| Basic Music Theory |
| Music Notation |
| Staff |
A staff consists
of 5 horizontal lines running left to right across the
page and parallel to each other.
|
|
|
Barline
|
A
bar line is a vertical
line placed in a staff
to mark off measures. |
|
|
|
V
represents the vertical bar line |
|
|
Measure
|
The measure is the
area between each vertical bar line. It is in this area
where the notes and rests go.
|
|
| Treble
Clef and Bass Clef |
| There are two musical symbols that name lines and
spaces. They are Treble Clef and Bass Clef. |
| Treble
Clef or G Clef |
The treble clef is
a symbol indicating that the second line from the bottom
of a staff represents the pitch of G above middle C. |
|
| Bass
Clef or F Clef |
The bass clef is a
symbol indicating that the fourth line from the bottom
of a staff represents the pitch of F below middle C.
The bass clef symbol
also represents the lower notes on the grand staff. |
|
| Notes |
Notes are marked on the staff as small oval, sometimes circular, shapes. These shapes
may be a solid dark color or they may be an outline
with the center left white. Notes may be placed on the lines and in the spaces. Notes indicate the pitch by its position on the staff and duration by its shape. Notes are read from bottom to top. |
| Notes
on the Treble Clef |
The notes on the
line on the treble clef are labelled: E,G, B, D, F. - This is easily remembered
by using the saying
"Every Good Boy Does Fine"
The
spaces are for the notes F, A, C, E, in order from the bottom up.
|
|
| Notes
on the Bass Clef |
The notes on the
line on the bass clef are
labelled G, B, D, F, A or
"Good Boys Do Fine Always"
The
spaces are called A, C, E G or
"All Cows Eat Grass"
|
|
| Types
of Notes |
Whole
Note |
Four
beats equal one whole note. |
|
Half
Note |
Two
half notes make a whole. |
|
Quarter
Note |
Two
quarter notes make a half note
Four quarter notes make a whole note |
|
Eight
Note |
Two
eighth notes = 1 quarter note |
|
Sixteenth
Note |
Two
sixteenth notes make one eighth. |
|
Thirty
Second Note |
Two
32nd notes = one sixteenth note |
|
Whole
Rest * |
Worth
4 beats, like the Whole Note |
|
Half
Rest |
Worth
2 beats, like the half note |
|
Quarter
Rest |
Worth
one beat, like the quarter note |
|
Eighth
Rest |
Worth
half a beat, like 1 eighth note |
|
Sixteenth
Rest |
Worth
a half an eighth rest. |
|
Thirty
Second Rest |
Worth
half of a sixteenth rest. |
|
'Hold'
Dot |
Used
with notes and rests to add half a beat again the note
or rest value. |
|
* A rest is a pause in the playing of a song |
| Sharps
and Flats |
| Sharp |
A
musical symbol that raises the pitch of a note by one half step. |
|
| Flat |
A
musical symbol that lowers the pitch of a note by one half step. |
 |
Flat |
|
| Key Signature |
The
group of sharps or flats placed
to the right of
the clef and before the time signature *.
It indicates the key the song should be played in.
The key signature tells you if any note should be consistently sharped or flatted. The absence
of any sharp or flats at the
beginning tells you the song is played in the keyof
C. This example shows two sharps which tells you that
the song is played in the key of D major and that
F and C will always be played as sharps.
When
writing key signatures it is important to know the order in which they are
to be written.
If
with sharps,  ,
the order is: F, C, G, D, A, E, B.
If
with flats, ,
the order is: B, E, A, D, G, C, F. |
| * Time Signature |
A sign placed on a staff to indicate the meter, commonly a numerical fraction
of which the numerator is the number of beats per
measure and the denominator represents the kind of
note getting one beat.
In
this example the numerator is 4 and so the number
of beats per measure is 4. |
| Major
Scales |
The
musical alphabet stems from letters A to G. That is,
A,
B, C, D, E, F and G.
A scale is any
set of notes which
either all ascend or all descend in small steps, and
all the notes belong to a single key.
A scale consists
of the seven letters of the musical alphabet in sequence
and begin and end on the same note name. The C major scale begins on C and ends on C.
C,
D, E, F, G, A, B, C
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
 Click icon to hear c major scale
This
sequence or row of eight notes is the C major scale,
the major scale in which the key-note is C.
The
distance between the two Cs is called an octave.
An octave is a
set of eight notes.
What makes this a major scale is the distinctive sequence
of tones and semitones.
A tone occurs
when one note exists between two notes. A semitone occurs
when no note exists
between two notes.
|
| Rhythm |
| Rhythm is the basic beat of the song. This
includes how long you hold a note,
how long you rest or pause between notes,
and how you count the notes/rests in relationship to the "beat"
of the song. Learning to count the notes and rests in relationship
to the "beat"
of the song is rhythm. |
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