Glossary

A

Accidental

These are small symbols within the music that alert the player that they need to alter a note into a sharp or a flat or a natural.

Arpeggio

A collection of notes in a chord, played one by one up or down the keyboard, instead of at the same time as you would play a full chord.

Articulations

Articulations tell you to play each note in a particular style, expressed by little symbols near the note. Some of these include:

To play in a clipped, short fashion, shown by a small dot either above or below a note.

To smoothly slur the notes together, shown by curved lines which link notes.

Tells you to add some extra oomph to a note, shown with a right-facing ‘open-wedge’ shape.

B

Divide the stave into measured sections. Each measure ties in with the time signature, for example in 4/4 time, each bar will contain four crotchet/ quarter note beats.

Beat

A measured unit of time in a piece of music. The time signature organises the number of beats per bar and also dictates the length of a beat. The speed of the beat is dictated by the song’s tempo.

C

Chord

A chord is a group of notes, usually three or four, played all at the same time.

Clef

The symbol right at the start of each stave. It tells you which pitch to allocate to the notes of the stave.

D

Dynamics

Instructions within the music relating to its volume. They will be in the form of symbols (such as a crescendo) or Italian words such as piano (quiet) or forte (loud).

Mezzo means ‘medium’ and it’s often added before a word for a moderate effect, for example mezzo forte means ‘medium loud’ and mezzo piano ‘medium quiet’.

It is not uncommon to see a fair number of ‘iss’ added to a word, which exaggerate its effect. Eg, fortississimo means very, very loud and pianissimo means very quiet.

E F

Flat

An accidental that looks like a squashed b, which alters a note by decreasing its pitch by a semitone.

G H I J K

A collection of sharps or flats expressing the key of the song, found at the beginning of the stave. Symbols are on the line or in the space that the note occupies. If a flat symbol is placed on the centre line on the treble clef, every B note that you play will be a B flat, unless its cancelled out by an accidental.

L

When notes are higher or lower than the reach of the stave lines, they are placed with ledger lines that extend the stave.

M

Jolly, happy-sounding notes characterise a major scale or key.

The middle-most C key on your keyboard, it sits in the middle of the grand stave in notation and it’s also generally the divide between the notes played by your right and left hands.

Minor

Gloomy, sad-sounding notes characterise a minor scale or key.

N

Natural

An accidental on a note that cancels out any previous sharps or flats.

Notes

These are the building blocks of music, showing you which note to play, at what pitch and for how long. Each type of note has a specific duration, for example a semibreve/whole note has the same duration as two minims/half notes or four crotchets/ quarter notes.

O

Octave

The name given to the interval between two of the same notes. Look at Middle C, then the next C above it. The distance between those two Cs makes up an octave.

Ornaments

Symbols on notes to decorate the melody. An example is a trill, which tells the musician to flutter between two notes to embellish the tune.

P

Pitch

Put simply, pitch refers to the highness or lowness of a note. It is actually about the note’s frequency, which you will learn more about as you piano playing progresses.

Q R

Repeats

Instructions in the notation to go back and re-play specific phrases. Repeats include repeat barlines and also the coda symbol (circle with a cross through it) accompanied by the phrase al coda and other terms such as D.C and D.S.

Rests

Indicate a period of time that the musician must not play any notes. The rests come under the same duration classification as notes, for example a minim rest has the same duration as a minim/half note.

S

Scales

A group of notes with different pitches, usually from one octave, that are played in order one by one up or down a keyboard.

Sharp

An accidental that looks like a hash symbol (#), which alters a note by slightly increasing the pitch.

Stave

The five horizontal lines that notes are drawn on, both on the lines and in the spaces.

T

Tempo

Italian for ‘time’, the tempo dictates how slow or fast a song should be played. It is shown at the beginning of the notation, and can either be in super-precise Beats Per Minute (BPM) or indicated using one of many Italian terms that are more interpretive. These include:

means ‘at a walking pace’

this means ‘lively’

which means ‘slowly’

The time signature of a piece of music looks like a big fraction at the beginning of the stave, after the clef and key signature. It dictates the rhythm of the tune. The top number tells a musician how many beats there are in one bar of the music. The bottom number indicated the length of the beat. For example, in 4/4 time, there are four crotchets/ quarter notes in each bar. In 6/8 time, there are six quavers/eighth notes in each bar.

U V X Y Z

Type of rest Note Length of rest