There are several different mannerisms, or rather techniques, with the help of which, any kind of music is written. The most common way to learn to read music, that is used now-a-days is through guitar tabs and keyboard tabs. However, putting down music in the form of tabs is not the fool proof way to write music. The tabs can be used only to play music for guitars and keyboards. The best way to read and write music is to use the conventional musical notations. The standard musical notions can be used for almost any type of instrument or they can be used even by a vocalist. The conventional musical notations are actually a musical language which is represented by a series of symbols, thus the key to learn to read music notes is to know the significance of all the notations.
Musical styles - the book contains songs across a wide range of musical genres. It was published in 2001, and the songs range from that time back to 40 years previously, so there's a lot of classic rock and pop in here, as well as more modern songs. The artists covered include The Beatles, Pulp, The Corrs, Bob Dylan, Bryan Adams, Oasis, Blur, Eric Clapton, The Jam and many more.
So if you're looking for classic hits that most people recognise, chances are you'll find a good few of them in here. However, if you're more interested in specialist genres or more extreme musical forms, this is probably not the book for you.
Ease of use - the book is laid out in a very clear and simple way. For each song you get the full lyrics with chord symbols added in the appropriate places. Each song also includes chord box diagrams which show you how to play all the chords that are required for that song, which is useful if any of the chords are unfamiliar.
However, the book does not contain tabs or written notation, and if you don't know the melodies of the original songs, this will be an issue, as they're not included here. And while there's a playing guide which gives some useful hints, it's not as if every little step is spelled out for you, which may or may not be a problem.
Accuracy - according to the blurb on the back cover, each song has been arranged in the original key from the original recordings. However, like most books of this type, some of the chords have been simplified, as you'll discover for yourself if you listen very carefully to the original songs and compare them to the chords that are given in this book. This isn't a problem, as they still sound 'right', but if you want to play a note-perfect rendition of the original, you'll probably need to rely more on your own ears.
One of the biggest things you need to make sure that you pay attention to when looking to purchase an acoustic guitar is that bridge of the guitar. If you are not sure what the bridge is I can explain that to you as well. Think of the bridge as a megaphone for the sound of the guitar. You can get some pretty cheap guitars on the market but that is because the bridges are also cheap and thus you get what you pay for, a cheap sounding instrument.
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