Learning Guitar Tablature

Guitar tablature, or simply "tab," is the easiest way to read music on the guitar. This is the method we will be using to teach you. It is different and MUCH easier to learn than traditional musical notation.

Although learning how to read this type of music on the guitar is possible, not only is it time consuming, it's very BORING. For now we'll concentrate on faster and easier ways to learn the guitar. If learning to read music for the guitar is something you would like to learn in the future, it's definitely an option if you want to expand your musical knowledge. For now, however, we will stick to teaching you the guitar as quickly as possible with guitar tablature.

Guitar tablature is represented by 6 lines- the bottom line being the 1st (thinnest) string on your guitar, and the bottom being the 6th (thickest) string on your guitar. Below is a guitar tablature staff.

Beside each string you will notice letters (E, A, D, G, B, and E again). Musically, the first string is an "E" string, the 2nd an "A" string, and so on. Basically when you strike the 1st string you are making an "E" note, when you strike the 2nd string you are making an "A" note, and so on. For now, we'll just stick to calling the strings by their numbers as that is easier.

When a note is played on the guitar and written in tablature, numbers will appear on the lines. A note is simply the word to describe the pitch and duration of sound. The number on the line represents what fret is being held and on what string. If the number is "0" that means an open string is being played. An open string simply means you just pick the string without holding any of the frets.

Below means that the 5th fret is being played on the 4th string and then an open string is being played on the 2nd string.

The above example is playing single notes. Below we will talk about playing chords. A chord is simply any time two or more notes are played at the same time. How is this represented in guitar tablature? The numbers are stacked on top of eachother, just like in the diagram below. The diagram means that the 3rd fret on the 6th string and the 5th fret on the 5th string are both strummed at the same time.

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The Secret To Learning Guitar As Fast As Possible

The secret to learning the guitar as fast as possible: consistency. Don't confuse consistency with thinking this means you need all the free time in the world for guitar lessons. Practising the material I teach you for just 10 minutes per day will be far more beneficial to you than practising once a month for 6 hours in one sitting.

About Us

Contact us at stupideasyguitar [at] gmail.com. The goal of this site is to teach people how to play the guitar as quickly and easily as possible. From what I've found, guitar teachers and instructors often don't teach their students things that will help them learn the instrument as fast as possible. Why? Well, a lot of guitar teachers are classically trained so they will teach their students things like how to read music which can be very time consuming, frustrating and boring for beginner guitarists. While there is nothing wrong with learning how to read music, this should never be taught at the beginning of the guitar learning process because its gets in the way of teaching students things that are much easier to learn so they can get playing recognizable riffs, chords and songs on the guitar as soon as possible. The more students aren't learning the simple and easy things first, the greater the chance there is of them quitting and giving up on the guitar altogether.