Finally: Collide

So, now that we're just days from leaving for the summer, we finally got to recording Collide. Yesterday, we spent the evening coming up with a new set for next year's Open Mic-- we've got some awesome songs lined up. We'll definitely do Collide, and we're also working on You and Me by Lifehouse. The next thing we're working on is a duet for Hallelujah. Last, we're going to try and get enough people to perform Ed Sheeran's cover of Wayfaring Stranger. Miguel's got the perfect voice for it, and he and Rose may end up doing a duet.

A word on Hallelujah before I post Collide: We were practicing last night, first with guitar and viola, then with guitar and voice. The chords are easy enough, minus the barre chords which are slowly ruining my hand. The rhythm was also decently easy to pick up on, once I found the right video to practice with. So, we we're playing, and Miguel went at it with the viola, which sounded great. Then we moved to a study room, and he started singing...and holy shit. I mean, holy shit. I knew he was a good singer-- but this is just crazy. I mean it, I'm trying to convince him to record it with me, because he absolutely blew me away. We were playing, and we got to the second verse, and then all of the sudden I just missed a chord cause I was too busy listening to him sing. The notes he hits and the quality of his voice are just incredible. I can't wait to record that one.

But before then, here's our video of Collide by Howie Day. The strange frame is because we had to use my phone to record, since we blew out the mic on my computer with this song before. Below is the tab, as usual. Sorry you can't see my strumming hand, but the pattern is consistent throughout the song, so you should be able to get it by listening to the intro.




Verse and Chorus:
            G        Dsus2   Em7     Cadd9
e |-------3-------3-------3-------3-------|
B |-------3-------3-------3-------3-------|
G |-------0-------2-------0-------0-------|
D |-------0-------0-------2-------2p0h2---|
A |-------2-------0-------2---3---3-------|
E |---3---3---2---2---0---0-------x-------|

Bridge:
e |--------3-----------3----2-------------|
B |--------3-----------1----3-------------|
G |--------0-----------0----2-------------|
D |-----2--2-------2---2----0-------------|
A |--2-----2---3-------3----0-------------|
E |--------0-----------x----x-------------|

The dawn is breaking
A light shining through
You're barely waking
And I'm tangled up in you, yeah

I'm open, you're closed
Where I follow, you'll go
I worry I won't see your face
Light up again

Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the wrong words seem to rhyme
Out of the doubt that fills my mind
I somehow find you and I collide

I'm quiet you know
You make a first impression
I've found I'm scared to know
I'm always on your mind

Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the stars refuse to shine
Out of the back you fall in time
I somehow find you and I collide

Don't stop here
I lost my place
I'm close behind

Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the wrong words seem to rhyme
Out of the doubt that fills your mind
You finally find you and I collide

You finally find you and I collide
You finally find you and I collide

A chord library is a bit like your own personal bar

It's something that's developed over time, not something you can build overnight. Since I began playing, I would collect the tabs for songs in the "lyrics" section of iTunes. Some of them are proper tablature, and some of them are simply the chords listed above the lyrics. As I've encountered, and as people have pointed out, one of the biggest issues with being a self-taught guitarist is the very immediate ignorance you face when first finding songs to play. Oftentimes when you find a tab that consists of chords, the chords will be listed out in this format: G (320033).

Just as often though, chords aren't listed. If you use ultimate-guitar, you can often mouse over the chord and see the website's suggestion. This is fine for simple chords, A through G and some of the minor chords. When you get to more complicated chords though (often variations on F and B, the main barre chords), the site's suggestions aren't so great. And often, the fingering for these chords is not set in stone.

When you collect tabs though, you have a lot of people's opinions at your fingertips. One person might list a Dsus4 chord, which may be used but not tabbed out in another song. There are also plenty of variations on these types of chords (Xsus and Xadd type chords). Don't ask me what these mean; I just know how to play them.

On a new page (Chord Library) I'll list the information in my chord book, as well as my own chord library, developed over almost two years of collecting tabs. Don't be surprised if you see multiple or repeated fingerings, and don't be afraid to try these variations in the same song. Some variations sound better than the suggested chords. And aside from that, you can sometimes substitute things like Cadd9 (032033) for G (320033), and they sound basically the same. Conversely, you can insert a Cadd9 into a line that's supposedly all G, in order to make it sound more interesting. But I suppose that's a demo video for another post.

-Kal

So where do I find all these tabs anyway?

When you first start out looking for music, you'll probably type something like "collide howie day tab" into Google. You'll get a zillion hits from sites like www.e-chords.com, www.911tabs.com, www.azchords.com, and of course, YouTube. I will tell you right now though, your best bet is this little thing called www.ultimate-guitar.com.

If you simply go to the site, it can be pretty overwhelming. You can search for songs, artists, albums; you can find tabs, chords, drum tabs, bass tabs, solo tabs, acoustic tabs and chords. They also have this thing called "pro tabs". This will show you the tab and will also play the song, allowing you to follow along. Sort of like a sing-along.

Point is, the site itself is a little difficult to navigate if you don't know what you're looking for. Or even if you do. What I like to do is search something like "howie day tab" on Google, and click on the ultiamte-guitar link that says "Howie Day Tabs: 89 Tabs total @ Ultimate-Guitar.com". They always mention the number of tabs available; that's how you'll know you've got the right link. I try to avoid 911tabs because although the site shows up frequently, it's often just a bunch of reposting of the same tabs.

So, what do you do once you get to this page? You'll see an alphabetical listing by song title of every song by this artist that has been tabbed by ultimate-guitar users. If the song is a "tab" that means you'll get this notation:

e|------3-3-3-------3-3-3---|------3-3-3-------3-3-3-------| B|------1-1-1-------1-1-1---|------1-1-1-------1-1-1-------| G|------0-0-0-------0-0-0---|------0-0-0-------0-0-0-------| D|------2-2-2-------2-2-2---|------0-0-0-------0-0-0-------| A|---3--3-3-3---3---3-3-3---|---2--2-2-2---2---2-2-2------|
E|--------------------------|------------------------------|

------0-0-0-------0-0-0---|------0-0-0--0----0-0--0-0-----| ------1-1-1-------1-1-1---|------1-1-1--1----1-1--1-1-----| ------2-2-2-------2-2-2---|------2-2-2--0h2--2-2--0-0-----| ------2-2-2-------2-2-2---|---3--3-3-3--3----3-3--0-0-----| ---0--0-0-0---0---0-0-0---|-------------------------------|
--------------------------|-------------------------------|


If the song is in "chord" notation, you'll get a set of lyrics with the chords listed out above the words, like this:

CAPO 4
G- 320033
Dsus2- 200233
Em7- 022033
Cadd4- 032033

G Dsus2

The dawn is breaking

Em7 Cadd4

A light shining through

G Dsus2

You're barely waking
Em7 Cadd4
And I'm tangled up in you

The great thing about ultimate-guitar is that there's almost always both; and if it's an electric song, chances are there will be a tab for an acoustic version, too. So, take your pick! Eventually, you'll get an idea of which you prefer.

Now on to your next question... Since users contribute tabs to the site, there can be upwards of 20 tabs for just one song. If there are that many, how do you know which to pick? Well, the site also lets users rate their tabs. If you see a tab that's rated 5 stars by at least 20 people, that's probably the one you're looking for. These highest rated songs (and the ones with lots of votes, not just one or two) are a great place to start. If something doesn't sound quite right, or you want to see what other people have done, just go back and click on another. I usually try and stick with 4-5 star tabs. Even 4 star tabs are pretty good, even if they might need some tweaking. Stars and votes are something you have to look at in concert: if one tab has 5 stars with 2 votes versus another with 4 stars and 20 votes, the latter is probably a safer bet.

Another benefit of having so many tabs on one site: some songs (case in point, Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls), excuse my Japanese, are A BITCH to tune. Iris, by happenstance, is EBBBBB when played live. No one wants to do that. Often though, users will transpose these tabs into "normal people" terms, so you can keep your guitar nice and happy and in tune.

The last thing to watch out for (on any tablature site) is that some people won't tell you if a song needs a capo. My favorite case of this was when I found the tab for Kiss Me by Sixpence None the Richer. It had 4 stars, 38 votes (that's pretty good by my standards), so I went to play and DAMN it was awful. I don't know what possessed me to start playing around with the capo, but I think I may have found another tab that suggested capoing the 3rd fret. And poof, the song sounded perfect. Moral of the story: feel free to explore other tabs, feel free to combine them, and don't be afraid to just play around.

Hope this helps, and if anyone needs a little more guidance in navigating ultimate-guitar or has a tab that they absolutely can't find, feel free to comment and I'll see what I can do.

Also, this totally isn't a plug, but ultimate-guitar also has an app which is epically amazing for looking up tabs on the spot. It's also a little easier to navigate than the comprehensive site.

-Kal

A New Cover

So, I know that we promised you a cover of Collide, which Miguel and I have been working on, I swear. This is a really busy week, and we really haven't gotten a chance to actually record it. Plus with Open Mic Night coming up this week, I may end up memorizing another monologue if we can't pull our act together with the songs we were arranging.

However. In lieu of this song*, I decided to record another cover in order to illustrate a point I've been meaning to make. So, here's another recording of Say It's Possible by Terra Naomi:



Now, I know we've done this one before (see Beginner Song: Say It's Possible for the chords)-- Rose and I covered this for Open Mic, and she's a wonderful singer. I've tried singing this before, and I absolutely cannot hit the notes in the chorus. I've discovered a neat little trick, though. I'm sure this has some basis in music theory, and I'll ask Miguel if he can explain it to me later. But the idea is, since the song is usually capo'd on fret 2, I can just ditch the capo and drop the song to a lower pitch-- one that's within my voice range. I can also put the capo two frets up (4th fret, in this case), and raise the pitch. I'm pretty sure the only time this works is when the song is played on the 2nd, 4th, or 8th fret, or open strings.

Other songs this works for:
- Collide by Howie Day (originally 4th fret)
- It's Been a While by Staind (originally tuned half a step down, but can be played capo 1)
- Swing Life Away (also half a step down, but can be played capo 1. I also think this can be played open frets if you're really lazy, though I'm not sure musically why that works)

I'll let you know if I find any others, but play around with it. It's a great trick to bring songs into your range.

Another quick thing to note, is that sometimes when you do switch the pitch of a song, it can be a bit weird to sing if you haven't practiced. It takes a little bit of trial and error to hit the appropriate notes (take note of my little slip at the beginning of the final chorus, when I slip down almost an octave). With some practice though, you'll be able to tell when you're hitting the right notes.

Also, sorry if I blew out the mic. I put some fabric around the computer to absorb the sound, but the acoustic is really loud and the mic is really bad.

-Kal

For What It's Worth...*

...here is all the knowledge and experience I have with finger picking.

The two ways you can begin picking are 1) with just your thumb, or 2) with all your fingers. Usually it's just about what feels comfortable, and sometimes beginners feel more comfortable relying on just their thumb. I know I do. But when he saw me finger picking, Senpai suggested that you try to pick with all your fingers, by assigning each finger to a string. Even if you don't feel comfortable picking with your ring finger or pinky (watch the video to see just how uncomfortable I am with this), practice with your first three fingers and work up to that point. You'll be able to pluck a lot faster once you get the hang of it.

Next thing is that you can pick with your bare fingers, which is fine, or you can get these really cool picks that slide onto your fingers and make the sounds a lot more crisp. It's like the difference between strumming with your fingernails and strumming with a pick. The sound is just a lot less murky with the plastic. As you'll see in the video, I only have the pick that slides onto my thumb, but they make ones for your fingers too. And as you'll see from the video, I haven't used that pick in a while and I'm sort of messy with it. In fact, I abandoned it all together until I picked a song on just one string.

Lastly, there are three techniques that come into play with picking: hammer-ons (placing your finger on a fret after you've plucked the string), pull-offs (the opposite of hammer-on), and sliding (smooth transition, sliding your finger from one fret to a higher or lower one).



Tabs used:

Time- Hootie and the Blowfish
Dsus4
-------------------------3----------------------------3--
---------3------------3----3---------3------------3------
------2------------2--------------2------------2---------
--0--------0-h-2---------------0-------0-h-2-------------
----------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------


Sunny Came Home- Shawn Colvin
e------------------------------------------------|
b------------------------------------------------|
g------------------------------------------------|
d--------0-2-0------------------0-2-0-2-4--|
a—2/4---------4-2-0-0---2/4---------------|
E------------------------------------------------|

e---------------------------------------------------|
b---------------------------------------------------|
g---------------------------------------------------|
d--------0-2-2/0--------------------0-2-0------|
a—2/4------------4-2-0-0---2/4---------4-2-|
E---------------------------------------------------|


The Tain- The Decemberists
E|--0--3--7--6/7/6--3--0--3--7/10--11--12-----------------------|

E|--0--3--7--6/7/6--3--0-3--7/10--11--12-------------------------|
     Here upon this pillow

E|--0--3--7--6/7/6--3--0--3--7/10--11--12------------------------|
    Made of reed and willow.           You're

E|--0--3--7--6/7/6---3-0-3---5--7--0---12-11-12-----------------|
    a fickle little twister, are you sweet on your sister? Your

E|--0--3--7--6/7/6--3--0--------------------------------|
    fallow won't leave you alone.

-Kal

Messing With the Electric

Alright, crash course for anyone just picking up an electric guitar (like me!):

First thing that's actually really awesome, is that all the tuning pegs are on the same side. No more snapping that G-string! Turn the tuning pegs Away from you to tighten the strings, and toward you to loosen them. As you can also see, there are two metal platforms that hold down the highest four strings (DGBe). This becomes important when re-stringing your guitar-- all you have to do is make sure the strings feed under the hooks.








Next thing: there are so many ways to mess with the tone on an electric guitar, especially between the dials on the guitar and the amp. If you watch the video below, you'll get a quick tutorial plus you'll be able to hear the changes that each dial causes (and if I sound like I'm pretty new to this...........I am):



Other than that, here's a brief and probably more organized tutorial of what all the dials do:

First of all, the changes in tone are possible because of these three pickups. The top one is sensitive to lower tones; the middle one, to middle tones; and the last one, to higher tones. The principle way of controlling these is with this switch and these tone dials:



















The switch has five settings: all the way to the top is the top pickup, or the lowest tones. Next is the top and middle pickup. The middle setting turns on the middle pickup. The fourth position turns on the middle and bottom pickup. Last setting turns on just the last pickup, which means you'll get more of the higher notes.

The next way of controlling tone is with the two dials: the top dial controls the top pickup, and the bottom dial controls the bottom pickup. Basically, if you for example, turn the top pickup all the way up and the bottom pickup off, you'll get a very twangy sound. If you use just the top pickup, youll get a very full, bassy sound. To change the tone on the middle pickup, you have to play with both dials.

The last thing you can do to change the tone with the pickups has to do with where you play: if you strum closer to the top pickup, you'll get a much fuller sound, where strumming over the last pickup will give you a very twangy sound.

As if that weren't complicated enough, there's also the dials on the amp. This one has three channels, all of which have volume dials, in addition to the master volume. Then there are the tone dials, low dnd high. Low gets the bassy notes, and high gets the higher notes. I've been told that for playing live, it's best to turn the high knob up most of the way, and the low knob a little bit less so.


Yes, this does seem quite overwhelming at first. And by at first I mean that I'm still overwhelmed by it. It's very difficult to get the right sound for certain songs, especially when you're not familiar with this kind of equipment-- or this kind of control. Usually when I'm playing I'll set the pickup switch to either the second or fourth setting, I'll put the tone dials about halfway, and I strum between the first two pickups. Mostly, you just have to play with it to figure out what everything does, and what sounds good for which songs.

The key here though, which I can't stress enough, is BALANCE. Some people love to pump up the bass, and I can tell you primarily as a listener that it is not appealing when you can't hear the singer or the high notes of the song. That said though, it sounds very unattractive as well when you turn the bass all the way down, so that all you get is a low hum in the background while the high strings are buzzing against the frets. Sometimes it's cool to play around at the extremes of high tones or low tones so you get a sense for what everything does. But please, for the love of God, balance the tones when you're actually playing.

That is all.

-Kal

Beginner Song: Say It's Possible

So, if you're looking for a song that has some easy chords for you to practice, I'd suggest something like Say It's Possible by Terra Naomi. The chords used are:

Em7 (022033)                                          Cadd9 (032033)




G (320033)                                                  G/f# (200033)

   

This song is great because the chords are merely variations of each other; that is, two of your fingers stay in the same place for the entire song. This is good for two reasons: one, you can work on transitioning between chords (if you've never done this before, it takes quite a bit of coordination), and second, it helps to build strength in your hands. You might not realize it, but holding down your fingers in the same position for the entire song is actually quite difficult. Even now, my hands get tired playing this song all the way through.

I want to point out something quickly about the tab: you'll notice that the capo is on the second fret. All chords, when listed, are still relative to the capo. You can imagine how confusing it would be if I listed the finger notation with no regard for the capo. I've seen chords listed as, for example, Em7 (044055), and I think to myself, "that's not an Em7 chord". Then when I get my hand around the guitar, I realize that the notation isn't relative to the capo.

The video is posted below so that you can hear the strumming pattern. These are the only four chords used, and they are repeated in the same pattern for the entire song.

I just want to say, thanks so much to Rose for recording this with me-- it's a completely different feeling, recording with a friend versus singing and playing by myself. Aside from the fact that I can barely hit these notes, and she has a gorgeous voice, this was just a lot of fun. It did require some patience (this is our third take), and we couldn't even upload the high quality version because of some technical issues.

There were a few more things I wanted to mention, relating to the reading we talked about in my English class today. I actually started this post before class, and I just left the building about five minutes ago. Before class though, I had been thinking about a very minor point at the end of the chapter, about "living them [conflicts about self presentation] out in public, sharing every mistake and false step" (Turkle). While life mistakes lived on Facebook and such might be embarrassing, I also find the concept liberating in a sense. I mean, that's part of what this blog is about. I'm not perfect, I'm not a perfect guitarist-- if you listen to the video, you'll hear the metallic vibration of loose strings against the fretboard, because my hands were getting tired. We went through a few takes, editing, re-editing, knowing we weren't going to be perfect. But that's ok with me. I'm not trying to be perfect; I'm putting myself out there, with the level of experience I have, and nothing more.

And now, this brings me to the point of identity. I've been grappling with this idea of trying to go against what Turkle says about only presenting "the best" or "a fragment" of ourselves. I'm trying to write as myself, about my life, my experience, and my mistakes. But in a way I suppose, that's also presenting a "form" of myself. I'm trying not to appear perfect, trying to prove that I make mistakes. And in a sense, that itself is only a sliver of who I am. In reality, I've been known to be insecure about my short-comings, afraid of performing and presenting. So in reality, maybe this is blog is just a reflection of the part of me that wants to be fearless and confident. Maybe that was some of the reasoning behind why I started this blog.

It seems like a bit of a contradiction, an oxymoron, when you think about it. I'm trying to be myself, but in doing so, I'm presenting a self that I want to be, that I strive towards. To me though, that's ok-- it's not a self that's perfect, that's skinny, smiling, and a perfect guitar player. It's a self that makes mistakes and is ok with that. It's a self that's trying to share her experience, and a well-rounded and complex self that I want to live for. If technology is making me present a sliver of myself, then I'll turn that on its head, and make it a way to improve my life instead of a force that diminishes it.

-Kal

Tuning...and Its Hazards

How to tune your guitar!!! I don't have a transcript for the video (which is why I make a few mistakes when I'm speaking), but I can sum up tuning for you if you don't have time to watch the video.

I use either a standard tuner (the one I have is what I used to use for my violin), or the one built into my guitar. In the most basic sense, when you're holding the guitar: the top three pegs are turned away from you to make the note sharper (higher pitched), and toward you to make it flat (lower). It's the exact opposite for the bottom three pegs-- which is how I snapped my G-string. If you're using the tuner built into the guitar, you'll get a green light when the pitch is correct. If you're using something like my violin tuner, the needle will be centered on the screen. Just as a side note, I'm always at 440Hz with my violin tuner (it has to do with frequency, but don't worry about that too much).

The last thing I'll mention is different ways of tuning the guitar.

Standard tuning is EADGBe (excuse me for mixing up the A and D strings in the video).

Half a step down means Eb, Ab, Db, Gb, Bb, and eb. This took me a while to figure out, but the lower case "b" is used to mean "flat" in online tabs. So, E flat, A flat, etc. This means the top three pegs are turned towards you, to make the notes lower.

Drop D tuning means DADGBe.

Drop C is CGCFAD. This one tripped me up for a while, and I had to ask my friend for help. Basically, the first string drops two full notes (or "steps"), and each subsequent string drops one step. E goes down to D and then down to C. A drops to G, etc.

(For anyone who's not familiar with music at all, the notes are listed from A to G. Flats and sharps come in between the whole notes. If I have a C# (sharp), that's the same note as a Db (flat), because a sharp is half a step above a note, and a flat is half a step below a note.)-- If this is confusing, feel free to comment, and I'll ask my roommate (who's into music theory) to try and explain more clearly.

**Update** A quick note on "the hazards", which I suppose I haven't really gotten into yet: one of them of course (as mentioned above), is snapping a string while tuning.

Yet another, which has not been mentioned yet: not ten minutes after recording this video, have I lost my grip on the guitar pick, and dropped it inside my guitar. This is one of the most painful experiences you will ever go through while playing. Physical pain aside (unless your arm is really skinny, you can't reach in there and grab it), this is one of the most frustrating experiences I have ever had. Words of wisdom? It usually takes a lot of turning the guitar upside down and shaking it. It's especially difficult with mine, because of the numerous wires inside. The last time I did this, I was able to lift the pick out with a pair of tweezers. Just be careful not to drop those inside too.

**Update** My favorite guitar pick (.58 mm thickness), which has been stuck in my guitar since this post, has just been dislodged! I had been carrying the guitar back and forth today (2/22), since I was playing with my viola friend, and when I finally sat back down at my desk, I heard something that didn't sound like wires rattling around. Lo and behold, there lies my pick, obvious as ever within view of the sound hole. Took some maneuvering and tweezers again, but it has successfully been retrieved.

-Kal

For Beginners*

So, since I've already posted about some of the anatomy of the guitar, I thought I'd start to get to the interesting stuff. I'm not going to get into any of the actual guitar playing today (next time will be about playing chords), but this is a nice starting point for someone who's never picked up a guitar before.

The first thing to know about guitars is the strings: on a typical guitar, there are six strings, with the lowest pitched one at the top, and the highest pitched one at the bottom (a little counter-intuitive, but it makes sense once you start playing). The order of the strings by note is EADGBe, in ascending order (the last one is always listed as lower case to distinguish it from the first string. It's generally referred to as "high e"). I'll talk about tuning in a later post, but for now, let's get into how to read music. I've said before that guitarists don't have to learn to read sheet music. If you can, that's great, and it probably gives you access to more songs, but it's not necessary. I started off as a violinist myself, but I was never good at sight-reading.

Guitar music is laid out in "tabs", which are great because they tell you exactly where your fingers need to go, and on which strings. There are two types of tabs: finger-picking tabs, and chord tabs. Finger-picking is for playing individual notes, and chords are synonymous to strumming. A typical finger-picking tab will look something like this:

(Intro tab for The Freshmen by The Verve Pipe)
e|------------0-----------|--------------3-|------------------------|----------------|
B|------3-------------3--|------0---------|-----------3-----------|-----------0---|
G|----2---2-------2-----|---0-----0-----|------4-------4---4---|------0--------|
D|--0--------------------|-----------------|----4---4-------4-----|----0---0-----|
A|------------------------|-----------------|--2--------------------|----------------|
E|------------------------|-3--------------|------------------------|--3------------|
The first "measure" is plucked like this: open D string, second fret on G, third fret on B, second fret on G, etc. Sometimes the spacing is nice enough to tell you something about the tempo, but more often than not its a lot of listening to the song, and trial and error.

The second way songs are played is as chords. These can be laid out in a similar manner to tabs:

(Chords for Swing Life Away by Rise Against)
G:  e|3     Cadd9: e|3     Em7: e|3     D5: e|3     A5: e|3
     B|3                 B|3              B|3           B|3           B|3
     G|0                G|0              G|0          G|2           G|0
     D|0                D|2              D|2          D|0            D|2
     A|2                A|3               A|2          A|x            A|0
     E|3                 E|x               E|0           E|x           E|x

These appear at the beginnings of tabs, and will tell you every chord used in the song. When notes are listed one under another in a tab, that means those strings are strummed at the same time. If an "x" appears, like in the Cadd9 chord, that string isn't played (not a crucial distinction for most chords). As you can see though, alignment is crucial for this method-- if the font changes, everything has to be readjusted. Hence, I tend to prefer this method:

(Chords for Breathe 2am by Anna Nalick, as shown in the last post)
Aadd9 - (xx7650)
G - (355433) or (320033)
D - (xx0232)
A - (x02220)
Bm - (x24432)

These tell you the placement of your fingers, same as above, with the strings in order from lowest pitch to highest pitch (example: the first chord, Aadd9, is played with the high e string open).

Regardless of how chords are presented, the rest of the song will appear as such:

Aadd9 (xx7650)                                                      G
Yeah, we walk through the door so accusing their eyes
                                                     D
Like they have any right at all to criticize
                                                                    Aadd9
Hypocrites you're all here for the very same reason

...with the chord name appearing where it is strummed during the lyrics. Whenever I post a video of myself playing (like my last post), I will always include a (mostly) correct tab, so you can try to follow along where the chords change. Again, alignment can be an issue here, and sometimes I myself am too lazy to adjust the tabs if I can remember where to change chords. This is why videos are so great-- you can very easily see where chords change.

When I started playing, I tended to prefer tabs to chord charts, in a manner like this:

(Intro tab for Tomorrow by Avril Lavigne)
      G          Em7                         Cadd9
e|--3-3---3-3-3-3--3-3-3---3-3--3-3--x-x--3-3--3-3--
B|--3-3---3-3-3-3--3-3-3---3-3--3-3--x-x--3-3--3-3--
G|--0-0---0-0-0-0--0-0-0---0-0--0-0--x-x--0-0--0-0--
D|--0-0---2-2-2-2--2-2-2---2-2--2-2--x-x--2-2--2-2--
A|--2-2---2-2-2-2--2-2-2---3-3--3-3--x-x--3-3--3-3--
E|--3-3---0-0-0-0--0-0-0---x-x--x-x--x-x--x-x--x-x--

This tells you exactly where to place your fingers, and how many times to strum. Sometimes notation like this (^) and (v) will also be used to tell you which ones are upstrokes and which ones are downstrokes. I found this easier to read at first, because I wasn't familiar with any of the chords. When you become more familiar with the common chords (the ones I tend to use most are G, D, C, A, and E), you may begin to prefer the lyrics with chords.

I think that's about all I have to say on reading music for now. Hopefully this will make my future tips easier to understand. Next, I'll get to physically playing the guitar, so you can start to build up strength in your hands, and work on some of your favourite songs.

-Kal

The Equipment

Now when I first started playing, I knew nothing technical about the guitar. And in the beginning, you don't need to know much terminology to play. However, I would like to share my own experience as a word of warning: when for example, your G-string breaks and you walk into your local guitar shop for help, you want to sound at least mildly intelligent. When I was first looking for a case, I simply said that I was looking for a soft case for an acoustic. I thought I sounded very calm and confident, until the man working asked me "what kind of guitar" it was, and I'm thinking to myself, "I did say it was an acoustic, right?". He must've seen the blank look on my face, because he proceeded to ask me if it was, "a full dreadnought, or what?". Now at this point, I had no idea what a dreadnought was, so I proceeded to look behind me at the wall of guitars, pick one that was the approximate size and shape of mine, and said very intelligently, "It looks like that".

On that note, I present you with some basic knowledge that has almost nothing to do with playing the guitar.

Aside from the acoustic guitar itself, the guitarist has many other friends. As you begin to progress, some of these pieces of equipment may become more familiar to you than others; it all depends on what kind of music you're into. Today, I'm going to discuss the guitar itself, as well as its most common accessories: the guitar pick and the capo.


The anatomy of a guitar

 

For more on tuning, click here (link to be posted).
For more on the frets and how to play, click here (link to be posted).
For more on changing the strings, click here (link to be posted).


The accessories: The guitar pick

I'm sure that everyone's at least seen a guitar pick before, though not a lot of people know how diverse they can be. First though, I want to talk about why we use picks. It's perfectly acceptable to strum with your bare fingers. Some people do this by running their nails along the strings, some people use the side of their thumb, and some people pinch their thumb and forefinger together to strum up and down. I personally like the pick because it gives a crisper sound, and feels more exact that using my fingers to strum.

For more on strumming technique, click here (link to be posted).



The group of 5 on the left, as well as the 2 on top and 2 to the right are pretty standard. the only difference between them is the thickness. Under the logo, they read .73, .75, .71, .58mm, etc. This refers to the thickness. Again, when I began playing I had no idea what the differences between them actually meant, so I discovered my preference through trial and error. When I first started strumming, I used very thin picks (about .45mm), like the ones on the right. They were a lot easier to handle, and less likely to slip out of your hand when strumming. The two on the top are medium sized (about .60), and that's what I've gravitated towards now. They give a more distinct sound, but still bend easily when strumming. The group of five on the left are the thickest I've tried (about .75), though I've seen picks up to 1.25 mm. They tend to require a tighter grip, but the individual strings sound clearer. Again, it's all about personal preference. You'll come to your own decision the more you play.

The middle two sets of picks are ones that my friend (same friend from the previous post) uses. He's come to like the middle two especially, for finger picking. Since they're smaller and pointier, they can be more exact for plucking single strings.

The last pick I've used is the clear one in the corner, called a thumb pick. It slides onto your thumb, and is used for finger-picking. It makes the notes sound a lot clearer than just hitting the strings with your fingers. For someone who does a lot of finger-picking, there are picks that can slide onto each finger.

For more in finger-picking, click here (link to be posted).

The accessories: The capo

   


So, I know that this is a lot of information for today, and we haven't even gotten to playing yet. Hopefully though, this page can act as a reference if you ever need some quick, basic info. You know, in case you need help fixing your G-string, shopping for accessories, or buying a case, and you don't want to sound like the blithering fool I made myself out to be the first time I set foot into a guitar shop.

-Kal