Notes and rests are the two most fundamental and important sets of symbols that composers use to write music.
- Notes: Symbols placed on the staff that tell musicians the pitch to play on their instruments and how long each pitch should be held
- Rests: Indicate silence—they tell musicians when not to play notes
The Six Main Types of Notes
The notes most commonly found in music are whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, and sixteenth notes. There are other types of notes, such as 32nd, 64th, and 128th notes, but they are used less often.
The Relative Durations of the Most Common Types of Notes
The name of each type of note derives from its note value—its duration relative to that of a whole note. For instance, a half note is called a half note because it is played for half the number of beats that a whole note gets. Similarly, an eighth note is played for half the number of beats that a quarter note gets and 1/8 as many beats as a whole note gets. If a whole note gets one beat—as specified by the time signature of the piece—a half note gets half as many beats as a whole note, an eighth note gets 1/8 as many beats, and so on.
The Parts of a Note
Each type of note looks somewhat different, but all notes are composed of the same three parts: the head, tail, and flag.
- Head: The oval shape of the note. The head can be open (white) or closed (black) and is placed on a line or space of the staff, or on, above, or below a ledger line.
- Stem: A vertical line that rises or falls from the note head. Stems of notes whose heads are above the middle (third) line of the staff hang down from the left side of the note. Notes with heads below the middle line have stems that extend up from the right side of the head. Stems of notes with heads on the middle line can point either way.
- Flag: Also called a hook or tail, the flag marks notes with durations less than that of a quarter note. An eighth note has one flag, a sixteenth has two, and so on. All flags are drawn to the right of the stem and curve to the right. Notes with upward stems have flags at the top of the stem that curve down. Notes with downward stems have flags at the bottom of the stem that curve up.
Beams
When several identical flagged notes, such as eighth or sixteenth notes, appear in a row, they may be linked by one or more horizontal lines called beams, which replace the flags. The number of beams reflects the number of flags each note type gets. For instance, four sixteenth notes, which would each get two flags as individual notes, would be joined by two beams.
Types of Rests
Each type of note has a corresponding rest with an equal relative duration. For instance, a quarter note and a quarter rest get the same number of beats. The different types of rests are drawn onto the staff at specific places, as shown in the diagram below. Note the difference between a whole rest, which is “heavier” and therefore hangs down from the line, and a half rest, which rises up above the line.
Dotted Notes and Rests
Dotted notes and dotted rests are used to indicate durations that regular notes and rests can’t express, such as three beats. A dot placed to the right of a note or rest increases its duration by half. For instance, a half note gets two beats, but a dotted half note or dotted half rest gets three beats.
Ties and Slurs
An unattached curved line above or below two identical notes is called a tie. This indicates that the first note is to be held for its own length plus the length of the note to which it is tied. Although rests can be dotted, rests cannot be tied. A curved line above or below two consecutive notes on a staff is called a slur. Slurs indicate that the musician should play the two slurred notes in sequence smoothly, with no audible transition between the notes.
Tuplets
Composers use tuplets to split a beat into two or more notes without changing its duration. The most common tuplet is the triplet, one note split into three notes. Each of the three notes in a triplet equals one-third of the original note. Triplets are notated in two ways:
- Triplets of flagged notes: Are beamed and include a number above the center of the beam. The number represents the number of notes of that type that should be played in the same duration as a note of the next-highest relative duration. For instance, a triplet of eighth notes with a “3” above its beam means that the musician should play three eighth notes in the same number of beats that one quarter note gets according to the time signature of the piece.
- Triplets of unflagged notes: Have a brace rather than a beam above the affected notes. A number written above the brace serves the same purpose as the number written above the beam of tuplets that consist of flagged notes.
Tuplets can include rests, which get regular notation, within the brace or beam of the tuplet.
Chords
A chord consists of three or more notes that are written as a single unit and played simultaneously. In written music, notes of chords are shown in vertical stacks on the staff, as in this sample chord progression, or series of chords: