ShedTab

Guide

How to read guitar tab (numbers and symbols)

Tab is guitar notation you can read without knowing standard notation. The horizontal lines are the strings and the numbers are the frets to press.

Lines and numbers

The six lines are the strings. The top line is the thinnest string (high E), the bottom one the thickest (low E). It's upside down compared with looking down at the guitar, which trips people up at first.
Numbers are frets. 0 means the open string.
Numbers stacked vertically are played together as a chord; numbers side by side are played one after another.

Common symbols

h: hammer-on. Hit the string with a fretting finger to sound the next note (5h7).
p: pull-off. Flick the finger off to sound the lower note (7p5).
/ \: slide. Keep pressure and slide along the string.
b: bend. Push the string to raise the pitch. full is a whole step, 1/2 a half step.
~: vibrato. x: dead note, a muted scratch. ( ): a tied note or a ghost note.
P.M.: palm mute, resting the edge of your picking hand on the strings.

What about rhythm?

Plain text tabs don't show note lengths, so you match them to the recording.
Tabs made in Guitar Pro and similar apps have stems and flags under the numbers. One flag is an eighth note, two is a sixteenth.

Steps

Listen slowly: drop the tab into ShedTab and follow the numbers at about 50% speed.
Turn on the fretboard: it shows which string and fret each note is on as it plays.
Loop a little: loop one or two bars until your hands know them.
Speed up: use the speed trainer to raise the tempo a bit on every pass.

Questions

Is the low string ever on top? Rarely. Almost all tabs put the thinnest string on top. If string names (e B G D A E) are written on the left, go by those.
What about two-digit numbers? 12 or 15 just means the 12th or 15th fret.

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