How to get Better at Reading Music

Have you ever seen a piece of sheet music and thought to yourself: “This might as well be rocket science”. I know I’ve been there! But as with any other skill, at first there’s always a rough initial period of getting good at it, which is the toughest hurdle to overcome. After a while though, I can say firsthand that it does get better. In fact, it gets fun and easier to use in your musical journey. This is a valuable skill that will help you in everything you do in music. This includes playing your instrument, composing, or even jamming with your friends. And you can do this with 30 minutes a day! Here’s 3 tips that helped me improve:

LEARN THE NOTES ON THE STAFF USING A PATTERN

This is like learning a language, you need to do it at least a little bit every day to start identifying patterns. It’s NOT going to be fun, and it’s going to be uncomfortable at first, but it will get better with time. The important thing is to start seeing the pattern in the notes. Remember, the lines (in G clef) are E-G-B-D-F. For these notes, you can memorize this sentence:

Every Good Boy Does Fine.

The notes in the spaces are F-A-C-E. You can use the word “FACE” to remember it. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what pattern you choose, but it’s helpful to use some sort of pattern. Feel free to come up with your own nemonic sentences to help you remember the notes. This will help you in the same way that patterns in grammar help you read sentences better.

USE A METRONOME

The Metronome is your best friend, and your most precise lie detector. The key here is to lock in with the metronome and to say the names of the notes in a steady time with the click of the metronome. The exercises should be steady 8th notes. The way you do it is you start at something like 60 bpm and try an exercise out. If you can do the exercise at least three times in a row without issues, then increase the bpm by 5. Rinse and Repeat. The idea is that the metronome is your “lie detector” in a way, so it’s important to hear yourself against it and make sure you’re always on the beat. Without the metronome, we are lying to ourselves about our own progress.

DEVELOP YOUR RHYTHM

Once you get good at reading notes on a paper, you should move on to being able to tap out rhythms. At first, use as a reference the tree of rhythmic figures and starting out in 4/4 and 3/4. The tree of rhythmic figures starts out with a whole note up top, all the way down to at least a 16th note. A whole note takes up the whole bar (or four measures), a half note takes up half of that (two beats in a 4/4 bar), and it keeps subdividing the previous value by half. When picking exercises start with simple rhythms that only use up to an 8th or 16th note. After that, up the complexity by using the metronome in the same way as the previous examples. If you REALLY want to get good at this, you can try two handed rhythm exercises (you’ll definitely impress your drummer!)

So, the big takeaway, is that getting good at reading music is a daily routine, not a sprint to the finish line. Two final things, I want to leave you with a question and a piece of advice: What piece of music do you feel is the hardest to read? Whichever piece it might be, remember to always use a metronome and have patience!