Tablature or Musical Notation?
I’m dealing with this question now because I know it’s one that will arise in your mind within a few days of doing your first country guitar lesson. It’s one that crops up time and time again on the forums and it was one that I wondered about myself when I first started.
The point that people raise is, why go to all the trouble of learning to read music and understanding theory, when all you really need to play songs on a guitar is the tabs? And it’s a reasonable point (if you don’t understand any of this go to this page to learn what tabs are). You could spend the rest of your playing life having a lot of fun with friends and even some bands without ever understanding properly what you are playing, which is what tabs allow you to do. But they have their limitations.
For one thing, guitarists are the only musicians who use tablature. They have no meaning for anyone else. Ask the drummer for the tabs and he’ll probably hand you a sheaf of bar bills. They are also notoriously innaccurate because they are created by other guitar players, based on their interpretation of a piece of music. But the biggest problem is what they do not tell you. They do not tell you how long a note is or how long a chord should be held, they do not tell you what the time signature is and they give no indication of the theme of a tune. If you haven’t heard the tune before, you won’t know what it should sound like.
Learn music, on the other hand, and you will eventually be able to play anything and everything just by reading from a musical score. It will take longer to learn, but in the long run is likely to be more rewarding, depending on your personal disposition.
Now this is the important bit: I know from experience that some online guitar lessons are great for the tabs reader, but limiting for the dedicated musician, while others are the complete reverse. There are also some that are sort of middle of the road and teach you just enough theory to get you by. Before you spend any money on lessons, it’s a good idea to sort out which route you want to take. It will save you time, money and endless hours of frustration.