Notes on piano Get started with the Basics!
Notes on Piano - In this lesson, we will start with the basics of piano notation, and that would mean learning the various notes on a piano. Before that, one thing that you need to bear in mind is that the piano notes and the electronic keyboard notes are arranged in the same way. Though the touch and feel of the keys are different on the two instruments, the notes will be called by the same name on both the instruments.
If you closely observe the layout of the keys, you will notice that there are actually twelve different keys or notes 7 white and 5 black keys. The same set of keys is then repeated throughout the instrument, from the left to the extreme right. Even within this group of 12 notes, the 7 white notes are the ones that are named, whereas the black notes are derived from the names of the white keys.
So to summarize, the notes on a Piano/Keyboard notes are named as follows.
The 7 white keys are identified as C, D, E, F, G, A, B
The 5 black keys derive their names from the white keys, depending on whether the black key is to the left or right of the white key.
You need to be aware of this repeating pattern if you want to learn the piano notes quickly. This is because at first look it seems the piano has numerous notes that need to be learnt but the fact is it is just a handful of notes that gets repeated.
Accidentals
What about the black keys? How do you identify them? The black keys are identified by placing symbols called accidentals next to the name of the note. For instance, the black key to the right of G would be called as G# or G Sharp. "Sharp" indicates it is to the right of the white key. A black key to the left of B would be called as Bb or B Flat. "Flat" indicates it is to the left of the white key. The symbols # and b are known as accidentals, I have discussed it in detail on a separate page.
Notation in other regions
Traditionally the seven notes have always been named using alphabets but some regions do have their own ways of naming these seven notes. A few examples have been listed here.
European Style - Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Si
Indian Style - Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Da Ni
Octaves
The distance from one note to the same note, above or below it, is known as an Octave; this is true for any of the 12 notes. For instance the distance from the note C to the next C is one Octave.
You need to be aware that the various notes are basically sound waves having different frequencies and certain notes sound similar when their frequencies are in multiples of each other. Notes on a piano that are octaves apart have this property, and that is the reason the set of notes which we discussed above, keeps on repeating itself.
One C-to-C octave includes one set of 7 white notes and 5 black keys, so you may also call this set of notes as one octave. This will help you to know what size a keyboard is, since they come in various sizes. An octave has twelve notes, so a 61 keys keyboard will have 5 octaves (actually it has one more key but you can ignore that) and that is why it is also referred to as a 5-Octave keyboard. A Piano on the other hand has 7 and half octaves.
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