Monday, May 30, 2011

A Basic Guide To Help You Learn To Read Music

By Ray Stanley


Some people are lucky and born with a natural gift. They can instantly pick up languages or instinctively know how to kick a soccer ball. This is often the case with people who can play by ear. However if you can learn to read music it can help give you a more in depth knowledge of how people compose their works and make it easier for you to communicate ideas to people. It is also a good way of appreciating different pieces, whether they are written by classical musicians or songwriters.

The way notes are arranged on a sheet of music are similar to the way words are arranged on a page in the Western alphabet. The difference is that instead of a sentence the notes are arranged on five lines known as a staff. Knowing this helps you to understand how a piece of music is constructed.

Instead of a capital letter to denote the start of a sentence we use what is known as a clef. There are two main types of clef. A top clef is probably the most well known example and covers most high pitched instruments and most singing voices. It is also known as a G clef due to the fact that it meets in the middle where you will find a G note. In this case the notes go from E, G, B, D and F when played from top to bottom with F, A, C, E in the space between the notes. F, A, C, E is relatively easier to remember, but most teachers come up with a mnemonic such as Elvis Grew Beard Dandruff Fuzz.

You can follow these notes in order starting from the note E and then the sequence goes G, B, D and F. You can make up a mnemonic to help you remember this, such as Edgar, Graham, Bill, Dan and Fred. The space between these notes appears as F, A, C and E and therefore is a lot easier to remember. For a lower pitched instrument such as the tuba a bass or F clef is used. In this case the notes are arranged as G followed by B, D, F and A with A continuing with C, E and G in the spaces between the notes.

You should then look at the key signature next to the clef. If the symbols next to the clef resemble a small letter b then the tone should be flat. The symbols that look like pound signs on a telephone are known as sharps. If there is no symbol then the piece is what is known as natural.

When you learn how to read music time signatures are important. These look like fractions and give you an idea of beats per measure, usually indicated by a 4. 4 and 4 is the most common and is also marked with a C to indicate this.

As stated before this is a basic guide to help you start to learn to read music. There are online demonstrations that can go into more depth and can be more specific to the instrument you are learning or your own type of singing voice. It is often a good idea to get tuition for a more in depth learning experience. With hard work and dedication you can learn the language of music.




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