Learn how musical notation works and explore the creative process of composing music.
Musical notation is the written language of music — a system of symbols that tells musicians exactly which notes to play, for how long, and with what character. Notes are written on a stave — a set of five horizontal lines — where the position of each note shows its pitch (higher notes are written higher on the stave). The shape of the note shows its duration (how long it lasts): a crotchet (filled note with a stem) lasts one beat; a minim (hollow note with a stem) lasts two beats; a semibreve (hollow note with no stem) lasts four beats; a quaver (filled note with a flag) lasts half a beat. Rests indicate silences of different lengths. Composing music means using these building blocks creatively to make an original piece. A good composition considers melody (the main tune), rhythm (the pattern of long and short notes), dynamics (loud and quiet), tempo (speed) and structure (how different sections are arranged). Even a simple four-bar melody requires making many interesting musical decisions!