I am learning guitar and recently came across a sheet requesting what I understand to be an open B string (red arrow), however the music sheet shows a C (blue arrow) note being played. What is the correct way to interpret the vertically stacked numbers in the attached image? Do they not refer to left hand fingers?
Note that the music shows a C and also a B.
The first finger (1) of the left hand frets the second fret of the fourth string on the second eighth note of the first beat to make the E. Then the fourth finger of the left hand (4) frets the third string at the fifth fret to make the C in the chord. The first and second strings are left open (0 and 0) to make the B and high E in the chord.
On the third beat, the first finger slides up one fret (--1) on the fourth string to make the F. The fourth finger stays the same and the first and second strings stay open.
You may see a lot of notes in classical guitar made by fretting a lower sounding string with a fret higher than four or five instead of using a higher sounding string. This is idiomatic for the guitar as it is one way to play wider or narrower intervals without having to stretch the left hand as much.
