| By :
Teresa Rose
I bet you have wondered what it means when someone says they are playing the note "C". How do they know it's called "C"? Why Is it called "C" and not another letter? My guess is this person is familiar with the musical alphabet and that's why they know the note they are playing is called "C". Every pitch that you hear or note that you read in music has a name. To identify that pitch, that is what is used. This is similar to how you and I have a name that you are called. People are less likely to get us confused because our name identifies who we are and separates us from each other. This is also true for music notes. A standardized system of seven letters was developed to help us name pitches and identify them. Now we know that "C" is different from "G" when we hear it and play it. There are only seven letters in the musical alphabet: A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. Once the note "G" is played, the very next pitch is called "A" restarting the musical alphabet all over again. The entire musical alphabet can be cycled through many different times in a single piece of music. When you look at the white keys on the piano, you will see a repeating pattern of the seven letters used in music. I tell my students that if they want to play a trick on someone, ask them to play or sing the note "H". This will help you find out very quickly how much a person knows about music. I know it can be hard to believe that music only has seven notes, especially when you are listening to a very complex piece of music. Sometimes the pitches fly by so quickly, you have a hard time keeping up with what's going on. In whatever way music sounds to your ear, there are still no more than seven different notes that you are hearing. There are some notes that may sound higher or lower than others. They also may be altered by a sharp or flat, giving it another very unique sound. Regardless, the first seven letters of the English language alphabet are used to the name notes making music a simple language to learn. Try memorizing all seven notes now that you know what letters are used in the musical alphabet. Also, it's very worthwhile to memorize the pattern on the white keys of the piano as well. Remember to practice repeating the musical alphabet by restarting with the letter "A" after you reach "G". As you can see, music really isn't that hard to learn. The next step is to see how those seven notes are used when we read it on the music page.
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