Got a HUGE guitar instructional book last Christmas....

[GuitarGuy503]

Well, I got a big guitar instructional book last Christmas. It's got alot of good info in it (retringing guitars,installing pickups,guitar cleaning methods, tabs, a load of pics of guitars from different companies, etc.) Anyway, I sat down a few times and tried to read and play the tabs and its almost like I get so overwhelmed with all the symbols and numbers its hard for me to concentrate and learn how to play the tabs. Anyone else get overwhelmed when looking at a tab book and just can't seem to play whats in them or is it just me? Maybe I should look into guitar instructional videos? I wanna learn how to solo and learn the soloing scales but the book I got leaves me so overwhelmed and confused because of all the tab symbols all over the place. Any thoughts on this? :smack:

 

[korinastratkyle]

Re: Got a HUGE guitar instructional book last Christmas....

Either
1. Your brain isn't good at processing numbers
or
2. You have ADD! LOL

I had no problem picking up tab, but I also have a 140 IQ in Math, go figure.

 

[DonLduk]

Re: Got a HUGE guitar instructional book last Christmas....

i think its got nothing to do with IQ.

just try to play simple stuff at first, dont try to learn a solo with 32nd notes at 200bps.. its really complex in tab.

try playing some slow stuff, like the chilli peppers's solo's, thsoe are good ones to start reading tab.

and also, dont get so used to tab, try reading notes not numbers. I suck so much that when im with other guitarrist, i tell them like "this part is a slide from 5 to 12 in X string". it sounds so horrible and unprofesional, instead of something like "the slide is from E to G "

see the difference?

I love tab, and ive learned a lot of stuff with it, but sometimes I regret I dont read real scores...

 

[tone4days]

Re: Got a HUGE guitar instructional book last Christmas....

i say start slow with tab ... then take it bit by bit, one measure at a time .. and i find that tab is best to accompany actually listening to the music whenever possible ... tab is very 'physical' ... it's telling you 'how' to do it as opposed to sheet music which tells you 'what' to do ... but there is no shortcut to incorporating a deep, memorized understanding of the scales/chords relationship into your soloing

get some simple backing tracks and improvise alot of solos ... get the sound in your head and build up the muscle memory in your fingers ... even if you do something very simple, like:

||: Am / / / | F / G / :|| x infinity

and play a simple A minor or A minor pentatonic scale over it ...

good luck
t4d