How to Learn Flat Notes in Music
The concept of flat notes, a basic component of music theory, should be one of the first things beginners learn. Understanding flat notes and other accidentals will help build a basic foundation for the elementary principles of music theory and practice.
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Instructions
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Find a piano or keyboard. Either will work well for beginners, since the notes are laid out in sequential order. Learning about flat notes also means to learn about half steps.
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Pick any white key on the keyboard. Hit that key and hum the pitch. Release the key and immediately depress the key that is adjacent to the left, which will be a half step down. Hum that pitch as well. You have now experienced a half-step drop in pitch, which is what happens when a note is flattened.
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Study a music score. Any notes with an italicized "b" on its left are flattened--they're lowered a half step from the scale in which the score is written.
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Write out a chromatic scale. The chromatic scale goes from any starting note and sequentially goes through each successive half step until reaching the original note of the scale. There are 12 notes in a chromatic scale. Below is an example of a chromatic scale in C. Each note is separated by a "-".
C - C#/ Db - D - D#/ Eb - E - F - F#/ Gb - G - G#/ Ab - A - A#/ Bb - B - C
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Notice in the example of the chromatic scale above, that pitches that are between natural pitches can either be read as a sharp or a flat. That is because a sharp raises the value of a pitch a half step. If a flat lowers a pitch a half step and a sharp does the opposite, then it is important to realize that a single pitch can be called by two different names. F# ("F sharp"), for example, is the same as Gb ("G flat").
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Tips & Warnings
It is important to know some terminology when talking about music:
A half step is the smallest interval between two pitches in western music.
A pitch is a specific tone that resonates a specific frequency. Although a pitch is often denoted is by a letter name, it also has a specific frequency associated with it. The note "A," closest to the middle of the keyboard, has a frequency of 220 Hz.
A note, in terms of letter names of a scale, is a collection of pitches that are separated by octave intervals. For example, the note "A" can refer to any "A" on the keyboard, but only one of them is 220 Hz.
Accidentals refer to any pitch or note in a score of music that does not naturally occur in the scale in which the music is written. Accidentals can either be written as a sharp, double sharp, flat, double flat, or natural sign.
