Q&A for How to Read Guitar Music

There's not much you can do about it, but over time your fingers get stronger and you get calluses on the pads of your fingers, which makes it not hurt as much. Also, you'll get used to it.

If you are looking at a staff (the five parallel lines), each note on a line or a space represents a specific pitch. There are 7 basic notes/pitches: A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. A clef symbol on the left-most side of a staff will tell you what each line represents, in terms of these letters. You will most likely see the treble clef (also called a G-clef, which looks like a fancy G). In this clef, the lines from bottom to top represent E, G, B, D, and F. The spaces from bottom to top represent F, A ,C, and E. As you go up a staff, the pitch raises, and as you go down a staff, the pitch lowers. Notes are not limited to the confinements of the lines on the staff, but may extend beyond.

The strings are arranged in this order: E, A, D, G , B, E.

There is no difference, it depends on what the note is. Notes above the middle line should have a stem going down, and notes below the middle line should have a stem going up.

For chords , there should be a simple diagram showing where to put your fingers. For tabs , each line represents a different string. The top string in the diagram represents the bottom string when playing (the thinnest string). The numbers on the tab shows which fret to play. The frets are numbered from the head downwards.

Sheet music written on a musical staff doesn’t indicate which fret to play. The lines and spaces on the staff correspond to different notes, and so do the different notes played by holding down the strings on different frets. You have to know which notes are being played by holding the string on each fret, and correspond that to the notes on the staff.

Practice. It may seem tedious, but the best way to memorize longer, more technical riffs on the guitar is through repetition and perfection.

For tablature notation, the bottom line indicates the low E string, increasing for every line above.