What You Need to Know About Note Durations: Quarter, Half, Dotted Half & Whole Notes

Note durations are one of the most foundational aspects of rhythm that we learn as musicians and piano players.

Duration simply means the length of time that something lasts…such as a road trip or the length of a movie. It tells you how long you will be continuing the activity.

In music, we have different notes rhythmically – meaning that they have different lengths according to the type of note. This is what we mean by note durations.

When we travel, we measure the duration of the trip in the number of miles we must travel, or by our clocks in knowing how long the drive will take us to complete.

In music however, we measure the duration of a note by how many beats it has, or how many counts it has.
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            *One mistake that most beginners make is thinking that a beat is as long as one second. Don’t compare the tempo (how fast or slow) of beats in music, with seconds on a clock or watch. They aren’t the same. Beats can and often are longer than a second…it all depends on how fast your tempo is.

Today we're going to learn quarter note, half note, dotted half note, and whole note durations and how to play and count them. 

• Quarter notes are filled in circles with one stem attached to the side. The duration of a quarter note is 1 beat. This means that for each beat you count, you will play any quarter note in your music, or in the measure in your music. If you have 4 quarter notes in a measure, then you will play each of them for each beat that you count and play.
• Half notes are empty circles or an open head with a stem attached to the side. The duration of a half note is 2 beats. Notice that the half note is twice as long as the quarter note. Since a half note gets 2 beats, and remember that a quarter note gets 1 beat, that means that you will count and play a half note twice as long as quarter note. If you have two half notes in a measure that has four beats in it, then you will apply the 1st & 2nd beats to the first half note, and the 3rd & 4th beats to the second half note.
• Dotted half notes are next on our list and the reason is because we need to learn what adding a dot to a note does to the duration of a note. Remember this rule: whenever you add a dot to a note in music, you increase the duration of that note by ½ of the original note duration. So…if a half note is equal to 2 beats, and a dot is equal to ½ of 2…that comes to 1, so the dot is equal to 1 more beat being added to the half note, to get 3 beats total. When you count and play a dotted half note, you do it for 3 counts or beats. This will always be true. Dot = ½ of the note duration that has the dot.
• Whole notes end today’s list and these big guys get four counts and beats each. They look like an empty circle with no stem attached to the side…just a big circle, basically. To count a whole note, you must hold down the note for the entire four counts. 

​In the following video I show you what each of these different types of notes look like and how to count and play them on the piano keyboard. Mastering these types of note durations will give you a leap towards more complex rhythmic note values and playing lots of new kinds of music on your piano. 

If you like my tips and lessons, you will love the courses over on my website. Whether you are a beginner looking to get a solid foundation to build on or you are looking to take your existing skills to that next level, the online music courses on my website https://www.pianolessonsontheweb.com will help you do just that.