1.1 The 7-note gamut
The great majority of Western music makes use of a pitch system comprising twelve more or less equally spaced notes. Musicians began to consolidate the system in Italy during the second half of the sixteenth century (Dyson and Drabkin, 2001). The 12-note pitch system contains within it an older, 7-note pitch system that was first described by theorists of music in ancient Greece. (The 7- and 12-note gamuts represent only two of many pitch systems that exist in the world. Others will be discussed later in the course.)
The 7- and 12-note pitch systems are laid out in an especially clear way on Western keyboard instruments such as the piano, organ, harmonium and synthesiser, which produce sounds when musicians press keys down with their fingers. Keyboard instruments began to emerge in Western Europe in the medieval era and eventually adopted a pattern of black and white keys (Figure 1) that embeds both the 7- and 12-note pitch systems.
The 7-note pitch system organises the white keys – labelled with letters in Figure 1 – and the 12-note system organises the black and white keys together. In this way, the two gamuts are built right into the instrument.
When teaching Western music theory, it is typical to start with the 7-note pitch system, whose notes have the names A, B, C, D, E, F and G in English. On many keyboards, including the one shown in Figure 1, the 7-note sequence begins on C rather than A. In that figure, the keys move from left to right through two rotations of the pattern as follows:
C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C
The C on the leftmost side of the figure is the lowest pitch, and the C on the rightmost side is the highest.
A single iteration of the pattern, starting and ending on notes of the same name, is called an octave (so named because that span contains eight notes, at least in the 7-note Western pitch system). For example, the C in the middle of Figure 1 is an octave above the leftmost C, and it is an octave below the rightmost C (all three Cs are marked by asterisks in the image). Similarly, the two Ds, the two Es, the two Fs, and so on are all an octave apart.
Activity 2
Part 1
Watch Video 1, which explains how the white notes of the keyboard are organised and how to recognise them.
Part 2
Next, use a keyboard or an app to undertake the following exercises. They will help you internalise the note names as well as the geography of the keyboard. Check your progress against Figure 1 when necessary. If note names are new to you, come back to this exercise several times this week.
Note that step 5 instructs you to sing in a vocal range that is comfortable for you. As mentioned earlier, the sequence of notes (C, D, E etc.) is repeated in higher and lower octaves, which means that you can sing in a higher or lower octave than the one in which you play, depending on what best suits your vocal range.
Observe the regular patterning of the black keys on the keyboard, which occurs in groups of two and three. This pattern will help you orient yourself when you look for specific notes.
With the help of Figure 1, find a C in the middle of your keyboard and play it. The C will have a single white key immediately to the left of it and a group of two black keys immediately to the right of it.
Now find all the other Cs on the instrument and play them (the lowest and highest Cs on the keyboard may not possess the keys below or above them, respectively). All of the Cs sound like the same note, although some are higher and some lower.
Do the same thing with F, which is the note that’s easiest to confuse with C. There is again a single white key immediately to the left of F, but a group of three black keys immediately to the right of it. Find one F, and then all of the Fs on the keyboard.
Next, using the index finger of your right hand, play each of the white keys on your keyboard in succession, starting with the lowest (at the far left side of the keyboard) and continuing to the highest. Sing the name of each note as you play, using a vocal range that is comfortable for you.
Then reverse the pattern, starting with the highest key of your keyboard and moving downwards, playing with the index finger of your left hand. Practise this until you can sing the note names in a slow, steady rhythm without errors.
Finally, create a more complex sequence of movements on the keyboard and sing the note names as you move through them.
For example, you could start with the pattern ‘up two, down one’. Starting on C, you would play and sing C–E, D–F, E–G, F–A, G–B, A–C, B–D, C.
You could also try ‘down two, down two, up three’. Starting on C, you would play and sing C–A–F, B–G–E, A–F–D, G–E–C, F–D–B, E–C–A, D–B–G, C.
Discussion
Exercises such as those in number 7 can be a challenge if you are not yet used to note names, but they will help you learn them more quickly. Don’t worry if you aren’t able to say the names fluently right away – try repeating these exercises on different days to help internalise them.
OpenLearn - Introduction to music theory 2: pitch and notation 
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