Writing Down Electric Guitar Music

Although music for the guitar can be written using standard musical notation, on the internet and in many music books it is often written using tablature. This form of representing guitar music is widely used because it is very simple to learn and very quick to write especially on computers - no special symbols are required to represent musical notes. Tablature is often used in conjunction with a related method of transcription - chord diagrams. This lesson will provide an introduction to both techniques.

Tablature

Tablature (or tab for short) will show you at what fret to play on what string, what tuning to use, as well as indicating effects such as hammer ons, pull offs, tapping, slides and bends, for example. One disadvantage to tablature is that it gives no exact indication of timing, although in some tabs the spacing between notes can give a rough guide. For this reason, sheet music typically provides both tablature and standard musical notation.

Here is an example of a line of tablature, labelled to show what each part represents.

As you can see, a complete guitar tablature consists of six lines that represent the strings of a guitar (tablature can also consist of seven strings or four strings for a bass), however sometimes only a few of the strings will be represented. If this is the case the strings which are represented will usually be stated. On most tabs the lowest string represents the string on the guitar that is nearest your shoulders.

The numbers on tablature indicate what fret to play the note at and are read from left to right so that the note furthest left on a line of tablature is played first. If notes are above each other (as in the first bar of the example), then this indicates that they should be played simultaneously. The letters on the left of the tab (E, A, D, G, B, E) show the tuning to be used. There are many symbols that can be used on tablature to signify a special way of playing a note. Typical examples are listed below.

/ = slide
bu= bend up
bd= bend down
h = hammer on
t = tap
^ = vibrato
pm= palm mute

Click here to continue page 2 of this lesson >>

Previous lesson: First Notes
Next lesson: Changing Strings
Top^^