Lots of people are getting interested in the guitar thanks to all the great new games that have guitar for the theme like Guitar Hero. You might be among those who are thinking to learn to play guitar and go from looking like a Guitar Hero to being one.

   You might be wondering, though, just what the difference between acoustic guitar and electric guitar is and just how long it takes to learn to play guitar. If you are wondering what the right course of study for you is here is a little background information that might help you to decide what's right for you.

   The acoustic guitar and the electric guitar are mainly separated by musical style. The acoustic guitar is much older, of course, so it was initially used in classical styles of playing, mainly by Spanish masters of the guitar.

   This is wonderful music but it definitely requires traditional note reading. Also the picking technique is more complicated with the strings being picked individually by the right hand fingers. There is not a strict rule, however, that says the classical techniques must only be used on the acoustic guitar as many pop performers have mastered classical techniques to them them an edge.

   Pop style playing uses it's own school of technique. For example, if you don't feel that the classical style is your bag and you doubt you'll have the patience to learn all the notes on all six strings, there is an alternative notation system that is simple to use called tabs.

   If you'll look at the second photo, labeled 'tabs,' you'll see a very simple diagram of seven lines. The top most line is where the rhythm usually goes but the next six horizontal lines are your guitar strings. The top line of the six is string number one, which will actually be the bottom string on your guitar, as you have it in playing position.

   In the next diagram, called 'natural scale,; you can see numbers that represent the frets of your guitar. Most guitars have dots on the side of the neck at the fifth, seventh, ninth and twelfth frets. This is to help you find your way around with tabs.

   A scale is a stepwise succession of notes either up or down. You can see that this tabs of the natural scale starts on string number six, which will be on top as you are playing. 0 or 'open' means to play just the string with no fingers.

   The next scale, called the Pentatonic Scale skips around a bit because it uses only five different notes. This is called a movable scale because you can move the starting finger (finger number 1 on the fifth fret) to another fret and play this scale in any key. Movable scales are used to improvise leads in any key that you want.

   The next two diagrams are a song that should be easily recognizable if you are playing tabs correctly.

   While it's easy to find your favorite songs in tabs on the net, I recommend getting a book of your favorites in tabs from a music store. These will be more accurate and easy to read and they will usually have the traditional notes along side the tabs which will give you a chance to learn some notes but, most importantly, it will give you the rhythm and the beat.