Originally Posted by: sungreen
I am a beginner and have a quick question. How essential is it to learn to read music, or will just being able to read tabs good enough to get me through (for the long term)?

Reading music is not absolutely necessary; but is an invaluable skill.

I suggest to people that are only interested in playing guitar as a hobby or on an amateur level it is not necessary to be able to sight read music notation, but it is good to at least be able to read and understand the information in music notation.

Sight reading is a very specific, highly specialized skill in it's own right.

If you are only interested in playing music as a hobbyist, then you only need to be able to read music to understand what the symbols mean in case you are learning a song via sheet music. Not necessarily to be able to sight read your way through a piece, though.

Best of success.