Musical Alphabets In Order Of Pitch
Posted by Mike Schumacher
As we mentioned before, musical notes go up and down to create music. These are our major and minor scales. We also learned that there is an order to which these notes go in to create other melodies. This ordered sequence of notes is what is referred to as a pitch.
A natural place to start when learning about pitches is by studying the alphabetical scale. Starting with A, you will learn how to name each note within this set of eight sounds, and then move onto the next letter to identify the next highest or lower tone. By doing so, you have gone through all the letters in the alphabet!
This article will help you do just that – learn the names of the different pitched noises using the alphabet. But instead of starting at A, we will begin with I.
B is for Ball
A pitch that begins with an ascending second degree tone (B) is known as a rising second. This pitch moves down a half step, creating a lower position or tone. A song that uses this pattern is called a rising fourth chord.
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A popular example of this pattern is found in songs such as Adele’s Cold Hearted. The chords used are Gm7-B5-D4-F3.
In music theory, there are eight different tones, also referred to as notes. These include your middle note, tonic; your fifth, dominant; your third, subdominant; and your second, mediant. By using these four pitches as starting points, you can create many other chords. For instance, by moving the mediant up a half step, we get the perfect fifth, which is commonly used in songs.
Using those same chords mentioned before, you can create several other melodies.
C is for Computer
This year, music theory has an alphabet! And not only does it have an A through G letter to identify notes and chords, but you also get your computer at the end!
Computer music theory focuses more on how pitch works than what note or chord it is. You will learn about octaves (higher or lower), perfect fifths (the most common interval) and major/minor scales, which are just ways of organizing pitches.
Music theories’ alphabets start with the name “pitch class.” These include names like consonant, tritone, whole tone, and many others. After that, they organize those pitch classes by their position in the chromatic scale.
For example, the tritone is one half of a minor second, so it would be placed one third down from a B-major chord. Or the double flat five is a quarter step away from a D5 chord, making it one fourth up the chromatic ladder.
D is for Dog
Let’s look at some of the most famous dogs in music! The best way to learn the songs of any artist is by listening to their previous work, studying lyrics, and understanding how they relate to each other. For example, you can listen to Taylor Swift’s “I Should Have Known” and compare it with her song “The Way I Loved You” to see what she was trying to say in this case.
For her new song, she compares herself to someone who has hurt people before but now she wants to make up for it and show them that she cares. This person she refers to is the one whom she should have known better than anyone else. She wanted to be loved so she gave everyone opportunities to prove it, including you.
With these similarities, it is clear that both songs are about the same thing: A love interest who made your friend feel insecure or uncomfortable.
E is for Elephant
Let’s look at the letter E as an example of how music moves you, inspires you, and teaches you. The song “Elephant” by Ariana Grande is an excellent choice to learn about this concept. If you listen carefully, you will hear the beat, the melody, and the bass all work together to create the effect that elephants make sounds when they are moving or traveling.
When the elephant is standing still, none of these components matter- it is not until the animal starts walking that each one comes into play. As the rhythm kicks in, the feet move faster, creating a steady pace. Then the notes come, telling a story, establishing theme and tone. And finally, the bass drops down, setting the stage for more adventure.
This metaphor really works because even though there are no words, the lyrics tell a powerful tale. They inspire action and motivation, teaching you what it means to be passionate and encouraging you to do things that challenge you.
The song also makes you feel something– most likely passion. It can be a strong feeling, but it can also be sadness, inspiration, etc. There are many emotions that can be elicited from listening to this song.
F is for Frog
In music, pitch is how high or low a sound goes. Sounds that are higher pierce through the air longer than sounds that are lower, depending on what instrument you use to make them. For example, a violin has a very long neck so it can be extended up and away from your mouth more easily, thus creating a higher pitched note. A flute also has a long tube where air can move freely, making it easier to create notes of different lengths and heights.
In musical pitches, there is a range of frequencies we call a di-tone cluster. This means that two notes within this range go as one tone, with both being equally important components to the sound. An easy way to remember this is to think of the first letter of each word in the name Di-Tone Cluster. These are all related by their middle tone.
A common chord built out of these tones is called an octave circle. An octave circle contains eight chords, which makes sense because there are eight total notes in an octave. To play the octave circle major third – also known as the tri-chord – take the second note (the minor third) and raise it one full step, the fourth note.
G is for Golf
When it comes to music, there are several different pitches that make up what we call notes. A note is one of eight sounds or pitch classes — think di-doh or la-la-lou – like your standard A, B, C, D, etc.
The most familiar set of pitches are called the major chords, which have an extended tonal shape that includes the root (A in the A chord), the second degree tone (B in the A chord), and then both rising and falling thirds (C in the A chord). An example of this would be the song I mentioned earlier, “Happy Birthday”, where the root is A, the second degree tone is B, and the third is either F# or E, depending on the key.
But aside from those three main tones, other notes can be added onto the structure to create more fluid melodies and songs. These additional notes are referred to as harmonic sequences or arpeggios.
An arppegiois when certain notes are repeated or stepped down as others rise. For instance, if you take the first two notes of the A chord and step back one half step, creating an F sound, you get the flute tone. This is how many songs with flutes start off!
Another popular type of harmony is called parallel fifths. This happens when the fourth note of a scale becomes the fifth note of another lower octave.
H is for House
Let’s review! The first letter of the word house is actually “h”. A house is where you live, so the next letter is easily understood. If your house was burning down, what song would you want to sing? Probably something about saving all of your money because you can never be sure how much money you have!
The second letter of the word house is a silent “h”. This is an important part of the alphabet. When singing songs that contain music, like most people do, the musicians create notes by adding silence between sounds. That is why there are three parts to every musical note; pitch, intensity (or volume) and duration.
Silence is the poingtatelellefthookofnoisethatfallsbetweentwoothersounds. It is not very loud, but it still has sound, which makes it valuable. In fact, some say that it is more powerful than a normal voice tone. This is why musicians use silence frequently in their songs.
I learned this lesson when I was young, and my parents always said I should listen to music longer than five minutes to understand it. I found out later that this rule applies to any type of music!
Music theory teaches us that the length of each note depends on the length of the rest of the note or melody before it.
I is for Ice cream
Let’s look at some lyrics!
I want you to try something new this summer
Try something different, say hello to yourself
This is your life, live it as if it were yours
The time is now, there are no more excuses
You deserve to taste sweet happiness every day
So let’s learn the order of pitch in music!
The scale we use to describe sounds comes from an ancient Greek word that means “numbered” or “with numbers.” In musical theory, scales refer to patterns of notes used to create sound.
A natural way to begin practicing music is by learning the major scale — the most basic mode you can be aware of.
The major scale has three steps which go up then down then up again. This pattern of repeated rising and falling tones creates the feeling of upward movement that gives the tone its name.
Practicing with the major scale will teach you how to play many songs! Here are the names of each note in the major scale, their frequencies (how high or low they are) and the number of times to repeat the sequence to get one full measure– length song.

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