How do you read a lead sheet for a guitar?

Question:this is the one i'm trying to do: http://i94.photobucket.com/albums/l113/a...

i'm really confused on how to play it, please helllpp!

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: this is the one i'm trying to do: http://i94.photobucket.com/albums/l113/a...

i'm really confused on how to play it, please helllpp!

The letters on top, (G, D, G) are chords. You change chords on the words that have the letters on top. For example,

G D A Em
prison gates won't Open up for me, on these hands and knees
G D Em
I'm crawling, oh, I reach for you.

When you sing the word "prison, you would play a G chord, and strum it until you you sing the word "Open" at which point you would play a D chord, then you would strum on the D chord until you sang the word "Me" when you would switch to an A chord, and so on and so forth.

If you do not know how to play chords, this website explains them pretty well, and has sound samples for you to listen to, to make sure you're playing them correctly.

http://www.8notes.com/guitar_chord_chart...

Edit-For some reason, yahoo will not put the chord notes where they're supposed to be above the lyrics

A lead sheet is usually a single line of music that contains the melody only. Above the melody line is a chord diagram or chord sign such as C7 Gsus, that indicates what chord to play along with the melody line. The way to play the leadsheet is to learn the melody line first and try to frame the chord around it, or play the chords and sing the melody line. (especially if the lyrics are included) The other thing you can do is to play the chords and let a second instrumentalist play the melody line or sing. Mark Levine and many others, have put out books showing you how to use a leadsheet and they are very useful if you don't have a friend around to show you what to do. I included a couple of links below that will more specifically answer your question. Hope this helps.