Reading music isn't as hard as it may appear. Once you learn a how the symbols work everything becomes rather clear. Written music, called Musical Score, has sybols used for notes, timing, volume, and even quiet periods.
Let's start with a basic discussion of timing. There are many different styles of music, all organzied by the number of beats per minute.
In addition to beats per minute, there are also the number of beats per measure. Beats per minute will determine how many measure you play per munites, while the nuber of beats per measure will determine how long each measure lasts.
Each measure usually has one or more notes in it. Notes come in different types divided up by how long they are held for, or how long they last. Notes range from 1/64 of a beat, or count, all the way up to a single count. Special notation is used to signify if a note is heald for longer than a single beat.
A musical staff is an arangment of notes from low to high. Deeper notest are at the bottom and higher notes are at the top.
Guitar music has some of its own special symbols to signify to the player to perform certain guitar specific actions such as bends, chimes, hammer ons, and pull offs.