Heavy Metal Guitar Lessons - How to Play Heavy Metal Guitar

Burning Metal
First off, I'm going to have to offer up this awesome kick-start to heavy metal guitar playing. The 'Burning Metal' series explains everything in depth, it really flows , and covers the fundamentals incredibly well. It's packed full of great reading, easy to read tabs, and tons of really addictive tracks to jam along to! Go here to read a full review, or visit the homepage to check it out for yourself and grab a copy right now!
Heavy Metal Guitar Lessons


Free Legato Lesson!
An amazing technique, and one that I absolutely cannot live without, is 'legato'. In Italian, it simply means 'smooth', and in music it's used to refer to a type of lead playing using a fast slur of hammer-ons and pull-offs.
In this free masterclass, Martin Goulding (from Guitar Techniques magazine) takes you through a brilliant workout that any metal guitarist should follow! I for one have hugely benefited from following this, and still use it to warm up. Click Here


Jamplay - Some Free Guitar Lessons On Offer
Jamplay.com is a new membership based site on which you can view their thousands of hours of tuition videos, all filmed with their army of tutors, spanning dozens of styles. They also have quite a few free lessons on offer as a sample.

This is what JamPlay have to say - "We understand that guitar lessons can often be confusing and boring. That is why we strive to make all of our lessons easy, fun and step by step so the student is never left confused or bored. Our teachers explain things in a simple, understandable way and give you exercises and fun samples to play to cement your knowledge of the lesson at hand."
Click Here to check out the website and preview some free lessons!


Riffmaster Pro
A massively important program that I HAVE to show you, is Riffmaster Pro. If you ever wanted to be able to work out your guitar heroes' riffs for yourself, then this is absolutely ESSENTIAL!

Basically, it slows down any track you load into the program, without losing the pitch, so you can work it out note by note. ANY riff or solo is possible to work out by ear thanks to this awesome piece of software! Click Here to find out more, and grab a copy yourself, for an extremely affordable price!


How to Read Tab
Guitar tabs are an essential part of any learning process, and if you don't know how to read them then it makes life a bit difficult!
Don't be baffled, it's stupidly easy. All you have to be able to do is... well.. read! Basically, the fretboard is represented by lines each corresponding to a string, from high to low, like this -

E------------------------------------
A------------------------------------
D------------------------------------
G------------------------------------
B------------------------------------
E------------------------------------

If you were to lay the guitar down on your lap, strings facing up, neck to the left of you, bridge to the right, this is how it's represented. See?
So, knowing this, we can now start to form the content. Taking our template once again, this time i'll draw up the Gmaj chord.

E------3-----------------------------
A------3-----------------------------
D------0-----------------------------
G------0-----------------------------
B------2-----------------------------
E------3-----------------------------

The notes are overlapped at the same interval, meaning they are played at the same time, thus forming the chord of Gmaj.
Now, I'll draw up the Em scale in tab form, and show how notes that are played singularly are represented.

E-----------------------------------------------------12--15--
A------------------------------------------12--15-------------
D-------------------------------12--14------------------------
G---------------------12--14----------------------------------
B-----------12--14--------------------------------------------
E-12--15------------------------------------------------------

Non of these notes are at the same interval meaning you should play them singularly, note by note.

Accompanying tabs are many key symbols. Unlike sheet music, tab is more universally understood and easier to read, however it's not quite so in depth when it comes to showing time signatures, note durations, rests, and other musical features.
That said, tab does have quite a versatile key of symbols that it utilises, and I'll show a few of them here. You'll find these under, or sometimes above the note that they effect.

P.M - This represents which notes/groups of notes are to be palm muted.

/ - Slide.

H and P - Hammer ons and pull-offs. These are sometimes shown with a arch going between the two notes that are being hammered on/pulled off.

T - Tap. The 'T' is sometimes shown in a small circle.

^/v - Down/up strokes. This shows which direction you are to pick the note with your pick.

PH/AH/NH - Pinched harmonic/artificial harmonic/natural harmonic. These are sometimes represented inside shaped symbols, like triangles and squares etc.