Lesson 2: 五線譜(The Grand Staff)

The grand staff is the most widely used system of musical notation. Generally, knowing how to read music on the grand staff is regarded as "knowing how to read music" in the lay man's term. The "grand staff" consists of two staffs stacked together as follows:

There are two clefs in the grand staff. The one on the top is called the treble clef (高音譜號); the one at the bottom is called the bass clef (低音譜號). There are 5 lines in each staff. Notes can be written on the lines or between the lines (in the spaces). Notes written on the lines are called line notes; and the notes written in the spaces are called space notes.

The grand staff also provides a "visualization" of the music in a sense, because notes that are higher up in the staff will have a higher pitch (with a few exceptions). The figure below shows that the Middle C on the piano is also in the middle of the grand staff.

This image is obtained from this website.

It is extremely important to memorize what notes each line and space refers to, because that will allow you to read music scores more quickly. You should be familiar with the notes that you can look at the note and know which letter it refers to immediately. Similarly, you should know the notes well enough that you can write down every note on the grand staff immediately when you are asked to do so. It should not be very difficult if you have memorized the letters in Lesson 1, because it is just cycles of C, D, E, F, G, A, B. And remembering where the Middle C is located on the grand staff helps you to count your steps up or down the staff to see where the notes belong to.

Questions that you should be able to answer at the end of this lesson:

• What are the clefs mentioned above? What are the differences between them?
• What are line notes and space notes? (Try to write examples of them)
• Be able to name notes that are written on the grand staff without thinking (for too long).
• Be able to write any note on the grand staff without thinking (for too long).

Lesson 1: 白色琴鍵 (White keys)

A standard full piano keyboard contains 88 keys, which consist of 52 white keys and 36 black keys. Each key represents a unique note, or pitch. In general, the keys on the right are higher pitch than the keys on the left. In other words, the relative physical positions of the keys on a keyboard will tell you the relative pitches of those notes.

If you look at the keyboard carefully, you will notice that it has a repeating "pattern" as follows:

Starting from the left, the first white key is C, followed by D, E, F, G, A, B. The eighth white key is C again. Since the second C is on the right of the first C, it has a higher pitch than the first C, and we say it is an octave higher than the first C. Another way to understand it is that the "distance" between the first and second C's is an octave. The concept of "octave" is very important in music.

In the figure above, there are black keys between some of the white keys. As mentioned above, the relative position of keys tells you their relative pitches. Therefore, the pitch of each black key is between the pitches of the two white keys on its left and right. Note that not all adjacent white keys have a black key between them. In particular, there is no black key between E and F, and between B and C.

The figure above also has an arrow pointing at the first C with the label "Middle C". There are several C's on a piano keyboard, which one of them is the "Middle C"?

Ans: When you are facing the middle of the keyboard, the C in front of you is the "Middle C".

Questions that you should be able to answer at the end of this lesson:

1. How many keys are there in a standard piano keyboard?
2. What are the 7 letters for the white keys?
3. What is an "octave"?
4. Name the places where there is no black key.
5. Locate Middle C on the piano.

the Piano

Here is a little history of piano in English and in Chinese.
(You do not need to know all these before learning the piano... but it is always good to know about things like this.)

Frequently Asked Questions (that people asked me):

1. When did you start learning how to play the piano?
   When I was 5 (but I stopped taking lessons when I was 14). I only started to play chords after I came to BCEC.
   
   
2. How long does it take to learn to play chords on the piano?
   It really depends on how "naturally talented" you are, and how hardworking you are, and how much music background you have. E.g. if you have absolutely no background in music, it could take up to years for you to learn. If you have some background, it still can take more than one year. So, it takes great patience and perseverence for someone to learn how to play the piano.
   
   
3. Can you teach me what to play with my left hand?
   No, I cannot teach you what to play, because this is improvisation. I may be able to teach you the theory behind it, but that also requires a lot of basic knowledge.
   
   
4. How can I improve my techniques in improvisation?
   Keep playing, keep trying, and keep practising. There is no shortcut around this, I'm sorry. You should also listen to more music, because you can pick up more techniques by listening to music and try to replicate them with your own hands.