How to Understand Musical Notes' Corresponding Letters

This article covers musical notation with the corresponding letter it is. In music, the notes are known by where they are on the staff and by a letter name. This is to simplify transition between music written on a staff and either a musical instrument or the singing voice.

Things You'll Need

• sheet music or song with music on staff
• or piece of lined paper to practice on--lined notebook or looseleaf will do
• or simply print out this article and do later

Instructions

1. This first part is for the treble clef only. (The top series of lines in a song, the bottom is the bass clef).

2. 

   The first thing we will cover is the notes on the lines of the treble clef. The picture to the left covers what lines are which. These notes are known as EGBDF. Two tricks to learn these are:
   Every good boy does fine (on the line) or
   Every girl bakes delicious fudge.

3. 

   The next part of learning the notes is learning what notes go in the spaces. The picture to the left covers what note is in what space. The notes are known as: FACE. A trick to learn these is:
   FACE in the space.

4. 

   The next item to learn is that musical staves use notes not letters. Using whole notes--the little ovals next to the letters in the picture to the left--this is easy to accomplish. Where the notes are at, no matter if a quarter, half, whole, etc., they are the letter that corresponds to their location.

5. 

   At times there will be notes above or below the staff locations. These must be understood as the next corresponding letter down or up. They will be indicated by a note on a blank space or a short line above or below the staff. See the picture to the left for this example.

6. For the bass clef, I have no tricks to memorize this--but one can tell what the notes are by comparing it to the treble clef above it. The notes on the lines and in the spaces will go down corresponding to the notes in the treble clef.

7. If one wants to learn this more easily, the easiest way is to get a practice keyboard with notes clearly labeled by the letters and find or label notes in a sheet of music with the corresponding letter name.

8. Also, practice writing these notes out on a piece of lined paper or on a piece of sheet music, labeling the notes with the corresponding letter.

Tips & Warnings

• The notes on a staff might have lines from oval, unfilled ovals, dots, and flags on them these are special notations for how long the notes will last.

• There are also special symbols such as boxes or what looks like a backwards "z". Those are rests or periods of silence in the piece.

• This will help a singer or a beginning musician, but there are other things to learn in music before one grasps the whole concept.