The Steel Guitar Forum

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How do you write your tab? Here are some that I am playing with. I also use word to subscript, superscript, and set fond sizes.


You can use numbers and letters to denote pedals and levers, and
use dashes to keep track of lines
3 G#|-------------------|-------------------|
4 E |-3--3p3--5p3--8rkr-|-3--3----5p3--8rkr-|
5 B |-3--3p3--5p3--8----|-3--3p2--5p3--8----|
6 G#|-3--3p2--5p2--8----|-3--3p1--5p2--8----|
7 F#|-------------------|-------------------|

You can us letters to denote pedals and levers and no lines within
the measure.
3 G#|-----------------|-------------------|----------------------
4 E | 3 3c 5c 8 | 10 10c 13f 15 |--------------------
5 B |-------------------|-------------------|--------------------
6 G#| 3 3b 5b 8 | 10 10b 13 15 |--------------------
7 F#|-----------------|-------------------|----------------------

You can use - for flats, + for sharps, and underscores to keep
track of lines. The first time I saw the +- in tablature was the
second E9th book that Tommy Roots wrote.
2 D#|___________________|__________________|__________________________________|
3 G#|_______________3+__|_5+___8__10__10+__|__________________________________|
4 E |______5___5++______|__________________|__________________________________|
5 B |_6++___________3++_|_5++__8__10__10++_|__________________________________|
6 G#|______5- _5+_______|__________________|__________________________________|
7 F#|___________________|__________________|__________________________________|
8 E |_6- _______________|__________________|__________________________________|
9 B |___________________|__________________|__________________________________|

You can use # and b. The first time I saw this was when b0b posted with the
sharps and flats.
2 D#|___________________|__________________|__________________________________|
3 G#|_______________3#__|_5#___8__10__10#__|__________________________________|
4 E |______5___5##______|__________________|__________________________________|
5 B |_6##___________3##_|_5##__8__10__10##_|__________________________________|
6 G#|______5b _5#_______|__________________|__________________________________|
7 F#|___________________|__________________|__________________________________|
8 E |_6b _______________|__________________|__________________________________|
9 B |___________________|__________________|__________________________________|

</pre></font><font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Sherman Willden on 12 October 2006 at 08:07 AM.]</p></FONT>

Sherman, what, if anything, have you tried to indicate time? I am new to TAB and when I see, e.g., a fret notation in the middle of a 4/4 measure I don't know if the note is a half-note or a quarter-note with a quarter-rest on the last beat. Eighth-notes or accidentals create a greater challenge for me. What I am trying to do is create a TAB that mimics the essentials of sheet music, especially for one who does not have the sheet music or is, otherwise, unfamiliar with the tune. I have created sheet music that places the treble clef above the TAB but that limits me to eight measures of TAB per page. Without the treble clef, my page turning is cut in half.

Ed<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Ed Shimkus on 12 October 2006 at 08:48 AM.]</p></FONT>

Hi, Ed. I am still using your xls files for now. I agree that we need something to indicate time and yours does that. It would be nice to have some program that wrote the steel tab and the music notation to go along with it.

I am also messing around with the below tab structure which I use notepad or word to fill in the steel tab ( e.g. 3a or 4rkl ), print out the document, then fill in the top notation.

Also, I have the following tools and I intend to write a program that will fill in the tab structure shown below. Perl, Java NetBeans IDE, Sun Java Studio Creator, Visual C++, Visual Basic, and Visual C#. Disclaimer: I have very limited to no programming experience.

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|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|
|______________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________
|____|_________________|___________________|______________________


_____________________________________________________________
1 F#|_________________|___________________|______________________
2 D#|_________________|___________________|______________________
3 G#|_________________|___________________|______________________
4 E |_________________|___________________|______________________
5 B |_________________|___________________|______________________
6 G#|_________________|___________________|______________________
7 F#|_________________|___________________|______________________
8 E |_________________|___________________|______________________
9 B |_________________|___________________|______________________
10 G#|_________________|___________________|______________________
11 E |_________________|___________________|______________________
12 B |_________________|___________________|______________________

</pre></font><font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Sherman Willden on 12 October 2006 at 09:11 AM.]</p></FONT><font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Sherman Willden on 12 October 2006 at 09:38 AM.]</p></FONT>

Hi Sherman,

I'm going to snoop around the Internet and Microsoft to see if anyone has fonts or symbols that can be plugged into Excel. I looked through Excel's symbols (Insert -> Symbols) but nothing looked too useful. I'll let you know if I find anything that shows promise.

Ed

Thanks for you hard work, Ed

Sherman

I like to use Arrow to indicate movement of anything other than the A B C pedals.

The arrows are usually KLs, but this depends on your individual setup. A whole tone is indicated by two arrows.

I don't like #s and b's because the flat can be confused with a B pedal.

Several years ago, I requested the arrows be added as an option to the Tabledit program.
Mathieu, the developer, complied.

Here's an example. It's a lick I transcribed, that was orginally posted by Russ Weaver:



------------------
<img align=left border=0 src="http://joeyace.com/sgf/sig.jpg" >
-j0ey-
www.JoeyAce.com

I far prefer any system that shows the musical interval a pedal or lever moves a given string. The MuSymTab system invented by Jimmie Crawford is the best I've seen, with std notation above the PSG tab. In that case, no timing notation is necessary.

The example Joey shows is excellent, except that it doubles the amount of space required to notate a song. If it's a 16 bar solo or 4 bar intro or turn, that's ok, but for an entire instrumental piece, it turns 10 pages into 20 -- which may be fine. I just prefer something a bit more compact.

I also use Excel. I have the page divided into 4 measures across and 8 divisions for each measure. So each small square is an eighth note and each large rectangle is a measure that consists of 8 x 8th notes. For 99% of music I tab that works fine. Figure a way to notate triplets and you're 99.44% there.

Here's an example:


======
note
======
this example does NOT show the musical interval changes -- only the timing
the musical interval would use # for 1/2 tone raise; X (double sharp) for full tone raise; b for 1/2 tone lower; bb for full tone lower.

In the example the 6th string B pedal raise would be notated 0# and the 5th string A pedal whole tone raise as 0X
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<small>Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
My CD's: 'I've Got Friends in COLD Places' - 'Pedal Steel Guitar'
2003 Fessenden S/D-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S/D-12 6x6, 1984 Sho-Bud S/D-12 7x6, 1971 Dobro, Standel and Peavey Amps
<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Larry Bell on 15 October 2006 at 12:24 PM.]</p></FONT>