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How To Read Sheet Music: A Step-by-Step Guide
Have you ever wanted to learn how to read sheet music? We’re here to help! This article features a full introduction to the language of music, plus it includes free tools to get you started on your music journey.
Have you ever heard a song on the radio and thought, “Hey, it’d be really cool to know how to play that?” Do you have friends who play musical instruments, and you want to join in on the fun? Do you want to expand your general artistic knowledge? Well, learning the basics of how to read sheet music can help you achieve all of these, and in a shorter amount of time than you might think!
At its very simplest, music is a language just like you’d read aloud from a book. The symbols you see on pages of sheet music have been used for hundreds of years. They represent the pitch, speed, and rhythm of the song they convey, as well as expression and techniques used by a musician to play the piece. Think of the notes as the letters, the measures as the words, the phrases as the sentences, and so on. Learning how to read music really does open up a whole new world to explore!
Follow our step-by-step introduction to reading music and, with a little practice, you’ll be playing along in no time. Keep reading to the end for some free tools and sheet music arrangements to help you learn.
How to Read Music
Step 1: Learn the Basic Symbols of Musical Notation
Music is made up of a variety of symbols, the most basic of which are the staff, the clefs, and the notes. All music contains these fundamental components, and to learn how to read music, you must first familiarize yourself with these basics.
The Staff
The staff consists of five lines and four spaces. Each of those lines and each of those spaces represents a different letter, which in turn represents a note. Sheet music notes, represented by lines and spaces, are named A-G, and the note sequence moves alphabetically up the staff.
Treble Clef
There are two main clefs with which to familiarize yourself; the first is a treble clef. The treble clef has the ornamental letter G on the far left side. The G’s inner swoop encircles the “G” line on the staff. The treble clef notates the higher registers of music, so if your instrument has a higher pitch, such as a flute, violin, or saxophone, your sheet music is written in the treble clef. Higher notes on a keyboard also are notated on the treble clef.
We use common mnemonics to remember the note names for the lines and spaces of the treble clef. For lines, we remember EGBDF by the word cue “Every Good Boy Does Fine.” Similarly, for the spaces, FACE is just like the word “face.”
Bass Clef
The line between the two bass clef dots is the “F” line on the bass clef staff, and it’s also referred to as the F clef. The bass clef notates the lower registers of music, so if your instrument has a lower pitch, such as a bassoon, tuba, or cello, your sheet music is written in the bass clef. Lower notes on your keyboard also are notated in the bass clef.
A common mnemonic to remember note names for the lines of the bass clef is: GBDFA “Good Boys Do Fine Always.” And for the spaces: ACEG, “All Cows Eat Grass.”
Sheet Music Symbols and Notes on a Staff
Notes placed on the staff tell us which note letter to play on our instrument and how long to play it. There are three parts of each note, the note head, the stem, and the flag.
All music notes have a note head, either filled (black) or open (white). Where the note head sits on the staff (either on a line or space) determines which note you will play. Sometimes, note heads will sit above or below the five lines and four spaces of a staff. In that case, a line (known as a ledger line) is drawn through the note, above the note or below the note head, to indicate the note letter to play, as in the B and C notes above.
The note stem is a thin line that extends either up or down from the note head. The line extends from the right if pointing upward or from the left if pointing downward. The direction of the line doesn’t affect how you play the note but serves to make the notes easier to read while allowing them to fit neatly on the staff. As a rule, any notes at or above the “B” line on the staff have downward pointing stems, those notes below the “B” line have upward pointing stems.
The note flag is a curvy mark to the right of the note stem. Its purpose is to tell you how long to hold a note. We’ll see below how a single flag shortens the note’s duration, while multiple flags can make it shorter still.
Now that you know the parts to each note, we’ll take a closer look at those filled and open note heads discussed above. Whether a note head is filled or open shows us the note’s value, or how long that note should be held. Start with a closed note head with a stem. That’s our quarter note, and it gets one beat. An open note head with a stem is a half note, and it gets two beats. An open note that looks like an “o” without a stem is a whole note, and it gets held for four beats.
There are other ways to extend the length of a note. A dot after the note head, for example, adds another half of that note’s duration to it. So, a half note with a dot would equal a half note and a quarter note; a quarter note with a dot equals a quarter plus an eighth note. A tie may also be used to extend a note. Two notes tied together should be held as long as the value of both of those notes together, and ties are commonly used to signify held notes that cross measures or bars.
The opposite may also happen. We can shorten the amount of time a note should be held, relative to the quarter note. Faster notes are signified with either flags, like the ones discussed above, or with beams between the notes. Each flag halves the value of a note, so a single flag signifies 1/2 of a quarter note, a double flag halves that to 1/4 of a quarter note, et cetera. Beams do the same while allowing us to read the music more clearly and keep the notation less cluttered. As you can see, there’s no difference in how you count the eighth and 16th notes above.
But what happens when there isn’t a note taking up each beat? It’s easy, we take a rest! A rest, just like a note, shows us how long it should be held based on its shape. See how whole and quarter rests are used in the song “Here We Go Looby-Loo.”
Step 2: Pick Up the Beat
To play music, you need to know its meter, the beat you use when dancing, clapping, or tapping your foot along with a song. When reading music, the meter is presented similar to a fraction, with a top number and a bottom number. We call this the song’s time signature. The top number tells you how many beats are in a measure, the space between each vertical line (called a bar). The bottom number tells you the note value (the length) of each beat.
In the example above, the time signature is 4/4, meaning there are four beats per bar and that every quarter note gets one beat.
In the example below, the time signature is 3/4, meaning there are three beats per bar and that every quarter note gets one beat.
Let’s look again at the above examples. Notice that even though the 4/4 time signature in “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” calls for four beats per bar, there aren’t four notes in the second bar. That’s because you have two quarter notes and one half note, which added together equal four beats.
In addition to your note values and time signature, the last piece to feeling the rhythm is knowing your tempo, defined by the beats per minute. Tempo tells you how fast or slow a piece is intended to be played, and often is shown at the top of a piece of sheet music. For example, a tempo of 60 BPM (beats per minute) means you play 60 of the signified notes every minute or a single note every second. Likewise, a tempo of 120 doubles the speed to two notes every second. You may also see Italian words like “Largo,” “Allegro,” or “Presto” at the top of your sheet music, which signifies common tempos. Musicians use a tool called a metronome to help them keep tempo while practicing a new piece.
Step 3: Play a Melody
Congratulations, you’re almost on your way to reading sheet music! Next, let’s look at scales. A scale is made of eight consecutive notes. For example, the C major scale is composed of C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C. The interval between the first note of the C major scale and the last is an example of an octave. We recommend practicing the C major scale as much as possible, since knowing it makes it easier to learn the other major scales. Each of the notes of the C major scale corresponds with a white key on your keyboard. Here’s how the C major scale looks on a staff and how that corresponds to the keys on your keyboard:
Notice that as the notes ascend the staff, and move to the right on your keyboard, the pitch of the notes become higher. But what about the black keys? Musically, whole tones, or whole steps between the note letters, would limit the sounds we’re able to produce on our instruments. Let’s consider the C major scale you just learned to play. The distance between the C and the D keys in the C scale is a whole step. However, the distance between the E and the F keys in the C scale is a half-step. Do you see the difference? The E and the F keys don’t have a black key in between them, thus they’re just a half step away from one another. Every major scale has the same pattern: whole-whole-half-whole-whole-whole-half. There are many other types of scales, each with unique sounds, like minor scales, modal scales, and more that you’ll come across later. For now, let’s focus only on major scales and the major scale pattern. Look at the C major scale again on the keyboard below.
Semitones, or half-steps on the keyboard, allow us to write an infinite variety of sounds into music. A sharp, denoted by the ♯ symbol, means that note is a semitone (or half step) higher than the note head to its right on sheet music. Conversely, a flat, denoted by a ♭ symbol, means the note is a semitone lower than the note head to its right. Notice on the keyboard picture and notated staff below, showing each half step between the C and the E notes, that whether you use the sharp or the flat of a note depends on whether you’re moving up or down the keyboard.
There’s one more symbol to learn regarding semitones, and that’s the natural, denoted by a ♮. If a note is sharp or flat, that sharp or flat extends throughout the measure, unless there’s a natural symbol. A natural cancels a sharp or flat within a measure or a song. Here’s what playing C to E would look like with natural symbols.
The last key to learning how to read music is understanding key signatures. As an example, the C major scale you learned above was in the key of C. Scales are named after their tonic, the preeminent note within the scale, and the tonic determines what key you play in. You can start a major scale on any note, so long as you follow the whole-whole-half-whole-whole-whole-half pattern. Following that pattern in keys other than the key of C will require you to use sharps and flats. Since that’s the case, we place the sharps or flats for your song’s key signature right before the meter, after the clef, on your sheet music. That tells you to maintain those sharps or flats throughout the music unless there’s a natural symbol to override it. You will begin to recognize the key signatures of pieces based on which sharps or flats are shown. Here’s a quick glimpse at some key signatures using sharps and flats:
Step 4: Free Tools to Help You Learn
The steps above are a great place to start as you learn to read music. To help you along on your musical journey, we’ve also created a few free tools to begin practicing with.
First, download a free arrangement of “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” Just add the song to your cart and proceed through checkout. For more variety, check out the rest of our sheet music for beginners, all of which you’ll be able to play using the steps above. Play popular hits like the Star Wars Theme, “Let It Go” from ‘Frozen’, “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen, and more. We’re adding new Beginner Notes daily, so be sure to check back often and learn to play all your favorite songs!
We’ve also created a helpful guide for lettering the keys on your keyboard or piano. Download your Keyboard Note Guide here to print, fold, and place on your keyboard. Once you become familiar with the keys, you can easily remove it and continue to strengthen your note-reading skills.
Finally, don’t forget to download the free Musicnotes app! Enjoy instant access to all your Musicnotes sheet music files, plus tools and features created by musicians, for musicians. As you progress and learn how to read sheet music, your collection of arrangements will grow. Our app makes it easy to keep everything organized on the go. If you have any additional questions or need help finding songs to practice, reach out to our team of experts and we’ll be happy to help. Good luck and, most importantly, have fun!
piano notes for beginners
Piano Tutorial For Complete Beginners
There are few instruments friendlier to complete beginners than the piano. On most other instruments, it takes new students weeks or even months to learn how to produce single notes, but generating noise on the piano is remarkably intuitive. Press one key down softly and you’ll get a soft sound. Press a key down firmly and quickly and you’ll get a louder sound. Press multiple notes down simultaneously and you’ll get some sort of chord. Anyone can get sounds to come out of a piano, but converting those sounds into music takes work. If you’re dying to learn how to play the piano but have no clue how to get started, then you’ve come to the right place. This is a special Musika piano tutorial for complete beginners. We’ll give you everything you need to help you master basic skills on the piano.
What you’ll need
To get the most out of this piano tutorial here’s what you’ll need:
– A piano, electric keyboard or synthesizer. Any basic instrument with a keyboard will work. If you’re learning on a regular old piano, it’s super important that your instrument is tuned. You can tell if your piano is tuned or not by playing every note from left to right and listening for notes that sound out of place.
-A metronome. This is a device that produces audible rhythm patterns you can practice to. There’s tons of free or cheap metronome app options you can download straight to your phone, or your local music store will have plenty of options.
-A pencil and paper to take down notes.
A gateway to music theory
Before you tackle basic concepts on the piano, it’s very important that you put what you’re learning into a music theory context. Why? The piano’s keyboard is essentially a perfect visual representation of what happens in music theory. Learning a few simple formulas and patterns will help you to be able to build scales and chords not just on the piano, but on every instrument in music. New students to other instruments have a much harder time understanding their instrument in a music theory context, but us pianists have it easy because our instrument is laid out in a straight line, key by key. To help you get the most out of this piano tutorial, we’re going to show you how to master some piano basics while teaching you theory at the same time.
Middle C, steps and note names on the piano
Many traditional pianos have 88-key keyboards, but you’ll stick to playing just one octave (an octave is a set of eight white keys). The first thing we’ll show you is where middle C is located on the keyboard. From this spot, you’ll learn every note name on the piano:
The piano’s keyboard is built off of repeating sets of white and black keys. The distance between one note (this includes white and black keys) and another one directly above it is called a half-step. Two half-steps are called whole-steps. Starting from middle C, the white keys follow the alphabet note-by-note until they reach G where they’ll reset to an A on the next note.
The piano’s black keys are called accidentals. The accidental above middle C is called both C# or Db (sharps are a half-step above a key and flats are placed a half-step below) depending on the context of whatever you’re playing. Yes, that sounds totally complicated, but I promise it’s for a very good reason that we don’t have time to get into in this piano tutorial. In short, every accidental can be both flats and sharps.
Here’s a visual guide to help you learn the notes names on the keyboard:
Proper fingering
Most scales, exercises and notated music written for the piano comes with detailed instructions for how to play with your fingers. Fingers on both your left and right hand are numbered like this:
Playing with proper fingering is an an essential element of good piano technique. At first it might be difficult to play with the correct fingering, but down the road you’ll find it nearly impossible to play the piano without the proper fingering. Don’t try to learn or play anything on the piano without using the correct fingers.
Introductory exercise
This exercise is a great way to introduce rhythm, note names, proper fingering and the correct way to hold your hands while playing the piano. Let’s start with your right hand. With your thumb (#1), find middle C on the keyboard. Your hand should be relaxed with your palm facing down to the keyboard. Position your hand so that each finger rests above each key. When you’re ready, play C, D, E, F and G with your 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 fingers. Then without pausing play that same sequence of notes backwards. If you need help memorizing note names, try saying the name of each note as you play it.
Once you’ve completed that sequence, move your hand and thumb to the D above middle C and repeat the same sequence there and on every note until your hand reaches the C an octave above middle C. When you’re ready, add in your left hand and try playing the exercise with your hands together. You’ll play the C an octave below middle C with your left hand’s pinky (#5 finger). As soon as you get your bearings, start practicing this exercise to the slow click of a metronome (start around 70 beats per-minute). Every seemingly inconsequential thing you play on the piano should be an opportunity for you to develop your rhythm-playing skills, so have your metronome out and clicking while you master this exercise.
C major scale
Learning scales is a great way to develop independence between your left and right hands. In music theory, a scale is simply a series of notes that explore a key or tonality through a step-by-step sequence of notes. The different notes in major and minor scales can be arranged in a way that builds the basic chords we hear in music. We’ll discuss more about chords in a bit.
The C major scales’ fingering pattern can be applied to lots of other piano scales, so this is a great place to start connecting your hands with scales. We recommend learning the scales with your hands together instead of separately even, but feel free to split your hands up if you need to. In this scale, you’ll play exclusively the white notes on the keyboard. When you’re ready, practice this scale with a metronome.
Here’s the note names and fingers for the C major scale:
C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C
RH: 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
LH: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 3, 2, 1
With this fingering, your middle fingers will always play at the same time. If they don’t, start the scale over again. When you’re ready, start practicing this scale to a metronome.
A natural minor scale
There are three minor scales in music: natural, melodic and harmonic. For the purposes of this piano tutorial, we’re just going to show you how to play natural scales. The A natural minor scale has the same fingering pattern as the C major scale. You’ll basically do everything you did on the C major scale only starting on the note of A.
This scale shares all of its notes with the C major scale because it’s a parallel minor the key of C. Parallel minor keys and scales are located three half-steps below their major counterparts. For example, G major’s parallel minor key is E minor.
The fingering pattern used in the C major and A minor scales can be applied to these other scales:
G major
G minor
D major
D minor
A major
A minor
E major
E minor
Start by memorizing these scales before you move on to learning ones with more complicated fingerings.
Building major and minor scales
All major and natural minor scales can be built on the piano and in all of music by using one simple pattern of whole and half steps:
W-W-H-W-W-W-H
To use this pattern, start again with the middle C note. Skip a whole step and you’ll get D. Skip another one and you’ll get E. From there, move up just a half-step and you’ll get F. Skip three more individual whole-steps to get G, A and B and one more half-step to get back to C. Practice building major scales by trying this pattern out on different keys around the piano.
To build all natural minor scales, you’ll use this pattern:
W-H-W-W-H-W-W
Remember, these formulas construct major and minor scales not just on the piano but in all of music. Singers, guitarists and tuba players all use these same sequences of notes to build scales, but pianists have a much easier time visualising and understanding scales because the keyboard is laid out in such a linear way.
Basic chord exercise
Once you’ve got a good idea of how scales work, you can apply some simple formulas to every major and minor key on the piano. There are three different types of basic chords in music: major, minor and diminished. Major chords sound full and complete. Minor chords sound sad, morose and pensive. Diminished chords sound tense, dramatic and unsettling.
Different combinations of individual notes create the basic chords we hear in music. Most the music you hear is built off of different chord progressions.
To start, press your right hand thumb, middle finger and pinky down (1, 3, 5) on the middle C, E and G notes to play a C major chord. Maintaining the same fingers and hand shape, build a chord on every key in the C major scale until you get back to a C note located an octave above where you started on middle C. Add in your left hand when you’re ready and use the pinky, middle and thumb fingers (5, 3, 1). If you’ve gone through every note in the C major scale correctly, you should have played the following chords: C major, D minor, E minor, F major, G major, A minor, B diminished.
All major keys will have this same exact sequence of major, minor and diminished chords:
- Major 2. Minor 3. Minor 4. Major 5. Major 6. Minor 7. Diminished
Once you’ve mastered this exercise in the key of C with a metronome, try it out in different keys around the piano. Playing the same chord progression in multiple keys will help you to practice your chord-playing and develop your music theory knowledge at the same time.
This basic chord exercise can also be played in natural minor keys, but the order of chords will be different. If you try this exercise in the key of A minor, you’ll get the following sequence of chords: A minor, B diminished, C major, D minor, E minor, F major and G major.
All natural minor keys have the same sequence of basic chords:
- Minor 2. Diminished 3. Major 4. Minor 5. Minor 6. Major 7. Major
If you apply everything you’ve learned in this piano tutorial so far, you’ll now be able to play every basic chord and many major and minor scales on your instrument.
Hanon exercises
Once you’ve mastered playing scales and basic chords on the piano, we recommend picking up a book of Hanon piano finger exercises. These exercises are designed to deliver strength, flexibility and dexterity to your hands. You can pick up a copy of this book online or at your local music store.
