Sophie S asked:
Do I need to learn how to read music before I try playing acoustic guitar? How hard will thiese 2 be? any suggestions? I’m 14 I sing, don’t play an instrument. I tried piano, but the teacher told my mom he thought i should quit! (lol, right?) my mom thinks i might need to learn piano first! 
- not too big on that. suggestions on reading music and guitar?
Tags: How To Read Music, Play Piano, Reading Music
How to Read Music Notes
Music teachers and many musicians advise that the piano is the best instrument to start with, especially to learn to read music.
I’m curious as to why a teacher would say you should not take any more lessons. Did you practice daily? Practice is absolutely necessary with any instrument.
In my experience, piano is easer than guitar.
Learn How to Read Music
I didn’t learn piano but can play the guitar. First you need to become familiar with the fretboard. Many guitar players never learn to read music, they use ‘tabs’ instead. This is a system of six lines that each represent a string and a number on the string which represents the fret, with musical notes sometimes above to understand how long to hold the note. If you start learning this way, I think you will eventually start to learn how to read music as well.
This site might interest you:
Sight Reading Music
He said you should quit.. well that’s inspiring. Sounds like you’d rather play guitar anyway.
You don’t need piano first, though a lot of music theory seems to be based on knowledge of the piano, but it still isn’t necessary.
You don’t need to read music before learning, you learn to read music WHILE you learn. If you’re going to have an instructor, I’m sure they’ll have a good book in mind, otherwise, visit a music store and ask about intro acoustic guitar books that teach sight reading.
It isn’t that hard – reading music is just like learning to read anything else; your brain is made for pattern recognition.
Good luck.