top line is the 1st string and the bottom line is the 6th string. The lines in a tab represent the strings on a guitar. Be the first to know about new products, featured content, exclusive offers and giveaways.
