Wilbur's Music Tutorial #1

Music Basics...Terminology and Format

Introduction

Reading music is much like reading a language. There are rules, exceptions, and general format guidelines that must be
memorized and followed if you are to understand it. This tutorial provides the (minimum) basics, so you can begin to work your
way through a piece of sheet music and understand what it's telling you. This may sound complex at first, but trust me, once you
understand a few basic concepts...everything starts to fall into place.
A quick word on what this tutorial does NOT do. It does not attempt to cover all aspects of music theory, notation, and style. A
select few basic musical concepts are presented in simplified form and stated in absolutes for ease of understand. Even though
exceptions exist for nearly everything....you should learn the basics rules first, developing your musical sense of order, before
you begin addressing the exceptions and more complex music theory.

Music Format/Terminology

Music is written on a STAFF. A staff consists of 5 horizontal lines running

left to right across the page.

The staff is broken into segments by vertical BAR LINES cutting the staff into small pieces. The area between each vertical bar
line is call a MEASURE, and in this measure is where the notes and rests go.

TREBLE CLEF: That funny looking symbol at the very beginning of the staff is the
CLEF symbol. The clef symbol indicates whether the notes following it start at
middle C and go upwards (Treble Clef)...or start at middle C and go downwards
(Bass Clef).
(Check out the GRAND STAFF in TUTORIAL #2 and see the notes for both Clefs)

BASS CLEF: The Bass Clef symbol represent the lower notes on the grand staff.

TIME SIGNATURE: is the set of numbers (Ex: 4/4) right next to the clef sign. This
tells you how many beats to each measure and the time value of each note in the
measure (much more on this in PART #3).

KEY SIGNATURE: is the next group of characters that you SOMETIMES (but not
always) see to the immediate right of the clef sign and BEFORE the Time Signature.
This is the KEY the song should be played in. The Key Signature consists of a small
group of sharps or flats and tells you if any note should be consistently sharped or
flatted. The absence of any sharp or flats at the beginning tells you the song is played
in the KEY of C. This example shows two sharps which tells you that the song is played in the key of D MAJOR..and that F and
C will always be played as sharps. Most of the diatonic harmonica books for beginners have songs written in "C" (no sharps and
no flats).
NOTES: are marked on the staff as small oval (sometimes circular) shapes. These shapes may be a
solid dark color or they may be an outline with the center left white. Notes are placed ON the lines
and IN the spaces. They represent muscial sounds called "Pitches".

All notes (except for the WHOLE NOTE) have a STEM. The stems may have additional FLAGS attached to the right top portion
of the stem. The combination of NOTE COLOR (solid or outlined), along with the STEM & FLAG(s), indicate the time value of
the note. The graphic below shows the most common notes and their time value. The NOTE is on the top staff and its associated
REST is on the bottom staff.

RESTS indicate pauses in the music. Each rest has a different shape and a specific time value: that is each rest indicates how long
of a pause you should make in your music. Each note has a corresponding rest. (see above).
NOTE: It may be hard to determine from the graphic above...but a WHOLE REST hangs from the line above it. A HALF REST
sits on the line below it.
(More on how to count Note/Rest time values in Tutorial #3).

Wilbur's Music Tutorial #2

NOTES...Sound and Pitch

NOTES: indicate what musical sound (or pitch) should be played and how long it should be held. The placement of the note on
a line or space on the staff indicates which musical sound (or pitch) should be played. Each line and space has a pitch associated
with it, and each pitch is represented by an alphabetic character.
In the following illustration you will see notes arranged on the Grand Staff (both Bass and Treble Clefs). You will also see the
alphabetic letter associated with each note and the relative pitch of that note as it relates to the piano keyboard.

Find MIDDLE C above...notice how the Treble Clef goes up from middle C while the Bass Clef notes go down from Middle C.

FLATS and SHARPS: As previously stated, every note on a line or space on the staff has a pitch. This pitch can be raised or
lowered in whole steps by going from one note to the next...OR the pitch can be raised or lowered in half steps by using SHARPS
and FLATS.

• SHARPS are indicated by the "#" sign.

• A SHARP raises the musical tone by one half step (Ex: from C to C#).
• FLATS are indicated by the "b" sign.
• A FLAT lowers the musical tone by one half step (Ex: D to Db)
The notes in the illustration above could be raised or lowered one half tone by using sharps or flats. On a piano...the black keys
are used to play these half tones.
NOTE: Two exceptions to always using the black keys to make a note sharp or flat is B and C....and E and F. You'll notice these
two white keys are side by side with no black key in between. These 4 notes are the only exception to whole tone increases
between notes. For example...E# is F...and Fb is E.

DIATONIC HARMONICA: Here you see the diatonic harmonica with the notes each whole plays. The first note is the BLOW
note and the second note is the DRAW note.

In the next example you will which notes on the staff correspond to which hole (blow or draw) in the diatonic harmonica. The
Diatonic harmonica is constructed to play whole notes only. It is possible to play flats and sharps on diatonic harmonicas, but
this involves an advanced (and somewhat difficult) method known as "bending".
NOTE: This illustration is for a diatonic harmonica in the Key of C.

CHROMATIC HARMONICA: This example shows you the notes on the staff and the corresponding hole (blow or draw) in
the chromatic harmonica.
Notice that the chromatic harmonica, like the piano, can play all of the whole notes (with the slide left OUT)...AND play sharped
and flatted tones (with the slide pushed IN).

Wilbur's Music Tutorial #3

RHYTHM & TEMPO...How to Count the Beat

Introduction
Rhythm and Tempo are two essential and somewhat difficult subjects. If you've gone through Part #1 and Part #2, you understand
basic music terminology, how music is written, AND you should be able to figure out which note on the page equates to what
musical "pitch/tone". You should also be able to find the hole on your harmonica that will play that "pitch/tone".

So how come this isn't enough???

Why can't you stop here and go play music????
The answer is RHYTHM and TEMPO. Without rhythm, any song is only collection of musical notes. With the wrong rhythm...or
if you confuse rhythm with tempo....your chances of making a song sound good (even if you play the correct notes)is slim. This
becomes painfully obvious the first time you try to learn a song from sheet music without having heard the song before. With no
prior knowledge of how the song should sound...(ie understandit's rhythm)...learning the song from a piece of paper can be
difficult.
Of course the easiest way to identify/learn the rhythm of a new song is to HEAR the song played. Piano teachers always play a
new song once through (at least once) for the student to hear before sending them off to practice it. This requirement that a
student "understand/know" the rhythm of a song prior to learning to play it on an instrument, is one of the primary reasons
beginning harmonica books always use "old standards" and/or other familiar songs that everyone has heard.
You MUST understand rhythm and how to "count the beat" if you are to progress beyond playing the simplest songs from sheet
music.

RHYTHM is the relatiop between the notes, the rests, and the basic "beat" of the song. This includes how long you hold a note,
how long you rest between notes, and how you count the notes/rests in relationship to the "beat" of the song. Learning to COUNT
the notes and rests in relationship to the "beat" of the song is rhythm.

In PART #1 Music Basics...you learned where the TIME SIGNATURE went.

In this example the time signature is 4/4. That means that there are four beats to the measure and the quarter note gets one beat.

NOTE: For consistency and ease of learning, all of the examples on this page are in 4/4 time.
 COUNTING EXERCISES
Let's start with three simple counting exercises. Each exercise (#1, #2, #3) will play notes with a metronome keeping time in the
background. The metronome will play "the beat" and match the time signature. You will hear 4 beats of the metronome at the
beginning of each example and then the music will start. Be sure to have your speakers turned up loudly enough to hear the clicks
of the metronome.
REMEMBER: Each measure is counted individually and every new measure starts over at "1".

Exercise #1: contains three measures with 4 quarter notes in each measure. The Time Signature is 4/4...which means 4 beats to
the measure and the quarter note gets one beat.
Each measure is counted as "1....2....3....4".

Click on the SOUND Icon --> midi to hear Exercise #1.

Exercise #2: contains three measures with eighth notes instead of quarter notes. The Time Signature is still 4/4..which means 4
beats to the measure and the quarter note gets one beat. That means that each eighth note gets one half beat.
NOTE: The first eight note gets played right on the beat and the second eight note must be played right after the first. Both notes
must be played before the next beat starts.
Each measure is counted with two syllables as
"1 and....2 and....3 and....4 and".

Click on the SOUND Icon --> midi to hear Exercise #2.

Exercise #3: contains two measures with sixteenth notes. The Time Signature is still 4/4..which means 4 beats to the measure and
the quarter note gets one beat. That means that each sixteenth note getsone quarter of the beat. As with eighth notes, the first
sixteenth note gets played "on the beat" and the remaining 3 sixteenth notes must be played in rapid succession after the first. All
four sixteenth notes must be played before the next beat starts.
Each measure is counted in four syllables as
"1 E and ah....2 E and ah....3 E and ah....4 E and ah".
Click on the SOUND Icon --> midi to hear Exercise #3.

Exercise #4: contains a mixture of quarter, eighth, and sixteenth notes. The measures are counted as
"1....2 and....3....4" "1....2 E and ah....3 and....4"

Click on the SOUND Icon --> midi to hear Exercise #4.

Exercise #5: contains Quarter Note and quarter rests. Each measure is counted in four syllables as
"1....2 and....(rest)....4" "1 and....2 and....(rest) and....4 and"

Click on the SOUND Icon --> midi to hear Example #5.

TEMPO Versus RHYTHM

Rhythm is the relationship of one note to the next and the relationship of all notes to the indicated TIME SIGNATURE or "beat".
TEMPO is how fast or slow the underlying beat is counted.

In ALL of the exercises above the tempo did NOT increase from one exercise to the next. The number of notes played per beat
increased in Exercise #2 and #3, but the tempo (ie. the number of beats per minute) did not increase.

Exercise #2 played twice as many notes per beat as Exercise #1.

Exercise #3 played twice as many notes per beat as Exercise #2
Exercise #3 played FOUR TIMES more notes per beat than Exercise #1.

However in all exercises the tempo (or beat) stayed exactly the same.
You heard more notes per beat and each note was played faster but this increase in speed was a function of the relationship of one
note to the next and to the time signature...NOT an increase in tempo. The TEMPO (how fast each measure was counted) did
NOT change from one example to the next.

If you don't understand this concept then go back and listen to all of the exercises again. You should hear the clicking of a
metronome in the background counting at EXACTLY the same speed (tempo) on all exercises.

Rhythm versus Tempo is a very important concept. You can speed up or slow down the TEMPO of any song without changing
the RHYTHM. New pieces are always practiced at a slower tempo but this does not mean you alter the rhythm. You ALWAYS
practice a song at it's proper rhythm...however you will often start with a slow tempo and build to "performance tempo".

Wilbur's Music Tutorial #4

Putting It All Together

Defined in the most basic terms

playing music involves two main areas.
 1. You must be able to get the appropriate (and desired) musical sounds to come from your instrument at your
command.
Put another way You gotta be able to play!!! Regardless of the instrument you choose to play, you must understand and
master the basic skills required to get the proper pitch (in the proper rhythm) out of your Instrument.
On the harmonica, this involves the following....
o Holding the harmonica correctly in your hand.
o Using the proper mouth lip position (embouchure).
o Holding your tongue and shaping the inside of your mouth correctly to get good tone.
o Breath control: drawing air and blowing air.
o Moving the harmonica back and forth in your mouth and being able to find and play the correct hole at the
correct time.
(need a refresher on harmonica basics???
Go to the Beginning Harmonica Lessons )
2. You must have something to play.
You either have to make up the music as you go.. OR ...you must develop the ability to play music created by someone
else. Unless you have a tremendous amount of innate musical ability and can create you own music and/or consistently
play any song after only hearing it (in which case you are far too talented and should leave this web site immediately),
you must learn to read and interpret the music from a written page.
This involves the following.....
o Understanding the basic conventions of musical notation.
o Correctly interpreting which written note relates to which played musical pitch.
o Correctly interpreting the rhythm (swing) of the song from the written page.

That's it!! If you can do the things listed above...you can play music.

Every new skill is acquired in phases and steps.

As children we knew this intuitively but as adults we often forget this all important concept and try to do too many new things at
once. We learned to crawl before we walked, and we learned to walk before we ran. This same concept applies to learning music
(or a new language, or a new sport). Do NOT try to do too many new things at once!!

If you are a total beginner on the harmonica, spend time familiarizing yourself with your instrument. If needed, go back to the
Beginning Harmonica Lessons page. Spend some time practicing the mechanics of holding your instrument and getting good
sound from it. Play the musical scale, using all of the blow/draw notes on the harmonica. Acquire a little skill with the instrument
before you tackle anything else.

Keep your first songs SIMPLE. Don't try to play complex songs until you have some experience with the instrument. This same
call for simplicity applies to your first efforts at reading music. Select simple songs that you have already heard.

It is no coincidence practically every beginning music book made has the same simple songs that we have all heard 1000 times
before and can hum from memory. These beginning songs all have 4 things in common that make them good candidates for the
beginner.

1. They are short simple melodies that don't require very may notes.
2. The rhythms are straight forward. These songs are usually 4/4 time and they play quarter notes with a smattering of half
notes/whole notes.
3. The notes are all close to each other...which means you can usually move up or down one hole (perhaps two holes) at a
time on the harmonica while playing the song.
NOTE: In case you hadn't thought about it just yet....it is much more difficult to jump up and down the harmonica
multiple holes at a time and land squarely on the hole you need.
4. You already know most of these songs from your childhood and they are little ditties that are so popular nearly
everyone knows them by heart.

One primary, compelling (and not often obvious) rationale publishers choose these very simple songs, is reason #4 above. All
beginning musicians have enough to learn, remember, and do, without adding the stress of trying to play songs they haven't heard
before and/or don't already know. It is a basic rule of music that a song becomes infinitely easier to play on an instrument after
you can hear the music in your head. In fact it has been argued that it is nearly impossible to play a song that you can't hear
(visualize audibly) in your head.
The world famous Suzuki method of teaching violin to very young children is based on this key premise. In the Suzuki method
the teacher plays a short phrase (several notes), and the student copies. The teacher helps the student with fingering, bowing, and
which strings to play but the student learns solely by hearing and repeating the music. Only after the student is older and has
learned the mechanics and basics of actually playing the violin, is music notation introduced and the student taught to read
notes/key signatures/time signatures etc. Even in more traditional methods of teaching music, the instructor nearly ALWAYS
plays each new song at least once so the student can hear and understand how the song should sound.

It takes years of practice for any musician to become proficient at "sight reading" that is playing a new and unfamiliar song from
the sheet music without having heard it first. This is the reason I consistently encourage the acquisition and usage of music books
that include a cassette or CD so you can HEAR the songs before you start trying to play them on your own.

There is a Sequence to Learning a New Song

1. Decipher and interpret the notes.

Figure out which note gets played when and find them (in sequence) on your harmonica. Check the key signature
(usually C for harmonica).
2. Figure out the rhythm of the song.
Check the time signature. Count the note values, the rests. If necessary tap you finger on the table for each note played.
Don't tap for rests...do tap for notes. Ensure that you fully understand the rhythm before you spend much time playing
the notes.
3. ALWAYS practice a song at the proper rhythm starting with the very first practice session.
Do NOT assume you can practice the notes first and get the notes learned....and then add the proper rhythm later. This
approach rarely works. You have to practice proper notes and proper rhythm TOGETHER.
You can start at a slow tempo and add speed (tempo) later... but a thing called muscle memory will cause you all sorts
of problems if you try to learn the notes and rhythm separately.
4. Begin practicing the song at a Sloooowww tempo. DON'T RUSH.
5. Learn each new song in parts. Don't expect to always be able to practice the whole song immediately from beginning to
end. Start with the first several measures, practice, and then move on to the next several measures. Continue this until
you have worked your way through the entire song.
NOTE: This does NOT conflict with Tip 3 above. Each piece of the song must be practiced using the proper notes
AND the proper rhythm.

General Practice Tips

1. Practice regularly:
This sounds like a no-brainer, but you'd be surprised how many people expect to become adequate musicians practicing
once every blue moon.
2. Practice 3-5 times a week for 20-30 minutes a session rather than once or twice a week for hours at a time:
More frequent, shorter practice sessions work 70-100% better than longer practice sessions that occur less frequently.
There is a ton of research material available that clearly demonstrates the increased efficiency, ease of learning, and
greater retention that comes from 3-5 shorter (20-30 minutes) sessions per week as opposed to 1 or 2 marathon practice
sessions
For example, three 30 minute practice sessions occurring on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday work better than one 2
hour session on Friday. Even though the Friday session has more total practice time than the whole week of 30 minute
sessions, you will play better and retain more from the more frequent and shorter sessions.
3. Practice in private:
You need to concentrate on your music without distractions. Most importantly you need the freedom to make mistakes
and sound horrible in practice without having people hear you. I know of several aspiring musicians (beginners) that
inadvertently held back their own progress because they tried to practice in front of other people. They felt self-
conscious, and spent more energy worrying about what the "audience" thought, than they did about learning music. If
you were supposed to have an audience it would be called a "performance" and not "practice".
NOTE: If you plan to perform in public, the time will come when you will need to practice in public...but not yet.
4. Get a tape recorder:
Record yourself. The tape won't lie. Listen to how you sound. Are the notes correct?? Is your rhythm good??? Do
you maintain an even tempo??? Are you playing too slow or too fast???
 WARNING: Your home made recording will NOT sound like a professional CD. Don't fret over recording quality,
background noise, tape hiss, or any non-essential issues.
5. How you practice is how you play:
Playing music is surprisingly similar to playing sports or learning any other physical activity. The more you do it, the
more your body (muscles, lungs, etc.) learn and REMEMBER. It is very important to develop good playing habits early
on... because they can be difficult to modify later.
With regard to any one song...you will be surprised at how quickly your body remembers the mouth position, breath
pattern, and harmonica movements. This is a key reason why you MUST practice each new song using both the correct
notes AND the correct rhythm from the beginning.