tab archives fade away

[ratherdashing]

While i do agree with you to an extent, I believe it is unfair to apply this to all guitar players. I have only been playing about a year and a half now, and from about 6 months of self-teaching onwards, I found myself being able to play by ear more and more, to where I am now, which is where I can more or less improv a not so hard solo so that it would sound near enough like the original. Every now and then, I'd use a tab, because it's highly satisfying to note-for-note play a solo to the record in the background. Obviously, it's not as satisfying as if you taught yourself, but hey, we can't all be that great.

I think tab is a good teaching device. It takes someone about 10 minutes to understand how tab works, and all the abbreviations and so on, and looking at an artists playing in such a numerical way can help give a learner a better understanding of scales and stuff. I know a few teachers who use tabs to help teach their students.

I'm all for creativity, and it's great to see, but we can't all be born classical blues players.

Bottom line, my opinion is, so long as you don't use it as a crutch, tabs can be useful, and even if you are a good player, you should be able to use them without dying or anything. Could save you a lot of time. It's not as if 'cheating' to play a song someone else wrote is bad is it?

First of all, congratulations on progressing so far in a year and a half. I'm sure you worked very hard.

Second, tabs can be helpful up to a point. Personally (and I know I'm not the only one who thinks this), I believe a student learns a lot more by a. reading sheet music, b. practicing their butt off, and c. learning to train their ear to find the notes in the song. It's the whole "Teach a man to fish" thing.

I think we agree on the heart of this issue though: if you rely on tabs to play anything, you are cheating yourself out of a real understanding of music.

Learning music isn't supposed to be easy. It takes time and perseverance to do it properly.

[Skarekrough]

Sorry, but that's pretty ignorant.

Tablature can be a huge help for beginners.

I agree.

But it can also be a phenomenal crutch for lazy intermediates.

More than once I've walked into a rehearsal or an audition with someone who didn't have the ability to figure something out by ear or on the fly. It usually made the difference between them getting the gig and not getting considered for a call back.

One of my criteria for auditioning is solely witnessing the players ability to pick up and go with it by ear. When I audition I expect only to know about half of the material I'll play when I come through the door.

[big_black]

And sheet music isn't?

That assumes the person knows how to read music. If someone can't they are not allowed to play guitar? That's ****ed. Most people I know who only play guitar do not know how to read music. A lot of pro musicians don't know how to read music.

My point is that how someone learns and how seriously they choose take that instrument should be of no concern to you.

[big_black]

But it can also be a phenomenal crutch for lazy intermediates.

So we should ban free tabs to "help" people learn "better"? I see where you are coming from and I agree, but to use that as a supporting point is pretty elitist...and bull**** just the same.

[Lu_B]

Learning music isn't supposed to be easy.

But its supposed to be fun, and if a little bit of tab encourages you to practice the boring stuff in the first place then its a good thing.

45 minutes proper stuff and 15 minutes using tab of the latest tune you hear on the radio = every body is happy!

[JohnnyGuitar]

I still write my stuff down with tabs... It's just faster and more visual in a way. I think that tabs are great when you learn to do new stuff on the guitar that you didn't know how to do before... and I really don't think it is for beginners only (although today I learn stuff by ear or by standart notation and hardly use tabs).

I've learned guitar mainly without a teacher and internet tabs did help.

[ErikH]

Regardless of whether they stay online or go away, how did we all learn before the computer age? Before the internet? Before there were tab sites? What did players do? - figured it out themselves with the record or tape. Of course this applies to those of us who starting playing before this whole internet stuff.

Would you stop playing tomorrow if they were no more tabs, ever? I doubt it. You'd find another way to learn the songs and ...gulp... do it by ear.

[Robbiedbee]

Learning music isn't supposed to be easy. It takes time and perseverance to do it properly.

I was going to counter that whole post with 'If every guitar player had to start by learning music theory and being able to read sheet music, then far more would get put off'. Then I got to the end of your post and I had to mutter 'touché' to myself. I think 'properly' is they key word here.

I started playing guitar with the intention of having fun, and I later discovered that dedicating hours a day to practice and stuff is a lot of fun. I now feel like I have to cover all aspects of the instrument. I guess a lot of people just see tabs as a quick and easy way to be able to play decent stuff.

[SpiderVenom]

Figuring it out by ear isn't all such an easy skill. This is all very well for a Green Day song, but generally, it's a lot easier to develop the technique to play more demanding pieces than it is to learn them by ear.

Try figuring out a solo like Tornado of Souls or Lucretia by ear - even if you can, it'd be a long process. It isn't helped by the considerable number of articulations available to an electric guitarist.

Sure, it's the "better" way, but, amazingly, some people just like to have fun, and play stuff without spending hours with a stereo.

Guess it's phase trainer time for me

[Skarekrough]

So we should ban free tabs to "help" people learn "better"? I see where you are coming from and I agree, but to use that as a supporting point is pretty elitist...and bull**** just the same.

You wouldn't be the first one to accuse me of both points.

[big_black]

You wouldn't be the first one to accuse me of both points.

Me either.

[Robbiedbee]

Regardless of whether they stay online or go away, how did we all learn before the computer age? Before the internet? Before there were tab sites? What did players do? - figured it out themselves with the record or tape.

Heh, that reminds me of story my Dad once told me.

My Dad was sat in his bedroom, reading a book, when his brother comes in and goes 'get your guitar, it's on the radio'. Back in the late 50s/early 60s, my Dads household didn't have the capacity to have songs on vinyl or whatever. He was one of 10 kids though, so it could have been a money issue.

Moral of the story is, he didn't have the record or the capacity to play it. He had to sit around to wait for it to come on the radio.

I think it was a Shadows song or something.

[ErikH]

Of course learning it by ear isn't easy. It's a trained skill, something that gets better with practice. When I first started, I figured out a few songs just by playing the root note. As I learned chords, I played them with the chords, and played it as I heard it. As my ears got "tuned in" better, I would realize I was playing the wrong position or variation of the chord and adjust, then go from there.

With lead breaks, same thing, play it as I heard it, then add in the rest as my ears got "tuned in" better. Sure, it was hacked up at first, but it was still fun, and still is. I didn't have the tab to Eruption until a few years ago, learned it all by ear. Today that's easy compared to what's been done since but when I started out, that was "the" thing to figure out, the big mountain to climb. If you could pick out Eruption by ear, you were the coolest kid in school...lol.

[ratherdashing]

But its supposed to be fun, and if a little bit tab encourages you to practice the properly the boring stuff in the first place then its a good thing.

45 minutes proper stuff and 15 minutes using tab of the latest tune you hear on the radio = every body is happy!

Sure, that sounds good. The problem is, how many young guitarists are actually going to spend the 45 mins on the proper stuff when there are tabs right there? It's like giving a kid a pound of broccoli and a Snickers bar.

I guess I should clarify my position. Nowhere did I say I think tabs should be banned. Tabs themselves aren't evil - it's how they are used. I actually think the transcriptions you see in magazines and tab books where they have a staff of sheet music and a staff of tab are pretty smart, because it draws a parallel and helps students understand the relationship between the notes on the staff and what they're doing with their hands. The tabs you download as a text file off the internet aren't really helping anyone. The artists don't get their due, and the students learn nothing other than how to mechanically crank out a song.

No, you don't need to know sheet music to play guitar, but why the hell wouldn't you want to learn it? It's like learning how to speak English but not learning how to read and write it. If you want to use tabs as a stepping stone towards learning sheet, that's cool, but I don't think tabs should ever be used as the primary means of learning a song, save for absolute novice players.

I stand by my original post, though it was a bit elitist. Mainly I was reacting to the complete lack of musical intelligence among the guitar community, and how no one seems interested in improving their musical knowledge.

[A Skater]

Mxtabs.net is also down. Lame.

In my opinion, I hope tabs stay on the internet. They're one of those advances that humans have had. If it weren't for tabs, I never would've gotten as good as I am now (I've learned to correct tabs and use my ear). They're awesome tools. Kinda like using a screwdriver and a drill (tabs being the latter).

I can honestly say that most of the guitarists I know have used tabs to improve and eventually start learning stuff by ear. In order words, tabs should be used as a reference.

[SpiderVenom]

No, you don't need to know sheet music to play guitar, but why the hell wouldn't you want to learn it? It's like learning how to speak English but not learning how to read and write it. If you want to use tabs as a stepping stone towards learning sheet, that's cool, but I don't think tabs should ever be used as the primary means of learning a song, save for absolute novice players.

Well, that depends on what styles you want to play.

Rock is a riff-based, pattern-oriented playing style. Reading standard music notation is not essential -- in fact, most of the musicians who are creating the music that you hear on the radio do not even know how to read standard music notation (staff). I'm not saying that learning to read staff is a bad idea... I read it myself. I'm only saying that if your goal is playing rock or metal, it's not essential, and its value in that instance is questionable.

On the other hand, if you are interested in jazz or classical guitar, learning to sight-reading staff notation is a must. Also, it is helpful if you aspire to being a session player and getting a wide variety of studio work. Furthermore, if you just want to take your guitar playing skills as far as possible, certainly reading music is a skill that you'll want to work on, at least in the background at the same time you are developing all other skills.

[ratherdashing]

I suppose if all you want is to play AC/DC style riffs for the rest of your life, reading sheet music won't help you. It certainly can't hurt though.

[Luís]

What incentive do you have if you can't play a music? If you have access to that tool you'll devellop the physical skill. That motivates a player. It trains the ear. Eventually there will be no need for a tab save for an emergency or something too hard.

Tab or sheet music... who cares? Learn a system, learn both, I think that's not the point.

Take me for instance. You know how I first started playing songs? Bear with me cause it's a long story.

I had a karaoke programe. Now, that thing, ran on MIDI files and I had the luck that it showed the notes being played on a sort of keyboard. I realised I could shut off all instruments and play what I wanted, melody or guitar. I would do the play/pause/rewind or slow it down and take note of the keyboard keys map them out to the scale and try it, if it didn't work, try to move from to another string.

It would take a long time to get a music together and eventually I would discover tabs. Lets just say that when I was using MIDI files as soon as chords came into play I was doomed (couldn't figure out that at the time) and tabs where a blessing. I could see what chord patterns I should use, what they were called, ect.

Eventually I would be capable of being told what were the chords and being able to place them.

My point is tabs are valuable to a guitarist. And by tabs I mean any way to show music in writen form and that the music industry is trying to shut down.

I'd love to know what the opinion of the artists is... Or even better if most did what some Portuguese artists are doing, for unrelated reasons, putting the chords in the cd booklet with the lyrics.

Lyrics, that's another thing they are trying to shut down. Pretty soon, you won't be able to refer to someone's music, or post it in a forum for any reason... well, at least Emo kids would be dealt with in that regard.

I see a future where you will buy your music but can only listen to it once and it has to be on headphones because you are the owner and if anyone is to listen then you are publicly broadcasting and lending...

Ever noticed on some materials how you can't even lend what you own?
Take a look at your cd's, at your books and at you games. My guess is that it's there, I know I've seen it.

Sorry for the rant...

[dgk2448]

While i do agree with you to an extent, I believe it is unfair to apply this to all guitar players. I have only been playing about a year and a half now, and from about 6 months of self-teaching onwards, I found myself being able to play by ear more and more, to where I am now, which is where I can more or less improv a not so hard solo so that it would sound near enough like the original. Every now and then, I'd use a tab, because it's highly satisfying to note-for-note play a solo to the record in the background. Obviously, it's not as satisfying as if you taught yourself, but hey, we can't all be that great.

I think tab is a good teaching device. It takes someone about 10 minutes to understand how tab works, and all the abbreviations and so on, and looking at an artists playing in such a numerical way can help give a learner a better understanding of scales and stuff. I know a few teachers who use tabs to help teach their students.

I'm all for creativity, and it's great to see, but we can't all be born classical blues players.

Bottom line, my opinion is, so long as you don't use it as a crutch, tabs can be useful, and even if you are a good player, you should be able to use them without dying or anything. Could save you a lot of time. It's not as if 'cheating' to play a song someone else wrote is bad is it?

+1, I learned off of tabs of various artists. Those tabs helped me to a point to where now I'm writing my own music and improvising my own(not at all bad) solos. Sometimes, when your frustrated, I think a tab could be a way to learn something. I think they're a great way to start leaning the ropes on a guitar.

[RiffRaff]

If you can't for the life of you figure out how to play a song without tabs, put the guitar down, take some nice photos, and sell it on eBay.

This is not a joke. I am 100% serious.

There are millions of guitarists on Earth, and 99.9% of them treat guitar as some sort of game or parlour trick. They aren't willing to put in any effort whatsoever to learn musical skills and to learn their instrument as a craft. Why do you think there's no such thing as french horn tabs, or violin tabs? It's because the players of these instruments actually give a damn about music, and are willing to put in the time and effort it takes to learn properly. To these people, the average guitarist is a neanderthal.

Now, I know reading sheet music and learning theory isn't for everyone. There are a lot of early blues guitarists who couldn't tell you what a sharp or a flat was. These guys, however, had something else that is completely absent in most guitarists: creativity. When they played music, it was all them. You could have five guys play the same traditional blues song, and each one would sound completely different. Does that mean four of these guys were playing it wrong? Hell no, they were putting their own spin on it.

Next time you decide you need to find a tab for a solo, try playing your own interpretation of it. Odds are it will suck, but that's what PRACTICE is for. Learn some scales, and learn how different scales and modes correspond to different chords. If you know the chords of the song, and you know a bit of theory, you should have no problem coming up with your own solo. Along the way, you may even stumble upon the solo you were trying to play in the first place. Go figure!

I can't say this enough times: if you can't get something at first, PRACTICE. You can also try the time-honored traditions of READING A BOOK or ASKING SOMEONE ELSE.

If none of this appeals to you, sell the guitar, because you're not a guitarist. You're just a copycat making noise.

(deep breath)

The guitar nazi has spoken - now for a more realistic view, the technology is there for people to share their interpretations of a solo or lick - why not utilize it? Isn't that what a guitar teacher supplies his students, his interpretation of a lick or solo - and they tab it out for their students. If there's a problem with the accuracy of the information then try playing the lick in different places on the nect to get the tone you want (that's pretty much the same as picking it off a record but you with a little head start). I choose to check out tab (I'm not a beginner) and keep my guitar - I'm a rebel. Also, your last comment is just plain nutty, all guitarists are copy cats so are good french horn players and violinists, they listen and try and emulate the sound, tone, phrasing, sytle of those who have mastered their respective instrument.