How important is it to learn to read music on top of tabs?

Because it doesn't convey complete information about the rhythm, no matter how hard it tries.

Look at that tab figure you posted - you can tell from the tab that each note is the same length, eighth notes. You can NOT tell from the tab that the first note in each measure is to be held for the duration of the measure... but that's evident in the standard notation.

Hmm, good point. But you should be able to keep all the information of notation and just replace the dots with numbers and add an extra line, creating some kind of supertab? Would make it a load more intuitive without losing anything except the ability to give it to other musicians.

Arjen,

First off, try reading your example and remove the standard notation part. Then try to decipher the DURATION of any one note and the EMPHASIS placed on the beats in any bar. You can't.

There have been attempts to make a supertab, but the more you put into it, the more it looks like standard notation. Worse still, the whole thing becomes very cluttered and unreadable - if you read my review of emedia, this was one of the thngs that I disliked about it.

Let's face it, once you've got as far as putting timing, duration and rhythm patterns into tab, you may as well make the extra effort and learn where the notes are on the staff.

Haha, just blindly grabbed the first pic on guitar-rpo.com, kinda assumed they would showcase their product. I can send you a screenshot of how the current version looks if you want since it actually does show the duration of each note. But still, it isn't *that* much of an effort to learn it, as you said.

Even if you have some sort of "super-tab" that conveys the rythm, the tab doesn't tell you the note being played.

Take a look at this tab:

E ----2----
B ----3----
G ----2----
D ----x----
A ----2----
E ----x----

Now, which chord are you playing:

Bm7, D6, something else entirely?

If all you have is the tab you don't know. But the context of the notation you'd know.

Now you want your keyboard player to comp an inversion of this chord, so you turn to him and say what? You don't know what chord you're playing so what do you ask him to comp on?

Sorry Arjen, but you're wrong.

Musical notation is to music what mathematics is to physics -- it's the written language the whole thing is done within. Not learning it handicaps you as a musician, plain and simple.

Okay, so somebody give me some advice on how to start learning to read standard notation and play it on the guitar.

Where I'm at to begin with:

*I can read standard notation to play the piano but not well enough to play fluidly. I spent substantial time in college as a vocal performance major so I can sightsing (well, I could back then anyway) and can follow a melody line).

*I can tell you the note name of a given fret, though I have to think for a moment (currently I've been playing with "Fretboard Warrior", a little Mac widget that quizzes you by showing you a fret and asking you to identify the note).

*I do well with guitar notation that's tab plus staff; the tab tells me where to put my fingers, the staff tells me the rhythmic stuff.

*I know basic chords by name but music theory was never my strong suite and the subtleties of chord naming tend to elude me.

You're doing all right so far.

The answer to many guitar questions is the one and only "practice, practice, practice" - which is what you need to do now.

a lot of people use tabs to figure out how to play songs that they already have the music to, but don't know how to play. in these cases, rhythmic notations are superfluous, for the same reason that you can have physics conversations that don't need a lot of mathematics besides zero, 1, 2, 3 and infinity.
in fact, i've taken a few high level mathematics classes that didn't use any numbers besides 0, 1, 2, 3, and infinity.

Musical notation is to music what mathematics is to physics -- it's the written language the whole thing is done within. Not learning it handicaps you as a musician, plain and simple.

Well, once again I don't agree with you. One big difference is that you can allways play or sing music, but often can ideas in physics only be explained with mathematics. Music is a language in itself, physics is not. Physics can not explain itself, but music can be played.

If you write down music, you can not grasp the whole thing, right? In fact, the best way to write down music is to record it. It's like writing down utterances, you can't capture everything with text, like for instance an ironic touch. So therefore I think it's more suitable to compare standard notation with text.

If you want to be good with words - talk! If you want to be a good musician - play! I think that's more important than to learn to write down things.

With that said, I think it's a good thing to learn to write music. I've for instance written down a song with an arrangement for a piano, an oboe and an english horn. But of course I could have written it with MIDI and used a sampler with soundfonts to present it for the musicians. Still, I'm quite happy to be able to write down musical ideas, even if I don't do it so often. It's a bit boring, and in many ways I find it a bit primitive today. I prefer to record my musical ideas. Though, it feels good to be able to write down the music if somebody want it presented that way.

Even if you have some sort of "super-tab" that conveys the rythm, the tab doesn't tell you the note being played.

Take a look at this tab:

E ----2----
B ----3----
G ----2----
D ----x----
A ----2----
E ----x----

Now, which chord are you playing:

Bm7, D6, something else entirely?

If all you have is the tab you don't know. But the context of the notation you'd know.

This is interesting. You might have taken the discussion into territories I don't know. In what way does the standard notation tell you more about which chord it is than the tab does? You mean you don't know if it's a F# or a Gb?

If you want to be good with words - talk! If you want to be a good musician - play! I think that's more important than to learn to write down things.

That is why the history of so many ancient cultures is no longer available to us - they didn't write it down. Music may not be perfect, just as text can be short on inflection, but it is far better than nothing.
a lot of people use tabs to figure out how to play songs that they already have the music to, but don't know how to play. in these cases, rhythmic notations are superfluous,

Isn't that the whole point of standard notation? You can take a piece of music that you've never heard before and come out with a piece that is very close to what the composer laid down. Tab assumes that you already have the rhythm available to you.

Correct. You have no idea what those notes are.

They could be F#, D, A, B. They could be Gb, Ebb, Bbb, Cb. You simply have no idea. They could be something else entirely. You have no idea without standard notation.

Musical notation is to music what mathematics is to physics -- it's the written language the whole thing is done within. Not learning it handicaps you as a musician, plain and simple.

Well, once again I don't agree with you. One big difference is that you can allways play or sing music, but often can ideas in physics only be explained with mathematics. Music is a language in itself, physics is not. Physics can not explain itself, but music can be played.

Actually, I can write out instructions for an experiment you can perform that will illustrate the physics idea in question.

Standard notation is the universal language of music. Want to tell a horn player living in Jamaca his part for an upcoming recording session? He doesn't have a computer, or even a cassette deck with him. Just him and his horn are living on the beach. No problem - write it out in standard notation and fed-ex it to him. He'll have it in 36 hours.

If all you know is tab, you're screwed . . you can't get him his part.

Sure, that's an extreme example, but far less extreme, but none-the-less real problems arise every day.

You could live next door to the horn player. His computer is broke and he doesn't have a stand-alone cd or mp3 player, he uses his comp for all of that. You work days and he works nights so you almost never see each other. You want to change a few lines in the solo he has to play for the recording session for your band next week. You only know tab. How are you going to get him his changes?

If you read and write standard notation, you make the changes in red pen and shove it in his mailbox. If you don't, you have problems.
If you write down music, you can not grasp the whole thing, right? In fact, the best way to write down music is to record it. It's like writing down utterances, you can't capture everything with text, like for instance an ironic touch. So therefore I think it's more suitable to compare standard notation with text.

Actually, with a well trained ear and a bit of experience you can pretty well hear the whole thing in your head. Everyone has a point where they can't keep it in there anymore, but anyone with a few years of experience can easily hold the sound of a 3 or 4 piece band going over a 3 minute song no problem.

Actually, with a well trained ear and a bit of experience you can pretty well hear the whole thing in your head. Everyone has a point where they can't keep it in there anymore, but anyone with a few years of experience can easily hold the sound of a 3 or 4 piece band going over a 3 minute song no problem.

Yes, and I can hear a voice in my head when I read a text to, but how do I know in what way the author thought it should be spoken? The answer is, I don't. I have to interpret it. It's the same with music, you have to interpret it. You do agree on that one, right? And that's because you can't write down every aspect of the music. But that's of course not only a bad thing with writing down music, maybe it's just good! Because we don't want the musicians to be machines!

Look, I don't question the usefulness of standard notation. And I think it's better than tabs, but it's a bit harder to learn, which can justify the tabs. And tabs with a MIDI track is not a bad substitution. The idea I question is that you can't be a sophisticated musician without knowing how to read music.

By the way, do you think a lot of jamaican musicians live on the beach with just their instrument?

Here's one for the tabbers:
|-------------------||-----------------------|-------------------|------|
|-----------------8-||-----------------------|-6s7-------7h8p7---|------|
|-----------7-8h9---||-5h7--(7)----(7)---4h7-|-------------------|------|
|----7-9-10---------||-----------------5-----|-----------------9-|------|
|-------------------||-----------------------|-------------------|------|
|-------------------||-----------------------|-------------------|------|

You can hear an interpretation of this piece at:
http://people.freenet.de/greybeard/SamPar.mp3

There may be more notes in the clip than the tab (or the other way around), but you'll get the idea. The question is - what piece of music is this? The notes are accurate - you'll have to find the timing for yourselves