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Staff, Clef, and Name of Music Notes
The name of each music note is determined by its place on the staff…
…and the music clef placed at the beginning of this staff.
The Treble Clef (G)
The Bass Clef (F)
The C clef (alto clef, tenor clef)
Seven Notes of Music and Two Systems to Name Them
There are seven notes of music and two different systems to name the music notes: A B C D E F G and DO RE MI FA SOL LA SI.
The Syllabic Musical Notation: DO RE MI FA SOL LA SI (TI)
The origin of the syllabic notation is due to the Italian monk Guido of Arezzo (XIth century) who used the first syllables of a Latin hymn to name the music notes and is regarded as the inventor of the modern musical notation: DO (or UT) – RE – MI – FA – SOL – LA – SI (TI)
UT queant laxīs
REsonāre fibrīs
MIra gestōrum
FAmulī tuōrum,
SOLve pollūtī
LAbiī reātum,
Sāncte Iohannēs.
UT was changed to the open syllable DO, at the suggestion of the musicologist Giovanni Battista Doni (1595 – 1647) based on the first syllable of his surname.
A seventh note, SI (from the initials for Sancte Iohannes, Latin vocative for St. John the Baptist) was added a little bit later. It was changed to TI by the English music educator Sarah Anna Glover (1786 – 1867). TI is used in the famous Do-Re-Mi song from the 1965 American musical drama film produced and directed by Robert Wise, The Sound of Music.
DO RE MI FA SOL LA SI/TI
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The Alphabetical Musical Notation: A B/H C D E F G
Mainly used in Anglo Saxon countries (and so in jazz), it uses the letters of the alphabet:
A – B – C – D – E – F – G
A B C D E F G
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The German Alphabetical Music Notes Notation
The German music notation uses a H and not a B (SI/TI in syllabic notation):
A – H – C – D – E – F – G
Music Notation and Countries
Syllabic musical notation is used by Italian, Portuguese, Greek, French, Russian, Flemish, Romanian, Spanish, Hebrew and Turkish people.
Alphabetical musical notation is used by Anglophone countries.
German Alphabetical notation is used in Germany, Poland, Russia, Scandinavia.
Correspondence Between the Name of Music Notes
| Syllabic | Alpha betical |
German |
|---|---|---|
| DO | C | C |
| RE | D | D |
| MI | E | E |
| FA | F | F |
| SOL | G | G |
| LA | A | A |
| SI/TI | B | H |
Links About Name of Music Notes
Music Staff (or Stave)
The music staff (or stave) is made by five parallel horizontal lines.
Clefs – Treble, Bass, Alto, Tenor
Learn about the different musical clefs and which one is used for each musical instrument.
7 Note Values (Whole Note, Half Note, Quarter Note…)
The type (shape) of musical notes (Quarter Note, Half Note, Whole Note) fixes the note value (duration).
Music Rests (Whole Rest, Half Rest…)
For each note value, there is a music rest of equivalent value.