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I have been learning to play my new acoustic guitar lately. It is not easy as a beginner guitar player, but I have found that I can start to play some of my favorite country music songs on my guitar with the help of country guitar tabs.

Guitar tabs (in general), and country guitar tabs specifically, help you to play, much better than chords because they show you where to hold your fingers. I can’t even read chords but I can play with the help of country guitar tabs. But I digress, I wanted to say in the first play why I enjoy playing country music so much on my Esteban guitar. Country music songs just sound better, especially on my Esteban acoustic guitar. But I really like how country songs really tell a story.

I think my favorite artist is Carrie Underwood, and I love her song, Undo It. But I am torn because I really like the way that, Luke Bryan, tells stories and sings the song, Rain is a Good Thing. But I also really like some of the old classic songs, like Take this Job and Shove It, by Johnny Paycheck.  So what do you think about these country music songs? I am think about learning the first country song for my guitar next.  I will check out the Country Guitar Tabs blog to learn more. I am also thinking about buying the Jamorama beginner guitar course they sell online. It looks really nice. And I do like that I can download the songs and lessons, and they do have guitar tabs, which are great since I can’t really read chords or sheet music.

Country music, for me, is all about the stories, and I do love to tell them on my acoustic guitar. Though I am doing so well I am thinking about getting an acoustic electric guitar or just a regular electric guitar to play some cross-over country songs. So there are all these great country songs, and I’m learning to play them with country guitar tabs.

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As the first method that beginner guitar players use to learn songs guitar tabs are an important skill to understand. Most guitar dvd or similar guitar training product tabs are usually introduced early on since they’re such a vital role to your learning. If this is your first intro to guitar tab don’t worry I’ll go easy on you, and if you’re using a guitar lesson course at home rest assured you will have some lessons on reading tab.

In this article you’ll learn how to create tabs, how to read them and how to play guitar tabs. After you read this guitar tab lesson you should be able to read most basic tabs and underStand how to play them. Starting out take your time learning tabs, it’s a good idea to master a song or piece from a tab slow first then add speed, accuracy is what makes a great guitar player.

Let’s Begin

How Guitar Tabs are Made

A guitar tab is like looking at your guitar neck if the guitar was in the case. A guitar tab has 6 lines, one for each string on your guitar. The top line of guitar tab corresponds to the first string on your guitar or the high E. The bottom string on a guitar tab corresponds to the sixth string or your low E string.

Here’s a quick example

1st ——–
2nd ——–
3rd ——–
4th ——–
5th ——–
6th ——–

How to Read Guitar Tablature

The second part of reading guitar tabs is knowing which note or fret to play on each string. The nice thing about tab is you don’t need to know note names, it’s all about playing particular frets on particular strings.

Here’s another example

1st -2——
2nd ——–
3rd ——–
4th —–6–
5th ——–
6th ——-3

The number on each string line corresponds to the fret you are supposed to use when playing that string at that point in the song. In the above example you’re to play the second fret on the first string, then the sixth fret on the fourth string followed by the third fret on the sixth string.

A full song tabbed will look just like the above example with lines and numbers. Some songs will be all single notes on one or two strings while others will have full tabbed chords to play. Below is an example of a tabbed C chord.

1st ———
2nd –1—–
3rd —2—-
4th ——–
5th —3—-
6th —x—-

Above it the right fingering for a C major chord. Notice the x on the 6th string, this is something we haven’t looked at before the X means you do not play this string. So if you see an x on a particular string don’t strum or pluck that string.

With this information you should be able to go out and find some tabs of your favorite songs. There are some more advanced symbols you might run into in tabs, don’t worry you’ll learn them as your progress.

Quality guitar lessons on dvd will be of assistance to teach you more advanced tab reading skills. It’s important to not stop learning, tab is just one skill you should strive to master on the guitar. You will become a better guitar player and better musician if you push to learn how to also read music and understand theory as well as reading tabs.

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I get a lot of questions about what it takes to become a faster guitar player. My answer is always the same, practice. Of course that answer doesn’t always go over well with beginners it’s the truth. In order to get great at anything you must first be able to do it slowly, then add speed.

In this article I cover three practice exercises you can start doing now to improve both your accuracy and your speed. If you consistently do them you should start to see results after the first week.

If you are taking guitar lessons from someone right now I suggest you print this off and bring a copy to your instructor. They have have similar or better exercises they’d like you to do. The same goes if you’re using a learn guitar dvd or other home study program consider skipping ahead in your lessons to see if there are any exercises for playing faster coming later on. The course developer or your instructor may prefer you follow different methods to play faster

Exercise 1 – Practice Scales

UnderStanding the important major and minor scales, along with notes on the neck is something you should learn. f you don’t know your scales yet don’t worry. Do a quick search online for pentatonic shapes, or visit a beginner guitar lessons website and search for pentatonic scales. What you’re looking for is an image of the first pentatonic position.

You’re going to take that first pentatonic position and memorize it. Don’t worry yet about what scale you’re playing the shape is what you need first.

Start playing that first shape on the 6th string all the way down to the 1st string Once you reach the 1st string play the scale backwards up to the 6th string. Next slide up to the second fret and do it all again, then the third fret, fourth fret and so on.

The key here is to learn accuracy with hitting the frets and the notes as you move up and down the neck forwards and backwards through the scale position.

Exercise 2 – Playing Faster

Next you want to repeat the first exercise but we want to increase how quickly you’re doing it. Using a metronome find a pace that is comfortable for you to play the first pentatonic shape. For some that might be 60-70 BPM for others it might be 100. The key is to find a comfortable speed to start at.

Click start on your metronome and starting on the first fret play the scale forwards and backwards. You’re going to next slide up to fret two again but this time increase the tempo on your metronome by one beat per minute and continue to do this each fret all the way up the neck of your guitar.

This exercise allows you to “warm up” to the idea of playing faster while maintaining accuracy and skill. Once you make it all the way up the neck you’ll have increased your speed by 12-16 beats per minute and hopefully maintained your accuracy and technique Ideally do this exercise for a few weeks maintaining the same starting tempo for at least a few days to ensure you’ve mastered it, then increase your starting tempo.

Exercise 3 – Picking Up and Down

Most beginners only hit the string on the down stroke with their pick. As you advance in your speed exercises you’ll probably find that hitting the string on the way down isn’t enough to play as quickly as you’d like. You need to hit it down and up so you get two plucks of the string in the same time you used to only get one. This can feel uncomfortable at first but we’ll work into it slowly.

Before you trying playing a scale start by just hitting the first string, low E, up and down a few times to get the feel Next move down to the 5th string, then the 4th and onwards all the way down to the 1st string. Now do it in reverse from the 1st string to the 6th string. This exercise will help you feel comfortable picking up and down on all the strings and changing strings.

Finally add in the same pentatonic shape we’ve been using in the first and second exercises. You will probably find it tough to play fast right away. Moving your fretting fingers and remembering to double pick up and down at the same time takes some getting used to.

By practicing these exercises a few times each week for about a month you’ll find yourself becoming faster and faster. Of course don’t abandon your other practice exercises. You must maintain pace with your guitar lesson dvd or guitar lesson plan Learning to play the guitar is fun but it does take work. Rest assured how ever if you put the work in you will become a better guitar player.

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