Neat trick in reading bass clef.

Cafe Society
1

All, Cows, Eat, Grass

That is how most students are introduced to bass clef notes.

I learned to read treble clef at age 11. Used it daily in Orchestra for six years.

Bass clef is always a struggle for me to sight read. You don’t have time to recite All, Cows. You have to recognize the note in a glance.

Also the notation seems so terribly wrong. I’ve recognized a A note in the middle of the staff for 40 years. Too call it a C note (bass clef) just throws me when sight reading.

Today, I had a revelation that makes everything so clear and simple.

Bass Clef is shifted down by one slot. Imagine using a stick and shoving the treble clef notes down by one slot.

This also works for the notes on the lines.

https://goo.gl/images/nA5og1

F in treble looks like a D in bass

A in treble looks like a F in bass

C in treble looks like a A in bass

E in treble looks like a C in bass

G in treble looks like a E in bass

It’s so simple and easy for anyone who normally reads treble clef. Why hasn’t any teacher ever pointed this out?

This helps me confirm I’ve read the bass clef note correctly. That C note that looks so much like A
makes perfect sense.

It’s a VISUAL way to conceptualize the difference in the two staffs.

I’m playing a lot of piano exercises. Eventually bass clef will be as familiar as treble.

This trick gets me past the learning curve.

2

Anyhow, I hope this helps others struggling to transition from treble clef to bass clef.

Most instruments live on the treble clef. Guitar for example is transposed to fit on the treble clef.

Treble is what we know and feel comfortable using.

But sometimes you want to play piano or electric bass. Gotta learn the bass clef.

3

Yes! This is how I got myself to learn and remember bass clef when I got a bass recorder many years ago. I hadn’t played it in about ten years, and when I picked it up recently, I found I couldn’t remember how to read bass clef. Thanks for the memory jog.

4

Whatever works!

I took an AP music theory course in high school. It was almost exclusively band nerds, while I was a chorus nerd with a piano background. My ability to read both treble and bass clefs was generally regarded as a superpower. Before that, I’d never really thought about how most other instruments only use ‘half’ the staff.

5

Bass clef can be a struggle. It looks so familiar yet it’s so different.

I feel for any beginning piano student that is expected to learn to read both staffs at the same time. That’s got to be so confusing.

I’m still wrapping my head around ledger line notes. A treble clef, G ledger line note is the same bass clef G note. Exactly the same piano key. It’s just different notation.

Ledger lines can represent bass clef notes on the treble clef.

Or the bass clef can include treble clef notes by using ledger lines.

Music is something you can study every day of your life and still will never grasp all of it’s complexities and nuances.

6

Yes, this is a common trick, and it’s a shame no one pointed this out to you before. I will say, though, be careful thinking of it in terms of “Imagine using a stick and shoving the treble clef notes down by one slot” (bolding mine). It’s important–in my view–to recognize you’re pushing it down two slots, because it’s a dangerous game to differentiate the notes between the lines from the notes on the lines. It might help to consider a “slot” any note, not just the spaces on the staff. So yes, the bass clef is equal to two notes below its counterpart on the treble clef.

Don’t even get me started on the alto clef. :wink:

7

That’s a very good point. Bass clef notes are pushed down the staff by 2.

I’ll start thinking of it that way.

My sight reading is getting better. But then the memory side of my brain tries to second guess me. That C note on the bass clef looks so much like the A note I’ve read for forty years.

Now I have a visual way to quickly confirm that I’m reading the notes correctly.

8

Good, it’ll become second nature very quickly. And yes, what you said about the same note being represented in different clefs is correct; here’s a graph that illustrates that well.

9

I’ll have to give this some thought/practice.

I play upright bass, and have been trying to improve my reading as I try to play more melodic lines. To date, I’m pretty much limited to knowing which notes represent open strings, and working up and down from there depending on whether it is a major or minor key. I’m too reliant on hand positions on the neck, and relationships w/in a chord, that I am less aware of specific note names. Tell me to play a 5th, or a flatted 7th, no problem. But I have to think a minute before I can tell you I just plucked - say -Bflat.

When I consciously try to read the notes, I find it easier to play the melody written in treble clef.

When I played piano, I never found reading the two clefs as difficult, because my brain just translated the notes on paper as indicating where my hands/fingers should go. If a song was in D, for example, I just knew to move my fingers to always sharp the Cs and Fs - without really thinking of the value of each written note.

Now that I’m trying to get better at bass, I find it hard to practice everything I need to. My main concern is being solid, so I work on my timing, rhythm, tone. I also have to work on learning new songs, or the ability to sing while I play. Then I need to work on improving my breaks/leads. I’m also working on improving my bowing - a completely different skill set for this bluegrass thumper. With all that on my plate, music theory too often gets overlooked. When I start trying to get too regimented in my practice, it stops being as much fun, and I tend to do it less, which is not good.

10

I don’t remember it being confusing for that reason - it seems like you’re having a much rougher go at it since you’ve internalized the treble clef so strongly.

11

That’s true. I fight with my old ingrained memory a lot. Teaching this old dog new tricks is challenging. :wink: But I’m getting there.

It’s amazing how quickly we automatically translate notes to positions or keys on an instrument.

I see an A note and just know it’s my open A string on the guitar. I’d have to think for a moment to tell you what note I just played.

I can remember doing the same thing in school with the violin.

12

Now, I was like 8 or 9 at the time, but I don’t remember it being confusing at all. It was just kind of, well, this is the way things work, just memorize it. It didn’t feel any different than learning my letters, numbers, or time tables. But, like many things, I suspect it was also just easier to learn at that age. ETA: Oh, or Johnny Bravo does have a good point in that we learned it pretty much at the same time. While I do remember learning the treble clef notes first, bass clef was very, very soon to follow, so not enough time to get confused.

Other things you may not know (though are not necessarily important to know, but since we’re on the topic):

The treble clef is also known as a “G-clef.” Or, I should say, it is a type of G-clef. The bass clef is a type of “F-clef.” In a treble clef, you will note that the curlique of the clef symbol circles around the G line on the staff (G4, to be exact.) That’s why it’s a “G-clef.” It’s the only one commonly used today, but the G-clef, with the same familiar treble clef symbol, was also placed with the curlicue circling the E line below it as the French violin clef.

Now, as I said, the bass clef is a type of “F-clef.” So, if you look at the symbol for the bass clef, you will note the two dots on the right side straddle the line that represents the F on a staff. (F3, to be specific). You will also note that the big dot on the left side that is part of the “swoosh” of the clef symbol is situated on the line that represents the F. Hence, we have our F-clef. Historically, this clef has been used in other positions, but today, it’s only seen as a bass clef. You may also very occasionally in old music books see the bass clef drawn curling the other way around. See here for instance. That’s still just a bass clef.

Then you have your C-clefs, which look like this. Those are used in various positions in modern music, with the central point of that symbol marking C4 on the staff. Typically, you will see it on the middle line of the staff (alto clef, used by violas most commonly) or on the line right above (tenor clef, not used terribly often, but seen for the upper ranges of some instruments like the cello.)

13

Thank you. I didn’t know much about the two clefs. I’m always open to learning more about music. Sometimes I have to pull myself away and focus on actually practicing & playing music. Building the muscle memory that I need

Yeah, I’m a music geek. I’m drawn to anything technical. I entered college as a EE major and switched to Computer Science. I really liked applied math and science.

14

The clefs are actually easy to read because they visually point out their names. The treble clef is the G clef and not only is the clef symbol a stylized “G”, the crossbar/curlicue in the main body is across the line of the G note line.

The bass clef is the F clef and it not only looks like a stylized “F”, the two dots that represent the crossbars center on the F note line.

Both alto and tenor clefs are called the C clefs because the “nock” of the “bow” is always at the C note line.

15

For the two staves, memorize ACEG and FACE for the spaces, from the bottom, and Good Boys Deserve Food Always (GBDFA) and Every Good Boy Deserves Food (EGBDF) for the lines.

Something useful you can do anywhere, to help imprint the positions of the notes in your mind, is to mentally picture the two staves and call out to yourself notes at random, and then visually place them where they should be in your mind’s grand staff.

16

So the G clef and F clef are a step apart.

That’s why the A note, for example, appears in a different location on the two staffs? All the notes move down a full step when written on the bass staff.

17

I always heard All Cows Eat Grass and Good Boys Don’t Fool/Fuck Around.

18

I don’t understand the trouble. But then, I memorize things quickly. “Reading” the notes for the bass clef of a piano score is simple once you simply play a bunch of exercises with notes in that clef. Generally, most beginning piano books introduce you to playing the treble clef first, then, when you’ve got that down, teach you the bass clef by having you play single-note melodies (no chords) written in that clef.

As a former math teacher, I’d suggest that the easiest way to get the bass clef down is not to try and visualize the relationship, but rather to simply play bass clef melodies until you don’t have any trouble recognizing the notes. Especially important to include melodies that go above and below the staffs, so you don’t have to mentally compute what note is three lines below the staff, etc.

19

No, they are not a step apart. Yes, G and F the notes are, but the clefs aren’t in any meaningful sense.

20

:slight_smile: ok, I thought I was on to something good.

I’ll be comfortable sight reading pretty soon. I’m practicing every day.