Music notes

Music notes are the smallest building block of music. You can play them one at a time to make a melody or you play a combination of notes all at once and this is called a chord. Notes have four important characteristics. These characteristics are pitch, time, timbre, and dynamics. It is extremely important to be aware of all four of these characteristics when playing music.

Pitch is indicated by the position of the note on the staff. The picture above contains a staff with different notes on it. The higher the note on the staff, the higher the pitch of that note. The lower the note on the staff, the lower the pitch. When two or more notes appear to be stacked on top of one another they are to be played simultaniously.

The time or duration of a note is determined by the way the note looks. To the right is a chart that shoes what each note value looks like. This will be explain in more detail in the Concept of Rhythm lesson.

Timbre is the tone of a note. Several things can effect the timbre of sound. Timbre can be affected by how you play your instrument, temperature, acoustic environment, and a whole world of other things. Notes can be at the same pitch, but still sound very different. This is because of a difference in timbre. This is also why a guitar doesn't sound like a piano.

Dynamics are how hard or soft a note is played. This is a characteristic that often ignored by many amateur musicians. Being aware of your dynamics while playing is very important. You have to learn to be very sensitive to how loud or soft you are playing in order to make your music really come alive. Without any variation in dynamics your music will become very dull and it will lack a dimension that is crucial to all music. At the beginning of each piece of sheet music there is a symbol that is placed below the staff in order to notate the dynamics. Pictured below is a diagram that will show you the symbols that are used for each level of dynamics.