Reading Music

Reading music is not nearly as difficult as you might think. What most people don't realize is that it's easy to learn how it works; but it takes a lot of practice to be good at it. Fortunately, it's not necessary to be able to sight-read to play Irish music. Many players don't know how to read a note at all! These players can often, though, learn a tune by simply hearing it a couple of times, and then play it back perfectly; and, they often improvise better than sight-readers (see the section on Listening for more information and exercises).

The ability to read music comes in handy, though, when learning tunes on your own, or transcribing a tune to paper. This section will teach you the basics so that you can work on it.

Music is written on a series of five lines called a staff. Each line and space corresponds to a particular note, with higher notes taking higher lines or spaces so that the written music follows the ups and downs of the tune (more on this later).

The music is divided into bars by vertical lines, each of which represents the same length of time, and contains the same number of beats. But you must also know the length of each note. This is indicated by the type of note; each has a different appearance, and is played for a different length of time:

and so on. This is illustrated by the following chart:

You will see two numbers at the left of the topmost staff, for example:
The bottom number indicates what type of note constitutes one "beat", and the top number shows how many beats are in each bar. In the above example, there are four beats in each bar, and each beat is equivalent to a quarter note (incidentally, four-four time is also known as "common time", and is sometimes shown simply with a "C" instead of the "4/4"). This does not necessarily mean that there must be four quarter notes in each bar, as long as the beat-values of all the notes in a bar add up to four beats. For example, you could have a half note, a quarter note, and two eighth notes instead.

At the far left you will see a treble clef:
This indicates which notes the lines and spaces represent. With a treble clef, the second line from the bottom represents a G. (With other clefs, the lines and spaces correspond to different notes. For example, in bass clef, the second line from the bottom would be a B.)

The notes in treble clef are as follows:

If it is necessary to play notes above or below these notes, short lones called ledger lines are used to extend the range of the staff. Next, you might see some sharps and flats: . These indicate the key signature, or what notes you are to play sharp or flat. The one above has sharps on C and F, which indicates the key of D (remember that when playing a D scale, there are two sharps, one on C and one on F).

With all the above information, you are equipped to start reading music. But there are a bunch of miscellaneous symbols which you may need to know about, so they are presented here.

Accidentals are sharps , flats , and naturals which appear next to a particular note in the music. These affect the note within the current bar only.

Rests are periods in which you do not play, with lengths corresponding to normal notes:

and so on.

A repeat sign, indicated by two dots: indicates to repeat the section either from the beginning of the tune or from the last repeat sign, if there is one. If it has a number above it, repeat the section until you have played it that many times.

A repeat bar sign, indicates that you should repeat the last bar.

A triplet, indicated by a small "3" above or below a group of three notes, means that you should play those three notes in the space of two.

Dotted notes are quivalent to one and a half times the normal length of the note. For example, a dotted half note is the same length as three quarter notes.

Multiple endings are bracketed bars with numbers in the corners:

These are referred to as first and second endings. When you get to the first ending, play it, then repeat from the last repeat sign (or the beginning), as indicated by the repeat sign. When you reach it again, skip the first ending and play the second.

By now, you are probably thinking that it is impossible to read music and that musicians actually make it up as they go along. With a little practice, however, you will be able to learn a tune from the music, even if you can't yet play it straight from the music.

EXERCISE 6
Memorize the positions on the musical staff of all the notes you can play on the whistle. Your low D is the space just below the bottom line, and the spaces between the lines read upward F, A, C, E ("face"). Practically all written Irish music will have a sharp on the high F (this affects both the high and low F, by the way), and sometimes the C will be sharped as well.

EXERCISE 7
Pick a tune from those included with this manual. Start with the first bar, and work through it slowly, one note at a time, until you can play all the notes in order. Don't worry yet about timing or the length of the notes. You may find changing from some notes to others very awkward; if so, break it down into the finger motions necessary, and practice those.

EXERCISE 8
Tap your foot in an even, fairly slow rhythm, and using the same tune you practiced in exercise 7, proceed one bar at a time and play each note its proper length. Refer to the time signature of the tune to determine how many beats are in each bar and what type of note is one beat. Master each bar before proceeding to the next, and as you finish each bar, try to play the tune from the beginning to where you are without stopping. As you play, try to associate the written notes with the rhythmic patterns you hear, so that you can recall them later, in other tunes. Continue until you can play the tune from the music all the way through.

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