Finding the right book to learn all the notes

[mikeonpiano]

Hello
I'm looking for a book that will help me learn to memorize all the notes on the full staff. I've been looking at places like guitar center, but it seems like all these books they sell try to break you into cords before you've even learned the notes. I know some basic theory from guitar, but I need a book that will give me a solid workout of both the upper and lower staff of the piano notes. I have a little riddle to quickly find notes on the piano, but I find it confusing to try to think about the notes on the keyboards at the same time as the staff. I need a thick book with some lengthy exercises on just memorization of basic notes and working with the right and left hand.

Advanced Thanks
Beautiful forum by the way.

EDIT
I found two books at Barns & Noble that look pretty good.

• Alfred's Self Teaching Adult Piano Course
• Alferd's No-Brainer: Play Piano

[martinn]

I have Alfreds Essentials of Music Theory Complete (pt 1 - 3) but probably any short music theory book will give tips to get started.
Then, for practicing i used IOS apps (apple) : Music Tutor and Sight Reading HD Lite.
They are infinite and in my opinion better than some practice sheet for basic staffs.

But, on the other hand for hands on piano, beginners or childrens piano music books are great.

And my answers are for learning the notes, the beginning, and not sight reading in general, which is a lifelong task.

[mikeonpiano]

Thanks martinn
That "IOS apps (apple) Music Tutor and Sight Reading HD Lite" seems interesting. But is that avalible for the Mac OS also? I don't have an iPhone. I do have a Mac Mini that I record on though. EDIT. I guess it does https://apps.apple.com/au/app/sight-reading-hd-lite/id495281740
I'll do some searching on this material you mentioned. So for I've been working in the Alferd's No-Brainer Play Piano book with the CDs, it's been really good. The workouts are more lengthy and the videos seem to give some good tips. I'll also add in your material for extra learning.

On a side note:
I don't know if this is normal for NEW players to reading, but regarding note interpretation: I find it really difficult trying to get my brain to shift between the upper and lowers staff. I realize that the notes just repeat from A to G, but the staff lines look so similar I get mixed up when I'm reading the upper G staff for example and then jump to the lower F cliff staff.
There are those little riddles we use, but it's so difficult to think about that when your brain is trying to interpret the fingers notes and then the upper and lower staff notes. I suppose all this will just take some time.

[lettersquash]

Hi, mikeonpiano, and welcome to the forum!

As a returner to reading music after a break of half a century, I was extremely rusty, and back then, in my youth, I never really got to grips with reading the notes too well either. So I was virtually a beginner two years ago. I also found some apps (Android phone) useful for a quick refresher on reading the notes. I can't remember which, but it's a good idea to just try a few and see which you like. There will be Windows apps too, I'm sure. The one I settled on, as well as other exercises and theory pages, presented random notes on the staff according to various choices - so you could just work on the treble clef, and/or just C major, and then start adding more complexity. That's perhaps a good general tip. I think I'm right in saying we learn better if we limit ourselves to a manageable chunk of data and repeat it until it's fairly well established, then that gives us a place from which to incorporate more.

I'm not sure how to deal with the treble and bass clefs being different, in regard to that scheme - i.e. whether to spend a long time just working on one before spending time on the other. Maybe some of the teachers here will have better advice, but, as I see it, if we're learning piano music, it's kind of basic that we'll have to deal with both, so perhaps keeping switching mentally is best. But I'm sure most teachers will agree it's best to start with C major / A minor pieces and scales, then gradually get into key signatures with more sharps or flats.

I have to say, I find that difference between treble and bass on the grand staff one of the hardest things. I've been practising reading for two years now, and it still confuses me and annoys me that there are two sets of interpretations of the staff (not to mention a lot more depending on key signature and accidentals). But people vary in how well they accomplish this (for reasons I won't go on about now), and I'm just one of the unfortunates. And I don't practise regularly enough. Daily is best.

The downside of the apps I used was that your response is to tap on a virtual keyboard, often just a short section, which is far removed from playing the piano, and almost no better than choosing the note name. I believe there are some that listen via your microphone so you can play an actual piano, but I've not used them.

It's worth remembering that there are two different ways of thinking of this task - from the visible note to knowing its letter name (which all our little rhymes are about), and from the visible note to putting your finger on a particular piano key. Letter names are useful, but learning to play from music should move towards the latter.

One of the most emphatic bits of advice I got when I came here and asked advice about brushing up on my reading was to read lots and lots of very simple pieces - a crazy number, but very short exercises. I didn't - I knew I'd get so bored I'd soon hate the sight of my piano, so I took on harder pieces I was desperate to learn, but it's good advice and I would if I could (be bothered). It might suit you better, and it's worth finding your own balance. Some people are disciplined enough to sit and do exercises. I ain't one of them. All the best!

[lelle]

One of the most emphatic bits of advice I got when I came here and asked advice about brushing up on my reading was to read lots and lots of very simple pieces - a crazy number, but very short exercises. I didn't - I knew I'd get so bored I'd soon hate the sight of my piano, so I took on harder pieces I was desperate to learn, but it's good advice and I would if I could (be bothered). It might suit you better, and it's worth finding your own balance. Some people are disciplined enough to sit and do exercises. I ain't one of them. All the best!

One tip if reading lots of exercises sounds overwhelming is to basically just read one a day. If you do that every day you practice piano for a year, you'll have done hundreds of exercises more than if you didn't, and you will notice a difference in your reading fluency.

[mikeonpiano]

Great tips lettersquash and lelle

@lettersquash Someone else just mentioned learning the top staff /right hand first, or bottom, but just one first. That sounds like a great idea.

@lelle
Yes, I've head this also. A little everyday is better then a lot once a week to keep it fresh in your memory.

Thanks for the input, much appreciated!

[quantum]

On a side note:
I don't know if this is normal for NEW players to reading, but regarding note interpretation: I find it really difficult trying to get my brain to shift between the upper and lowers staff. I realize that the notes just repeat from A to G, but the staff lines look so similar I get mixed up when I'm reading the upper G staff for example and then jump to the lower F cliff staff.
There are those little riddles we use, but it's so difficult to think about that when your brain is trying to interpret the fingers notes and then the upper and lower staff notes. I suppose all this will just take some time.

The mnemonic system for reading notes, while seemingly beginner friendly, actually requires a lot of work.  The trade off for the gentle learning curve of this approach, is that when students gather up more experience playing music and want to advance their reading fluency, they are held back by the methodology of this system. 

Let's look at the steps to read a single note with the mnemonic system:
1. Identify the clef
2. Identify if the note is located on either a line or space
3. Based on the information in steps 1 and 2, recall the appropriate mnemonic
4. Using the mnemonic, count up the lines or spaces till one lands on the note in question
5. Recall key signature and identify any accidentals
6. Based on steps 4 and 5, identify the note name
7. Using knowledge of the name of the note, identify the key on the piano associated with that note
8. Position hand and appropriate finger above note
9. Play the note

That is a lot of steps for just a one note.  In addition, mnemonics generally don't extend their rhymes into ledger lines, so there is even more tedious work to do with ledger line notes.


Now look at the landmark system, or landmark notes (do a google search for details on the technique).  The basic premise is you learn a few landmark notes, and use these landmarks to help locate all other notes.  It encourages students to think about intervals, as well as employ more intuitive thought as to the locations of notes.  There are no mnemonics to remember, and there is no need to translate a mnemonic to a note name.  It is a much more direct approach to reading music, as one deals with the notes themselves.  Also, one is given a better sense of spacial awareness on the staff, location of notes in relation to one another, and the skill to approximate the location of a note. 

Using an analogue example:
Say you are given a number line of integers from -20 to +20.  The question is, where is number 5 located?  The landmark system would have you thinking intuitively with intervals, where you can say: 5 is not negative so it is not left of 0, it is not greater than 10 so it is not to the right of 10, however 5 is between 0 and 10.  Contrast this to the mnemonic system that would have you count numbers until you reach 5: minus twenty, minus nineteen, minus eighteen..., then translate to numerals: "five" translates to 5, and so on.


The next level up in note reading efficiency I call the pictograph method (not sure if there is a standardized term for this, but this is what I am calling it at the moment).  In this method the clef, staff, note, and duration are all flattened into a single pictograph.  In this way there is no need to identify a clef, a note or a duration, as it is conceived as a single image.  The thought process would be:

pictograph = sound = duration = key on piano = haptic sensation in hand

It is a singular sensation without the need to deconstruct it into its components.  Naturally, it will take a certain amount of experience to get to this point.  It is analogous to how one sees printed words in a familiar language - a collection of characters is immediately and intuitively perceived as word, along with its meaning and pronunciation, without the need to work through each character of the word in order to decipher it. 

The pictograph method will very easily scale up with complexity, used with recognizable patterns, as one progresses with music study.  For example, an arpeggio.  It can be read as a single pictograph, as opposed to a collection of individual notes.


The takeaway for all of this is, try to move away from the mnemonic system of reading.  As you have discovered, it can very easily lead to workflow overload.