How to read tenor banjo tab
Tablature tells you where to put your fingers. You do not need to read music to use it, and it works identically on mandolin, octave mandola and bouzouki.
The four lines are the four strings
Tab is drawn as though you are looking down at the instrument. The top line is the high E, the bottom line is the low G. Reading down the page is reading from thin string to thick.
E ───────────── 1st string, thinnest, highest A ───────────── 2nd string D ───────────── 3rd string G ───────────── 4th string, thickest, lowest
Five-string banjo tab reverses this, because its fifth string is a high drone. Do not learn the layout from a five-string chart.
Numbers are frets, and 0 means open
A number sitting on a line is the fret to press on that string. A 0 means play the string with no finger on it at all. Irish tunes use open strings constantly, which is why so much of this music sits in the first five frets.
A worked example
The opening of a D jig. The notation on top gives the rhythm, the tab underneath gives the fingering.
Read it left to right. The first note is a 0 on the A string, played open. Then the D string at the fourth fret, then the D string open. Your hand never leaves first position.
The rhythm comes from the notation, not the tab
This is the thing that catches everyone out. Tab numbers carry pitch only. Nothing in0 4 0 tells you whether those are three quick notes or three slow ones. That is why every good Irish tab book prints standard notation above the tab: pitch from one, timing from the other. If you already know how the tune goes, the tab is enough. If you do not, listen to it first.
Every tune page here has a player with a speed control, so you can slow a tune to 30% and follow the tab along with it.
Questions
The bottom line. Tab is drawn as though you are looking down at the instrument with the low G nearest you, so the top line is the high E and the bottom line is the low G. Five-string banjo tab reverses this because its top string is a drone, so do not copy a five-string chart.
The fret to press on that string. A 0 means play the string open, with no finger on it at all. A 3 on the second line means press the third fret of the A string.
From the standard notation printed above the tab, not from the tab itself. Numbers alone carry no rhythm. This is why every good Irish tab book prints the dots above the tab: you read pitch from one and timing from the other.
No, and that is the point of it. Tab tells you exactly where to put your fingers. Most players use tab to get a tune under the hands quickly and then learn it properly by ear, which is the honest position most experienced players will give you.
Identical. Tenor banjo, mandolin and octave mandola are all tuned GDAE, so the same numbers on the same lines produce the same tune. The instruments sound in different octaves but your fingers do the same thing.