Learn to Play Piano Lesson 2: How to Read Sheet Music 2
Reading Treble Clef and Bass Clef Notes
This is the second lesson in the "Learn to Play Piano" series on YouTube. This lesson continues on the topic of reading sheet music notes for both the treble clef and bass clef. It is important to continue practicing note reading everyday until you have it mastered. It is normal to take a few weeks to a few months to learn to read music so don't get discouraged if you don't understand it right away.
The Staff, Treble Clef, and Bass Clef:
Remember that the staff is a collection of five lines and four spaces between those lines. The lines of the treble clef are E, G, B, D, and F. The spaces of treble clef are F, A, C, E. Bass clef's lines are G, B, D, F, and A and the spaces are A, C, E, G. Bass clef notes are generally toward the bottom end of the piano (notes lower in pitch), while treble clef notes are toward the higher end of the piano. When first learning to read music, you want to play songs hands separately. Once you feel more confident playing lines of music with the right hand and left hand separately, try putting them together. I use these flash cards with my students who are just starting out with piano. You can find these at this affiliate link: Music Flash Cards
Musical Alphabet:
As a review, the music alphabet starts with A and goes to G then repeats. So, the music alphabet is A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B etc.. It is a good idea to practice reciting the music alphabet both forwards and backwards since it will help you find notes on the piano much more quickly.
Finger Numbers:
This is a new topic for this lesson and is fairly easy to understand. Each hand has five fingers and those fingers have numbers. You always want to count finger numbers from thumb to pinky with thumb being 1, pointer being 2, middle being 3, ring finger is 4, and pinky is 5. This is true with both the right hand and left hand. It is important to know your finger numbers since piano music will often tell you which note to play and which finger to play it with. Using proper finger numbers will allow you to play up and down the piano keyboard much more effectively.