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Courses/Stage 9

Reading Fingerstyle Tab: Telling Bass from Melody

Fingerstyle8 minRight-hand foundations · arranging · altered tunings · master styles

Fingerstyle tab has one more layer — “voices” — than playing-and-singing tab. If you can't tell which is melody and which is accompaniment, you can't play it. Learn to split the two apart using stem direction.

Video lessons are in production — follow the notes and practice checklist below and you'll learn it just fine.
Stage 9 · Acoustic Fingerstyle16 lessons

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  1. Fingerstyle Right-Hand Foundations: Posture, PIMA, Rest Stroke, Nails11 min
  2. Open-String Arpeggios and Right-Hand Independence9 min
  3. Reading Fingerstyle Tab: Telling Bass from Melody8 min
  4. Alternating Bass and Travis Picking9 min
  5. Your First Complete Fingerstyle Piece10 min
  6. Making the Melody “Sing”: Dynamics, Tone, and Expression9 min
  7. Double Stops and Harmony: Thirds and Sixths8 min
  8. Arranging Songs You Can Sing into Fingerstyle Solos: Getting Started with Arranging11 min
  9. Rolls and Tremolo8 min
  10. Harmonics: Natural and Artificial8 min
  11. Percussive Fingerstyle: Intro to Slaps and String Hits9 min
  12. Tapping and Combined Techniques9 min
  13. Getting Started with Altered Tunings: Drop D and DADGAD10 min
  14. Open Tunings and the Capo10 min
  15. Fingerstyle Master Players and a Style Map9 min
  16. A Boss-Battle Repertoire Ladder for Fingerstyle9 min

A quick tab review

The six lines stand for the six strings (the top line is the thinnest, the 1st string); a number on a line tells you which fret to press, 0 is an open string, and you play left to right. This part is the same as reading playing-and-singing tab.

Stem direction = voice

Fingerstyle tab usually splits the “stems” (those vertical lines) up and down: notes with stems pointing down = the bass voice, played with the thumb p; notes with stems pointing up = the melody voice, played with i/m/a.

When a single column has one note above and one below, that's “bass + melody” sounding at the same time. So the first thing to do when reading is to use the stems to separate the high and low layers.

  • 💡 When taking on a new piece, don't rush to play it — first trace the bass voice (stems down) and the melody voice (stems up) each with a pencil, and you'll have the score clear in your head.

PIMA marks and technique symbols

The score often marks p i m a above a note, telling you which finger to pluck it with. You'll also see h (hammer-on), p (pull-off), / and \ (slides), ◇ or harm. (harmonics), T or × (percussive hit / mute).

Get all these symbols recognized first; the next few lessons in this stage will teach you how to play each one.

Open the tab symbol referenceUse the symbol cheat sheet to recognize every PIMA and technique mark in fingerstyle tab.→

Practice checklist

  • Find a simple fingerstyle score and circle all the “stems-down” bass notes.
  • Identify at least 3 kinds of technique symbols on the score (h / p / slide / harmonic / percussive hit).