A Pretty Good Invention

It usually took ten years to memorize the music that was sung in church! Then a man named Guido d’Arrezo (991-1033) devised an ingenious method to help speed up that difficult task. He created a method of using parts of his hand to signify the tones. He could hold up his hand and point out the melody.

A good idea. In fact it sped up the whole process but it still took usually two years to do the job. Not satisfied with that progress he came up with a truly great invention. A way to write the music down on paper. Think of it. No where else in all of mankind’s history had that been done successfully. And what he invented now looks so simple- lines and spaces! The STAFF.

The Staff is the place where you put information.

It has five horizontal lines.

Notes have to be placed either on a line, or in between. Each line and space represents a note. The big question is what pitch exactly are you representing?

When you pluck a rubber band you create a pitch, a vibration. The Universe is full of vibrations. In fact, everything is a vibration. What we see are energy waves. Different waves equal different colors for our eyes. Slower frequencies create waves we detect with our hearing. Sound is the vibrations moving through a medium (like air) that reach our ears and then becomes audible as our brains interpret the waves.

A steady vibration creates a steady pitch. The slower the vibration the lower the pitch. The faster the vibration the higher the pitch. You can hear that when you turn a tuning peg on a guitar. (Ask first, and not too tight!)

NOTE NAMES

We only use the letters A, B, C, D, E, F, & G.

The first seven letters of the alphabet name our notes.

Just like Do, Re, Mi. (Actually, it is Do Re, Mi.)

It repeats as you continue the sequence.