Get ‘em while you can. OLGA’s been down since July and the NMPA & MPA are going after the rest. it’s beginning to look like the days of Free Online Tabs is behind us. Here’s a link to the New York Times article.

The publishing industry seems to have a sound legal argument. Personally, I’m torn (or at least I can see both sides) on the issue. Publishers & Songwriters should get paid for their songs. I should be able to pick up a Zeppelin Tab at the drop of the hat.

I remember back around 1992ish, typing up Rusted Root tabs for an FTP site that I was involved with. I learned the tunes from my guitar teacher and then I would convert them to tabs (–1–2–). It took me quite a while, but I think I did their whole first album.

Although I’ve contributed to the online tabs database, used them personally and recommend them to students, a life without poorly assembled internet tabs might be a good one. A lot of my early guitar learning was before we had the internets. We used to have to listen to CDs and transcribe them, or have our teachers transcribe them.
If the Free Tab sites fall apart, students will most likely have to pick up legitimate sheet music. As a teacher, this makes me feel good. It’s a lot easier to learn from an authoritative and accurate source. As a guitarist, this future gets expensive fast. MusicNotes.com is currently selling sheet music for about $5 a pop. This makes a tune library a pricy venture and also seems to hinder frivolousness. Learning frivolous or disposable songs is important for the beginning guitarist. If you want to learn the theme to “Guiding Light” or the chords to “Hey Ya,” are you really going to do it if you have to pay $5 for each of them?

We’ll see where this all sorts itself out. But as our days of Free Tabs are numbered, make sure to take advantage of all those awesome videos of Hendrix & Pat Metheny on YouTube. They’ll be gone next.