Ugh! Can't "Get" Sheet Music

Post Reply New Topic

Okay, so I just thought of a question, based on people saying you don't actually read the letter for each note (although I see there's one poster above who does, just very quickly). Is this similar at all to how we read words as whole words rather than saying to ourselves, "W-O-R-D-S words"?

I learned to read using the phonics method, so I can only say that I "memorized" what whole words sound like after sounding them out. I do read music this way (in large sections, like chords, etc.) but only because I first memorized what the notes were in each chord, then memorized what each chord looks like as written. (I also have memorized the chords the way they feel on the piano.)

I am a very visual learner with a lot of muscle memory and spatial reasoning, and a bit of a photographic memory (not as good as my son's, but probably higher than average.) I think all these things combined make it easier for me to read music. Other people who are not as quick in these areas will have more difficulty.

Translating written music into actual playing involves a lot of processes. Don't feel bad if it takes a long time.

I had similar issues. I was in college before it registered that the swirly treble clef notation was actually pointing to the "G" line on the staff. The little spiral part loops on the G note: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-cult ... 73/?no-ist. No one bothered emphasizing that. So the G note could be a kind of anchor: third finger of the D string.

Maybe find a way to change up the presentation for your brain. Try to avoid just repeating out of rote trying to force-memorize. Have fun with it. Have you tried picking out a short 5-6 note melody line on just one string, playing it over and over and then trying to find out and write down what notes you played?

It will be slow, but it will develop your relationship with music and the notation for it. For memory development, try a youtube search on TED talks about memory training: https://youtu.be/U6PoUg7jXsA. Start small and expand on that. If you have to go slower than you feel you should be going, give yourself permission to go even slower than that. If you need to take a month just to learn the four natural notes on the first string, then take it. In four months you'll have the natural notes on all four strings, which is better than just tossing it out from the stress and confusion.

And yes, you will "get it." You may have to find other ways to get the memory to stick, though. And don't let any method or instructor tell you that if you don't get it "their way" that you won't ever get it. That's just ego and there's a lot of it in... well, it's everywhere.

I think so, but for me it developed with familiarity. Like on trumpet, I got to where I could instantly recognize the C on two lines above the staff because I played it so much. Notation on the treble clef eventually got to be immediate as you describe. When I say eventually, I'm talking years of piano and "note spelling" practice.

Not so much for the bass clef, and I don't know why, despite eight years of playing piano. I think the mnemonics they used got me off track at the beginning, and I never developed a different point of access for those bass notes (All Cars Eat Gas). The C stuck in my mind ok, but the A, E, and G were always nebulous for me. That's why I advise avoiding the mnemonics, but maybe no problem for NT's, or even certain autistics who may find it to create useful associations. I just found that the massive amount of early repetition of that mnemonic established such a neural pattern, I kept using it, faulty as it was, and it ultimately really slowed me down.

If I were to give advice, I'd say try not to concern yourself with how others found their way. Keep in mind that the music came first - the notation is just a rough way of trying to capture the music on paper.

Try lots of different approaches to learning the musical notation and you'll eventually find something that works for you.

I agree that mnemonics are pretty useless. The more I teach, the more silly they are. How does one remember which five-word sentence goes with which clef? So confusing...

It just takes time and repetition, and figuring out what works best for you. I think knowing that the G clef (treble clef) swirls around the G line and the F Clef (bass clef) dots are on either side of the F line are the only thing one needs to remember to get started counting up and down the lines. The second important thing to know is that as you go UP the staff, you go forward in the musical alphabet and as you go DOWN the staff, you go backwards in the musical alphabet. Third, when you move from line to space to line, you move one letter name at a time. So, when you go from line to line or from space to space, you skip a letter name in the middle. These are the fundamentals of how the staff "works."

That reminds me of another "signpost" or "anchor" I developed which was knowing the octave relationships, which I don't remember anyone pointing out to me. For example on the treble clef: the E on the bottom line related to E on the top space. Or F on the bottom space related to F on the top line.

It helped me to spatially relate to each note once I specifically identified where their octave "cousins" were located at other places on the staff.

Actually, it's weird, but I DO remember "every good boy does fine" (it trips me out now when people say "every good boy deserves fudge" because that's not how I learned it, LOL) and "face." However, I have to say them upward to know where they are...

I am going to take all this advice to heart...everyone has such good ideas as well as, now, the underlying theme that there isn't ONE way...knowing that makes it so much better!! ! If I can eventually make pretty music...will the logistics of how I got there matter?

No

THIS is where I was trying to fit it in my previous post; in the movie "Mr. Holland's Opus" he has a student struggling with clarinet and he asks the student what is the most beautiful thing to her. She answers "a sunset". He then tells her: "play the sunset".

Yeh, Nice one, its always great to remember some of our challenges can be major attributes too!

p.s. the Treble clef is actually the letter G in olde days style fancy script.... look carefully and it wraps around the G line.... that is what it is telling you...... Look! heres a G!

The Bass Clef is actually the letter F in old style script and the two dots are guess where?
...... yes that`s right....... either side of the F line in bass clef.....

these are easy reference points if you forget the other mnemonics

I think most of the methods of learning to read sheet music have been covered pretty well, but I would simply like to add that it's slow going because it's actually a very difficult skill to learn. I've been playing piano since I was 5 (so a little under 30 years now) and I know instinctively where all the notes are simply because I've spent so much time staring at all those lines and spaces. However, learning to actually read the written music is only half the battle. If you want to sight read you'll need to read ahead and your hands are basically playing about a beat behind what you're reading (at least that's how I do it). It's tricky stuff for sure. My teacher told me that since I wasn't going to be a concert pianist and I have small hands, that I shouldn't worry too much about the fingering and simply play the piece in any way that was comfortable under my fingers.

If sight reading isn't a necessary skill for you, then you can take all the time you want to interpret the music. My father, who didn't want to learn how to play the piano but wanted to know how to play a few songs, learned to play Fur Elise note by note, looking up each note as he went along and memorized it all. He technically couldn't read the music but was able to translate the sheet music into memorized hand placements. It worked for him but it took him a year to learn the one song. Anyone else's mileage may vary, though. Then again, I've been trying to learn YYZ on bass for about a year now...

We're starting on the D string. Today we played G and F#.

"Play the sunset"...that is so sweet.

Somewhat; i need a few seconds to call a note by its name (the letter), even though playing it is second nature; in the same way that i can't instantly tell you the fingering for a note, even if you point at one on the sheet (ignoring that there are alternatives, let's keep to the 'primary').

Look at the note, instead, as a syllable: one single sound.
for example: the two notes "A" and "C" in succession can be seen as the word "table", the 'A' being 'ta' and the 'C' is the 'ble'.
A single note isn't a letter, you aren't spelling the 'words', nor is it the entire word (barring single-syllable words as an exception).
Compare music notation, if you will, with chinese character script: that also has a single, seperate symbol for each syllable (and for some entire words), but instead of the drawing keeping the information, it's the height on the staff that determines the sound.

Also: don't give up, i personally know several people who achieved near-perfect reading comprehension for sheet music while they started at a later age (together with their kid, exactly your situation, only a different instument)

I used to be able to read sheet music way back when I did piano in my teens. I picked it up very quickly, like it was a second language I already knew. I can't read music for s**t now though.

I wish I could offer some advice,it's very frustrating to try and learn something that eludes you.
Take your time,even though the beginning pieces are boring.Who wants to play Mary had a little Lamb?haha
I had a terrible time learning to read,yet now I can read faster then most.It may all of a sudden click with you and become easy.
I found it easier to read music than the written word.I can't explain it.I always envied those who could play by ear.
We all have our strengths and weaknesses.