Read Music -- You Can Learn Music Reading Fast!

You've seen countless others do it, looking over their shoulders' with curiosity. They're doing something you'd like to do. They're reading musical notes.

Sitting on paper looking back at you are lines, squiggles, dots and stick like figures. What is all that stuff?

It's music notation. All those strange looking symbols are the language of music. To learn a song, from the simplest to the increasingly more sophisticated, it pays to know the lingo. Music notation truly is a universal language.

The Secret of Reading Music -- It's Not Brain Surgery!

Learning to read musical notes is not difficult. It does take a little patience. Think of this number and keep it in your mind: 457.

This represents three basic elements in perceiving musical notation.

We write music notes on a music staff.

The number 4 is the number of spaces within a music staff.

The number 5 is the number of horizontal lines on a music staff.

The number 7 is the number of pitches or notes in music.

These notes are the seven letters of the alphabet:

A, B, C, D, E, F, and G.

These seven notes sit on the five lines and in the four spaces within a staff. You can play these notes individually. You can play two or more notes in unison, as a chord.

Think of it, all the different songs in the world formed from just seven notes. It's the same seven notes used in endless combinations that creates variety in music. From Chopsticks to Beethoven's fifth symphony, seven notes in countless configurations and patterns are all that's used.

To represent note values, notes assume different characteristics on the music staff. Some are solid black in color. Some are clear ovals without stems attached to them. Some have stems attached to them. Some have stems attached to them with what looks like little flags at the top. All of these things help us understand the 'duration' of each note.

Then there are 'rests'. These are different looking music script. These markings indicate pauses or intervals of silence in the music. These help you understand the 'duration' of silence, before you play another note.

We write music for the piano on a Grand Staff. This staff combines the Treble Clef and the Bass Clef. We need a Clef at the beginning of a staff so we can determine the letter names of the lines and spaces.

The Treble Clef or 'G' Clef curls around the second line from the bottom, or 'G' line of a five line staff. We write notes for the upper part of the piano keyboard on this staff.

The Bass Clef or 'F' clef sits on the fourth line from the bottom of a five line staff. We write notes for the lower part of the piano keyboard on this staff.

It helps to know where line 'G' in the Treble Clef is. It allows us to figure out the letter names of the other lines and spaces. The same goes for line 'F' in the Bass Clef. When we know the name of one line, we follow our alphabet in order. If you know one line is 'G' then you know the space after it is 'A' and the line after the space is 'B'. When you're through the seven notes, they just repeat themselves. On a piano keyboard, they repeat like this:

A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A

It's that simple, all along the keyboard.

Reading musical notation also involves Time Signatures and articulation markings, rhythm, sharps and flats.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves here. The first thing, now, is to become familiar with the Grand Staff and the names of the notes that sit on its line and in its spaces. Then associate the notes with piano keys.

When you're comfortable with the basics of reading notes, you can move on to the other stuff.

Reading musical notes is easier than you think. Why not get started now. It will give you another arrow in your musical quiver.

For exciting courses in reading music, come on over to PlayPianoCatalog.