Learn to Read Music

A good start on reading musical notes

I would recommend ‘Learn to Read Music’ to people who already play by ear: perhaps fiddle, mandolin, electric bass or other instruments notated in a single clef, as well as singers.The author’s target audience seems to be people looking to plunk out melodies on the piano, I’m ambivalent about recommending the book to keyboard players or guitarists: On one hand there’s so much specialized material for those instruments you’re better off learning detailed nomenclature in that context.Yet this book covers topics not usually found in guitar/piano books including: vocal beaming of notes, notating repeated notes, alternating notes, and entire measures. While transposition is not explicitly covered, the different clefs are.If you’re a songwriter who wants to arrange for voices or non-transposing instruments, the material will teach you enough to craft basic parts in concert pitch.The language is very conversational and easy to read.Finally I would not recommend the book to anyone looking for thorough orchestral or jazz arranging coverage – see Gardener Read and the Norton Notation Guide for that kind of depth. Nor does the book cover actual manuscript writing (see Mark McGrain).

This book is THE most useful book I've purchased and read on how to read music so far. I have just started learning to play the violin (I am in my mid-40s)and although all my life I've sung and music is, and has always been, a huge part of my life(many of my family members are accomplished musicians)I've never played an instrument or had any formal musical theory training. This book is the reference I have gone back to again and again as I progress with my violin and I have questions or areas that aren't clear to me (such as the concepts of major and minor scale, flats/sharps/accidentals and how they came about). . not only does this book take you from the very basics to the complex, Howard Shanet takes the time to explain WHY certain things are the way they are in written music. I was struggling with some concepts and when my teacher explained them to me I didn't get it....I looked it up in a smaller book on music theory and the explanation was there but I still didn't quite get it . . and then I looked up the subject (this happened to be accidentals/flats and sharps and also time meters) in this book and because Howard Shanet explained why sharps and flats are written the way they are, I was able to understand the concept and work beyond it. Just an excellent book and I recommend it to anyone learning to read and play music. It is true, this book will not teach you how to play any instrument, BUT without the basics and theory in this book it would be very difficult for me to progress with my violin playing. Highly recommend it.

Actually this book isn't as bad as I thought it was. Even though it's not designed for string players it's still useful.I just skipped the prelogue and chapter one, since chapter two about pitches is what I need in order to be able to read sheet music and play by sight.We all have learned sing and clap in rhythms more or less at elementary school so it's not a big concern. The only drawback of the book is has no reference to finger placing on strings. It teaches finding piano keys in very easy steps. But I soon figured it out by refering to another book, I can read music for violin vol 1. Now I know how to locate notes on each string and how to read music, thanks to the simple method offered by this little book.

I was very anxious that I would never understand how to read music - especially by reading a book, but let me say this -- you can.The first thing that calmed my fear was learning that music is divided into two parts, Rhythm (how long tones last) and Pitch (how high/low tones are). I read that a second time and said...that was easy to understand --The book is well written and I am learning.

I took music lessons as a kid and played the piano a bit (Intermediate level). Fast forward 16yrs later and I wanted to get back into it. I already have a decent music lingo background so this book wasn't complicated to grasp at all, and maybe helped explain some things better (like what the heck is the minor scale?)I would seriously doubt the book's claim that you can read it all and understand how to read music in 2 hours. I'm a slower reader granted (because I'm anal and want to read and understand every detail before moving on) but I won't finish the book in 2 hours even with my previous background. It did help understand concepts better and read music better/faster.SUMMARY: Solid information on reading music, may take longer than 2hrs to fully understand and apply the information.

This book has been invaluable for me. I'm in my 40's with no musical background and purchased this book when I started playing the Violin over 2 years ago. I read the book cover to cover when I received it just to get an understanding about reading music. Over the past 2 years, I've pulled this book out so many times, this book has been a gem for me. I'm now at 2 years 7 months playing and I just pulled the book out again to try and understand the melodic minor, and harmonic minor scales-I get it now. I understand the subject is dry but the topic is what it is and this book helps me to understand the subject.

I ordered this to try to help my daughter when she is playing the piano. She's 8 years old and has been taking weekly lessons for a year. I took lessons when I was her age, but if you don't use it you lose it. I thought this book would help refresh my memory. It's hard to order books online because you can't see what you're getting. I was disappointed when I got it because there is more to read than I'd like. I think I'll stick to ordering books in a store where I can pick them up and look through them. I gave it 3 stars because it's more than I wanted to read. I never read the book, so I can't speak to what's inside. It might be a great book.

I bought this book thinking that it would be great for me to learn to read music but boy was I wrong! In the past I have learned a little music theory but that was many years ago and I had forgotten it all. Having gone on to YouTube I found people there that were teaching some lessons for free and it was not until then that some of that music theory came back to me. Howard Shanet does not teach music from the very beginning. For example, he only gives you the notes on the Treble Clef Staff but he completely ignores the Bass Clef Staff. If you want to play music either for pleasure or professionally you have to know the notes of both Staves. If you wanted to play the piano in particular you would have to be able to read both Staves because one is for the right hand and the other is for the left hand. I should be more clear on this, the Treble Clef Staff is for the right hand and the Bass Clef is for the left hand, so without knowing the notes on the Bass Clef Staff how will you be able to play the piano with your left hand? There are other things missing from the book which I will not go into here, but suffice it to say that this book is most definitely not for a beginner. I am waiting for a couple of more books to come through and I will see if they are any better than this one. For now, though, I will stick to listening to the people that I have found on YouTube as they are very good. You will need to listen to more than one person as each of them has something to offer that the other does not but together you really will get to know how to read music and also how to play piano a lot better than just having a book in front of you. The 3 people so far are Lypur, LessonsOnTheWeb with a person called Tim, and finally The 'Official' How To Play Piano-Lessons with a young lady called Alison. Please look up these people as it is better to be able to watch what these people are doing as well as listening to the music theory. I hope that this helps people out there and I wish you all well on your journey of learning about music.

I bought this book last year for my Dad as he said he wanted to learn to read sheet music, but having seen it sat on the bookcase unused after 6 months had passed I decided to read it myself. I learnt a little about notation at school but I have to be honest I forgot a lot of this, but this book really helped me to recall the basics and then continue on to learn the more intricate symbols and activities. Now don't be fooled, it's not going to be easy and it's not going to be fully understood in one read through. You will need to be prepared to actually "study" the book, much like a student. You will need to keep notes and also, ideally, need the use of a piano or a keyboard to learn the practical side of reading sheet music.I personally found it best to learn a little each day rather than read the book from cover to cover in one sitting. The diagrams and descriptions may seem very easy at the beginning but they will start to become more challenging and if you skip chapters you will not be able to fully read sheet music. That's the beauty of keeping notes. I kept going over things I didn't understand again and again until I had fully understood the lesson. Sometimes I would leave it overnight and continue from the same point the next day in sheer determination to understand all that I needed to.Basically If you really want to learn then this book will definitely help you on your way. It's not the end of learning sheet music but the beginning so always keep your eyes open for other books on this subject.

Being a bit ancient I thought that this would be sooo difficult for me as memory is useless but I can now pick out a tune on the keyboard, albeit a bit slow. This book is excellent.You can go at your own pace. I've also downloaded an app on my smartphone to test me on notes and the combination of the two has been brilliant.

This is a very easy to understand book on how to read music - even without an instrument in your hands. Taken from the author's well proven seminars that promise to teach the audience to read and understand standard notation in less than a day. As this is a book rather than a roadshow with instruments at the ready to demo what's being said, the book claims a bit much considering most musicians take years to perfect their sight reading (and mines still pretty poor after 45 years) However most of my students struggle with timing and duration of notes rather than the third elemnt - pitch. This book is an excellent practice tool for learning timing. The book focuses on what it does well - note duration and poly-rhythm notation. Once you've cracked that you'll only have to practice playing the right notes - when, and how long, can be learnt from this book. Well worth the cover price if you need to read - but you'll still have to practice.

This is being returned. No disrespect to the now deceased author - but the book is not user-friendly and could easily be off-putting to a true beginner.