the March or 2/4 tempo

THE MARCH TEMPOThe last time signature I am going to explain briefly is the 2/4 beat..It is the tempo of many Marches ( Stars and Stripes Forever, (US ), Maple Leaf Forever ( Canada ), Les Marsailles ( France ), Katipunan March, Bayang Magiliw ( Philippines )

If soldiers hear a marching song, some believe that their courage is doubled, maybe quadrupled and they would run headlong towards the enemy..That is the reason why in certain battlefields ( during the American Revolution ) there were always musicians out there in the field..A bugler would sound the charge fanfare or the retreat one.

A friend of mine once asked me when I was explaining this time signature.."Why 2/4, why not 1/2? It is the same isn't it?"

Of course. But Music is not Math , it just follows some principles of Math.

2/4 signature means, there are always 2 notes in each measure of a 2/4 song.. So the conductor or the Bandleader just gestures his hand in 2 directions: up and down, up and down...

A 2/4 measure may contain any of the following:
1. a single half note
2. two quarter notes
3. a half rest
4. maybe 4 1/8 notes
5. 1 quarter rest and one quarter note..
some other music elements whose Mathematical value would add up to 1/2

Some marches are played fast, some are moderate..

Some marches may not follow the 2/4 signature..March from AIDA ( the Opera ) might be 4/4..But the rest of the Martial pieces ( esp. ones written by John Phillip Sousa ) are written in 2/4.

There are some of the popular marches for important happenings:

Graduation or commencement exercises : POMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE

Weddings: Bridal chorus for entrance,
Lohengrin March for the exit

Funerals : Funeral March by Chopin

There seems to be no part of a person's life which is not affected by music---#

MY BOY JETHRO by RAIN

my little boy Jethro




My little boy Jethro
Is now so tall and warm
It was so many years ago
I tucked him in my arm

Jethro is now a drummer
Just like his caring Mom
I see his image every night
Thru my old PC 's cam

Inside the house of our God
He plays like no one can
I pray to God they 'll soon arrive
That we will all be one!

submitted by RAIN

playing with the one man band

playing the yamaha keyboard with a
"one man band.."

Playing this type of electronic keyboard is one of the simplest ways to make beautiful music with little effort or easy keyboard skills...

But you must have a good sense of timing, a good musical memory ( remembering the tune accurately ) and being able to play it with the right hand either by ear or by reading the music manuscript...

It is best to memorize the melody and play it by ear. But if you are a good music reader you can play the song also with Music Books printed for this purpose..

The left hand must know how to form chords..Chords are combinations of at least 3 notes..

Some Yamaha music books have the melody line written in bold notes while the accompanying chords are written above the right hand staff...

The percussion or rythm is determined by a list of numbers and names written under the heading style..

The Yamaha I own have at least 100 styles ranging from ballad, latin music, rock, samba, etc.. It has also 100 voices. Voices are the different instrument sounds...

You can control the speed or tempo of the accompaniment by some buttons.

The chords you play with the left hand determines the "background music " that will be played by the built-in "one man band.."

Examples of left hand chords are:

CMajor: consisting of C, E and G, played all at the same time by the fingers of the left hand..

Or G7 which is D,F,G and B..

Another useful chord is FMajor which consists of F, A, and C...

Withe these 3 left hand chords you can already play several folk songs..All you have to do is to select the right "style" for it.

If you press the chord of CMajor, the "one man band " plays the C,E, & G notes, plus some drum sounds which would make it sound like your right hand playing is accompanied by an orchestra, including some drums..

But again, you have to accurate with your timing..It is like playing with a a KARAOKE TRACK..The Karaoke does not play with your timing, you have to play with the timing of the KARAOKE..

Which in a certain way, really sucks, especially if your timing becomes off..

Anyway, here is a Filipino love song I recorded ..with the one man band..One wrong note, one wrong timing and you have to re record it again..

Sometimes the recording work could take you a whole night...

Friday, November 21, 2008

Old Man Winter is back with a vengeance
here in Toronto starting Tuesday night. When we woke up Thursday morning, everything is white again. And it is not even Christmas yet.
The first thing I remembered were the birdies. Will they come and feed? Well they did but not in the same number. I guess these are the regulars who were hatched atop the roof of 19 Dixon road. I wish there would be a way of marking them. But sparrows are so shy. Unlike the pidgeons, you can not approach a sparrow. They would fly at once at one look at an approaching person .a

In the last frames of the accompanying video clip, I noticed that some of them do not look healthy anymore. Maybe it was due to the sudden change in temperature. Their eyes seem to be watery. I guess some of them won't survive the winter. I put up several birdhouses in the front yard but I am not sure they would avail themselves. The only places they know are under neath the bushes which are abundant in my front and backyard.
The closeup shots were taken from inside my window in to a bush right under it. I used zoom lens. The bird did not know it would be featured on the Internet.---#
bir

diana ( ja-na ) music in Asingan

THE DIANA MUSIC is a March played in 2/4 time signature ( to be discussed in a coming lesson ) .

Photos portray Asingan town fiesta activities in the absence of pictures showing the Yuletide spirit in our town. Some photos came from the Pangasinan.Org website and a few were given years ago by OCTOARTS a company owned by Mr. Alfredo Gelacio Jr.

When December 16 rolled around in Asingan during the '50s and early '60s, this traditional Dawn Mass is heralded by a 5 piece brass band made of a trombone, a clarinet, a saxophone, a snare drum and a bass drum. They would rouse the Poblacion people up so they could attend the 4:00 am High Mass. There would be a HIGH MASS ( Misa Cantada ) sang by music volunteers.

When the Diana was stopped or scrapped from the Christmas Church agenda, canned music blaring out from the speakers atop the church tower took its place. ..

The music was written by an unknown composer and it has a happy, lilting tune in the spirit of Christmas the happiest holiday all through out the world.---#

EMMA'S BLOOPERS...

When Emma was still in Junior Kinder, she was already singing several songs..She can not read yet. But she managed to learn the lyrics by listening intently to the words and memorizing 'em..She also joined the children's choir of St. John which I handled for a few years..

One time while we were practicing at home, she told me:

"Lolo, when I already know how to read I am going to sing all these songs in this Mass book.."

Singing is now a part of her daily routine. She knows by heart most of the current hits which her generation is crazy about..Do not ask me what those titles are..

Last Thanksgiving, she did an impromptu concert after supper. With her I-pod ( it has several Karaoke tracks of the current hits ) connected to a Bose mini stereo player, she sang her favorites..She knows websites where she can download karaoke tracks and also the lyrics of those pop ditties..

She is now taking voice tutoring. Her voice range is quite high and wide. She won prizes for her Irish Dancing and also awards for singin DANNY BOY in certain vocal competitions.

Yes, she is half Filipino and half Irish and 100% playful..

She can make you laugh and cry at the same time...:)

Just kidding, as usual..:)

two Pilipino lullabyes..

There are several Pilipino lullabyes
originating from several parts of the country. I am publishing two of these..

The one sung by Miguelita goes:

SAMPUNG MGA DALIRI (Ten fingers )
KAMAY AT PAA ( Hands and feet )
DALAWANG TAINGA ( two ears )
DALAWANG MATA ( two eyes )
ILONG NA MAGANDA ( a beautiful nose )

If I am not mistaken, this song was once used in a segment of SESAME STREET....

The piano selection interprets NENA'S LULLABYE..

First lines go:

"Sleep my Darling baby,
Mother is not far away..."

Emma Forbes sings O HOLY NIGHT

THE WALTZ, ( AKA THE THREE QUARTER TIME )

Waltz is called VALSE among Filipinos and othes using the Latin Language..

For me, there are just two kinds of music as far as timing is concerned: the 4/4, the one which we just studied and the 3/4..This is the valse, the waltz..

If you examine the music score of say BLUE DANUBE WALTZ, you will find that the key signature at the beginnig of the first bar is 3/4.

If you examine the notes contained in each measure, there are only 3 quarters..Thus the other name, 3 quarter time...

When you conduct a 3/4 music your hand goes:

first...down, second...right, third, up...Just 3 beats to complete a measure...Nothing simpler..

Thus when you beat to the music of say MALINAK LAY LABI you go, down, right, up, down right up..ad infinitum until the piece ends...

NARANIAG NGA BULAN is also written in 3/4..And so with SILVER BELLS ( hmmm almost time for those bells to go out ringin' again )...

In the beginning of this paragraph, I said there are only two kinds of music timing..I greatly simplified it...

There is the timing called 6/8...There are 6 1/8 notes in each measure..If you add these mathematically, you will get 3/4..Bingo...!

A very common song written in 6/8 is the carol SILENT NIGHT..But when I conduct a choir singing, I use the 3/4 method, down, right, up..But the way I count is not 1,2,3, 1,2,3...rather it is 1,2,3,4,5,6....then 1,2,3,4,5,6....Some conductors, use a different way, but I do not want to go into it....Too technical..And it might be too boring...

Once in a while you will come across a music score in 9/8.. Yes there are some scores written this way..


In 3/4 music scores, you will be meeting the dotted half note...It is the half note with a dot beside it.. The dotted half note has 3 counts. The undotted half has just 2 counts. Why?..The answer is somewhere in the past Blog pages on this topic..Yes, the dot extends the life or value of a note by 1/2 of the actual value of the note...

Now we come to the rests..There are 3 rests in each 3/4 measure..

By the way, the rests are also dotted..And it also extends the value in the same way as the notes....

A 3/4 measure with only a dotted half note inside ( or a dotted half rest ) is mathematically correct...

And finally, a waltz also follows the no. 8 with regards to music phrases..( remember this lesson ?) Each musical phrase in a 3/4 composition has also 8 measure...

End of lesson..Til next time again folks!

IKAW LAMANG ANG AKING I-IBIGIN..

A SHORT MUSIC VIDEO

a short poem

A SONG AT THE BEACH

Am back at the beginning of life

Beauty is all I see

the world in its primeval cloak

The sky, the land, the sea

There is no difference, the sea or sky,

Or the debris upon the strand

"Rejoice!" a voice tells me so clearly

From the creature on my hand

The silence is sweet, no fuss, no noise,

I hear the angels' wings

I look around, to catch the sound

Of how Creation sings!

by Victorio Costes

note:

The photos are submitted by Teresa Costes. Subjects are my two grandaughters: Olivia and Audrey Costes. Their dad, Oliver Costes is an Animator working in a Computer Graphics Studio in New Brunswick.

RESTS ... in music

One characterstic of a GOOD ART ( of course there is also bad art ) is the presence of CONTRAST.

In a painting, there are highlights and shadows, thin and thick lines, bright and dark colors, etc. In a novel or literature, there are the good guys and the bad guys, the beginning and the end, the presence of conflict, then the resolution of the conflict..etc.

In MUSIC WRITING, there is the time when you sing, ( or an instrument plays ) and there are the times when there is absence of a certain sound ( or singing ) in a music passage.

In short, the absence of music is called REST.

Rests are somehw the opposite of notes...

The sketch that I did on this page illustrates how rests look like on a music page...

1.---- is called whole rest ( in contrast to whole note )
2. is half rest, in contrast to half note
3. is quarter rest, the opposit of quarter note
4. is eighth rest, the opposite of eighth note...
5. ..how a whole note looks like on a piece of music score
6...How a half note looks like on the music score..

The rest of the music symbols appear as they are on the music score. Try to figure these details are when you examine your child's piano scores for rehearsals..Anyhow, you are the one paying for his high fees for his music education...You have the right to know as much as possible the music education your child is getting..:)

***

Again, there is also Math in the use of rests..

A whole rest occupies a whole measure.. A Half rest occupies half a measure, a quarter rest occupies 1/4 of a measure..and so on..

A half note written with a half rest inside a 4/4 measure is mathematically correct. The total value is ONE. A quarter rest added to 3 quarter notes inside a 4/4 measure also is correct.. and so on, and so on....


In a music sheet for an orchestra, the arranger have to write ( by hand ) separate scores for the violins, violas, drums ( yes even drums have notes too! ) , the choir, the soloists, etc.. You can just imagine what kind of work the arranger-conductor has to contend with when it is creating or preparing for a performance or a recording session..So, as you can see, lots of SSS are poured into each recording, into each CD or DVD.. The music arrangers, the artists, then the artists that prepare the CD covers, the writers that do the liner notes..Everything adds up...

The producer have to recover the expenses..

Somehow, when the music industry rants and raves because of downloading and free copying, they might have a point too...

Bye, til nex time!!!

*********************************

kudos to Mia Gonzales, my granddaughter

Mia in a Halloween costume

PEANUT BUTTER in print

Mia Gonzales was my first child singer at St. John church in Weston, a long time ago..She was I think 7 or 8 years old. She has recently turned 15. She has not turned away from music.

Last weekend, she came to visit me and we talked, among other things about music. She is now in Music Theory being a student of an Art School in Brampton, the city where she resides presently with my daughter and her husband.

Well part of discussion was something like: "give me the key if the music score has 1 sharp, 2 sharps, 3 sharps or 1 flat or 2 flats..and so on, and so on.."

Stuff like that. Very interesting to some, but not to all, if you know what I mean.

Anyways when she arrived, I gave me a copy of the magazine YOUNG VOICES published by the Toronto Public Library. Her article PEANUT BUTTER was one of the articles published .

So I congratulated her, she said "Thank you.." Then we started chatting about a common point of interest: MUSIC.

Above are photos of her and the magazine page..

MEET MY VIRTUAL BAND!

This section controls the accompaniment. It has 100 styles. It has LATIN ( Rhumba, Salsa, Mambo, etc ) On the right side of the keyboard, you first play a button that says STYLE. Then punch in the numbers. Each accompaniment has its code number. When you press a red button, you will hear the drums playing. Then you press some basic chords with your left hand and the machine will play some accompaniment ( very nice sounds ) depending on the number you pressed. All you have to worry about is your right hand doing the solo melody. BUT you must play the song precisely, in perfect timing. Your "band" will play on and on without listening to how you play! In short if your timing went south, you created a MESS, not MUSIC!

This section controls the voices ( instruments ) ..My favorite instruments are the piano, MIDI gRAND, and the BELLs..You will discover other quaint sounds..There are 100 to chose from, including drum sounds, dog barks, whistles..Those sounds would be good for the 4 year olds in your household!

the OVER ALL VIEW of the Yamaha keyboard..

It is nice and handy to have a "band in your pocket." This is for musician wannabes, or frustrated musicians who dreamed of playing on primetime TV but never made it. Or maybe for people who have lots of time in their hands at home and just want to spend some of it creatiively..

I bought this gizmo about 2 decades ago. It is only now that I have learned how write on the net that I got reacqainted with it.

Ironically, when I started playing it in public, that I found out that I did not know how to use the one man band features!

So I apologized to my audience ( the Seniors group ) and I reverted back to the old piano. Then that night I swore to learn its features and I did.

Maybe some of you have this keyboard. Somewhere. Unused. Well I am sharing with you what I learned. Just the basics anyway and you could build from there.

The best way to learn something new is to do it. Make mistakes you will but then you will learn something new until you reached the point when you have attained what you wanted to learned in the first place!

So get to your keyboards, ready, set, PLAY!

If you are doing this at 12:00 midnight, I hope you are using your head phones!!

playing with Mary and her Lamb

Studying music theory by itself could be dry and boring..But try applying it with some dusty almost forgotten music instrument in your house, then you will find Music Theory could after all, be palatable..

I re-discovered this Yamaha keyboard which I bought about 15 years ago. I used it for some Christmas and Wedding gigs then I stopped because the stress level was getting high while the pay check was getting low. So I kept this instrument away until I rediscovered it hiding in some dingy part of my basement, still in its black soft case.

I was running out things to do as I retired because I wanted to do something creative while I still have my senses working..


The good thing about this instrument is, it comes with a "virtual " band. It has 100 instrument sounds ( called VOICES ) another 100 kinds of accompaniments ( CALLED STYLES ).. So for playing around while waiting for the Mrs. to arrive home it is nice making some music because canned music after a while could turn into drag. Yes, this is what they called before a ONE MAN BAND. And you do not even have to pay your band members or feed them or give them beer after rehearsals..

So if you can play with the right hand the melody line, in this case MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB , then the left hand can play some basic chords like CMajor or G7 or FMajor you could play something with the instrument. ..With these 3 chords in your memory pocket, you can play many, many songs particularly in some birthday parties for kids from 1 to 9 years old..Do not go higher than that! Because the songs you can make with 3 left hand chords are limited to Mother Goose rhymes or lullabyes..

Anyways, you can manage to play a few of them once you have a basic grasp of music reading, a ggod timing, and some head phones so you would not bug the other occupants of your house by your constant and heart felt practice..

Good luck!

More lessons next time!

***************************

MY LOVE FOR YOU was done by Johnny Mathis. I wrote the notes first, then with the lyrics using the Cakewalk software..It is one enjoyable software I learned a few years back.

One of the things you can do with it is to write music scores without using your hand. You use a mouse to write the notes, thus giving your written score a nice printed look..

Anyway, there are two new lessons connected with the 8 measure score which I wrote...

1. the dot. In music, you use the dot to indicate that the value of the note proceeding it is extended to one half of its actual written value..( huh? )

Example: the value of a half note are two beats, right? If you put a dot after the half note, the actual value of the dotted half note are 3 beats...

2. The eighth notes..1/8 notes..These notes were resulted from dividing the quarternotes into halves..In simple math 1/2 of 1/4 = 1/8...

A couple of 1/8 notes joined together have the value of 1 beat...

Thus if you have to write just 1/8 notes inside that 4/4 measure, you will be needing 8 1/8 notes so your music composition is correct..Getting boring?

Anyway, the photo above show the first 8 measures of MY LOVE FOR YOU. ...

music lesson 3

Here is a graphic representation ( a longer term for the word picture ) concerning the previous lesson..

In this picture, you will see the quarter, half and whole notes I was talking about. Try singing this short exercise while making a 4/4 beat with your right hand.Do not use your left The left hand performs the opposite manner ( going right instead of left on the 2nd beat, then going left instead of right on the 3rd beat ). Both left and right hand goes the same direction on the first and 4th beat! In basic music reading, you beat only with one hand, specifically the right hand. If you are right handed.

In advanced music reading ( conducting a choral group e.g. ) then you beat with two hands. When two hands conduct at the same time, they go the opposite way on the 2nd and the 3rd beat.

This short lesson by the way concerns basic music conducting ....



The symbol at the left of the staff is a twirling thingy called a CLEFT. A new term! This cleft IS CALLED THE G cleft. Another term for this cleft is the treble cleft.
There are 2 kinds of cleft: the treble and the bass cleft..

the treble cleft is called the G cleft,
the bass cleft is called the F cleft..

Next time I will show you how a F cleft looks like..

In a score or music sheet written for a piano, there are two staves for each melody line. Each staff is marked by an F and a G cleft side by side. These two staves are joined by a music term called BRACKET. Reason for the 2 staves? One staff is for the right hand, the other staff is for the left.

The trebel staff is what the right hand performs, the bass staff is what the left hand performs..
Again you will see these terms next time: I do not want to cram in too much terms in one lesson..I do not want you to choke!

Anyway just take a look and try to sing the simple children song by looking at the notes, the words ( called lyrics ) and the other music terms like the bars, the cleft, the time signature the number of measures from the start to the end of the song. It is always the number 8!
til next time!

****************

Here is a feedback from my buddy, Ben Soloria from Virginia..

Now that you got my curiosity, Maestro, how do the notes relate to the syllables in the lyrics?Is one syllable equivalent to a quarter note? For example, these lyrics --- "My love for you isdeep and endless as the sea, strong and mighty as a tree, my love for you." In this particular example, if I would write the notes, which syllables or words would be a quarter note or a whole note?Hey, just kidding. You don't have to explain that one cause no matter what kind of explanationyou give I'll probably won't comprehend it anyway. I learned to drive, I learned to swim and I learnedto cook but just can't have a way with music. Ciao. I'll keep up with the serial lessons.

Will answer your e-mail extensively next time, buddy!

lesson

Teaching could be an enjoyable experience, more so if you are tutoring music to gifted students.

Children seem to have an inborn ear ( and eye ) for music. A good teacher seems to to have the ability to look at the subject from the view point of a child. Or see it thru the eyes of a child.
Thus most piano and music theory books start with children's songs. Let us take the song MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB.

A music teacher can tell many things about MATH and MUSIC from this simple children,s song.
No. 1-The entire song -MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB is made up of 8 measures...
All songs that I know are written in 8 measures, or multiples of 8..

Written stories make use of sentences to relate something.

Songs make use of Musical pharases to convey something: a story, an expression of love, a ballad about a country.

A musical phrase has always 8 measures...Not 7 not 9 but 8. It is the magic 8. Check any song and you will always discover that each line of the song is made up of 8 measures..Why?..I do not know. That is how it is..

Let us analyze MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB from a music teacher's point of view..
First measure of the song covers the words MA-RY HAD A ..

second measure covers LIT-TLE LAMB...
THIRD measure covers LIT-TLE LAMB...
FOURTH measure covers LIT-TLE LAMB...
FIFTH measure covers MA-RY HAD A ..
SIXTH measure covers LIT-TLE LAMB...HIS
SEVENTH measure covers FLEECE IS WHITE AS SNOW
EIGHTH measure covers SNOW!

Music conductors make use of their hands to count the 1-2-3-4s in many songs.
This is called BEATING or MAKING BEATS..

To make a 4/4 beat follow only 4 simple steps are done with your hand or with a baton stick.
In the first beat the right hand goes down, in the second beat the hand goes to the left, 3rd beat it goes to the right, 4th beat it goes up and 1 measure is finished. You again will repeat the cycle, first beat goes down, left, right up and so on, and so on..

Try singing MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB while making a beat on 4/4 time..
MA - is one beat, RY is another beat, HAD is another beat, A is another beat, One measure is done..

Now we go to the 2nd measure
LIT- first beat
TLE - second beat
LAMB - 3rd and 4th beat..
3rd measure is just a repeat of the 2nd measure
4th measure is just a repeat of the 2nd or 3rd measure,
5th measure is a repeat of the 1st measure
6th is a repeat of the 2nd measure but it includes IT'S
7TH MEASURE has the syllables FLEECE IS WHITE AS ( four syllables, four beats )
8th measure has SNOW which is sang very long. It is a WHOLE NOTE..
WHOLE NOTES ARE SUNG with 4 beats
HALF NOTES are sung with 2 beats ( The note that goes with LAMB is a half note )
The note that goes with SNOW is a WHOLE note. The rest of the syllables are quarter notes.
QUARTER NOTES are sung with 1 beat..
Can you see a pattern emerging?..Not yet?..Read this piece again from the beginning. It takes a while before the lesson sinks in.

Lessons are:
MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB is written in 4/4 time, and in 8 measures..
IT makes use of a combination of quarter, half and whole notes..
If you add the value of the notes inside each measure, you will always arrive to the sum of ONE!
The last meausre has only one note..It is a whole note..the value of a whole note is ONE!
tHE VALUE OF A HALF NOTE IS 1/2 OF A whole note
The value of a quarter note is 1/4 of a whole note..
So as you can see, MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB is not just a kiddie song. It is one way of teaching an aspect of MATH AND MUSIC..MM!!!!
four quarter notes make a whole note
two half notes make a whole note
2 quarter notes make a half note..
But the kind of notes with regards to life span does not end here.
Divide a quarter note and you get a 1/8 note
Divide a 1/8 note and you get a 1/16 note..
Mind boggling?..I do not think so...

Til next time.
vic.

***************

more scary photos!!!

Imagine a Tarantula making a snack out of your scalp..:)

Isn't he suppose to melt away when sunlight appears?

Emma and her beautifying mud plaster..:)

Excellent!!!!

PHANTOM OF THE LIBRARY!!!!!!!!!! ( where is the sound of hollow laughter?)

Spirits of Halloween Past

SOMEONE'S WATCHING OVER THEM!..( Miguelita and her staff...)

Meet my friend Jack! Hi Jack, now hit the road, Jack!

Reminds you of someone?..:)

couple of shots from Louena........

A sure winner for the toothiest pumpkin..:)

Must be Caitlin Untinen, AKA...?

Another spooky night came and went..

and thanks goodness, we are still alive!!

MUSIC LESSON NO. ONE...

Music theory is always a part of learning how to play a music instrument, example the piano.

MATH AND MUSIC

You may not know it, but Math and Music are co-related: one can not exist without the other.
Any musician or singer know how important timing is. Without timing is, you might as well stop singing in public. Your audience will dissapear as fast as you can say DO-RE-MI.
One time, I read an ad here in Toronto that says a child who is good in music will be good in Math or Arithmetic.

Timing is related to mathematics. Have you ever seen a printed music sheet? Do not be intimidated by the symbols there. These could be learned and applied so after you have started studying how to read and write music, the messages in a printed music sheet will become very clear to you.

Some of the best musicians in the world are Filipinos. Singing, playing an instrument, arranging music scores, composing, writing lyrics ( which is the same as writing poetry ), etc. Name it, they can do it.

One of the good music readers from Asingan was the late Mr. Fabian Ballesteros. He can sing a music part if it is written on a music sheet. This ability is good if you are joining music groups which sing in harmony. Have you ever heard a choir singing in a Concert Hall or inside a church? It makes you feel like you are already in heaven. Heaven on Earth, that it. You will be mesmerized.

learning the ropes

I learned how to read music after about 6 months of extensively studying music theory. It consists of reading music exercises by singing. One start from the easiest and day by the day the exercises becomes more and more difficult. There is always difficulty in achieving something worthwhile. As they say, no pain, no gain. But you do need a trained teacher to tell you whether you are singing the notes correctly or not.

Just like reading ABCs, you can not learn how to read notes if you do not learn how to write them.

As you go along your music studies, you will discover how Math and Arithmetic is intertwined with music reading and writing.

If you have a pretty tune in your head, you can write it down on paper, using blank music pages. Then you have captured the tune forever. If you can not write yet, sing it to a tape recorder and send the tape to one who can write music. He/she will gladly do it for you. But you have to pay of course, because the process is also quite time consuming. Anyways, let us go back to the original topic: MATH AND MUSIC. Double M..MM in short. Sweet candy. Or another MM. A good writer in the Discussion Corner of Pangasinan.Org.

Music writing ( and reading) is a kind of language. It was used by Ludwig B. when he wrote his famous compositions. Remenber that he was deaf, yet he was still capable of writing them.
When a musician checks a music sheet, the first thing he looks for are the fractions written at the begining of the song. Which is at the very first staff atop the music sheet.

The most common ones are 4/4, 3/4, 2/4, 6/8..plus a few others. But since this short essay is about the FUNDAMENTALS OF MUSIC READING AND WRITING, I will try to explain to you what these fractions are.

By the way, if there is no fraction ( the proper term for this in music is TIME SIGNATURE ) by default, the time signature is 4/4. Sometimes the wriiter also use the letter C to indicate the music is written as 4/4. Again: no time signature written means the composition has a 4/4 signature.

Most of the songs you hear ( from the oldies to RAP if you consider RAP as music ) are all in 4/4.
Wait, I have to define to you certain terms present on a music sheet.
STAFF is the group of five horizontal lines in the music sheet. A blank music sheet ( used by kids in their elementary piano exercises ) has a number of staffs, sorry STAVES would be the proper word because the plural of staff is STAVES. .

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There are always five lines in a music staff..

FIRST ITEM WRITTEN IN THE BEGINNING OF EACH STAFF ARE SHORT VERTICAL LINES CALLED bars. Hey, these bars are not the same places you go for a quick you-know-what. Bars are like marks separating the music in parts. In music, the area between 2 bars is called..A MEASURE!

You fill up each measure with a certain NUMBER of NOTES.

NOTES are the 8 thingies called do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-si do. Other teachers use C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C. C is for do, D is for Re, and so on and so forth. These are just the WHITE NOTES in a piano. The black notes have their own names too. But we will learn their names in some future lessons.
The note groups from Do ( C) to the next Do ( C) is called an OCTAVE. A prefix meaning Eight is called an OCTO. Octopus, Octogenarian, Octet, etc. If you have started reading this article, it would be helpful if you are sitting in front of a piano. An acoustic piano have seven octaves. Try counting them...

want some pie?

Let us go back to the fractions in music. In this point, I will draw an analogy between the music note and a piece of pie.

A whole pie is the same in value as a whole note. Or the number one, althoogh 1, in terms of music value is not used. We always use the term whole note. Awright!
If you cut a whole pie into 4 equal parts, each piece is called a quarter of a pie.
If you cut a whole note into four equal parts each part is called a quarter note. Now your music education is starting.

A quarter note is a black note with a stem. Check a printed music sheet under your piano bench.
A whole note is a small oval shaped thing which looks like a zero lying on one side.
Okay, four quarter pieces of pie makes up a whole pie. Four quarter notes makes up a whole note. The first lesson a music student do is how to count 1,2,3,4..1,2,3,4..ad infinitum, over and over again while you are playing the piano exercises. If you are singing voice exercises, you have to use your hand in counting the beat. There are hand gestures for each time signature. Just check how the conductor do it next time you attend a live concert. Counting is very important when learning any kind of instrument, including your vocal chords. The voice is also a music instrument, right?

Each measure of a music composition written in 4/4 time must have only 4 quarter notes, or 1 whole note. If you wrote 5 quarter notes inside 1 measure in your music writing exercise, you will get a red mark on your test paper and the teacher would frown or scream at you. "NOT 5, NOT 3 BUT 4!!!" This is one of the music rules which music composers followed ever since the day music writing was invented. And this is quite a number of years ago. The rules of music writing never changed up to this very day.

Brahms used his hand in writing his compositions. There was no Cakewalk music writing software during his time. His original documents, if these still exist must now cost a fortune. Composers write music with bold and fast strokes. They are not rounded or artistic as you see in printed music sheets. But the music printer can read these these crude music writings and he sets them nicely on print. Not long ago, some compositions of John Lennon written with his hand were auctioned. Now those are real collectors' items which fetched good money.

More on time signatures next time! And HAPPY SINGING!!---#

BY VICTORIO COSTES