BazzLow
ENIT
Module 1 · Lesson 1

The musical alphabet

Know the seven natural note names, how they repeat, and what an octave is.

Before this lesson: 0.3 Reading the diagrams

Music has its own alphabet, and it is a short one. Learning it is the first step towards knowing every note on your bass.

Seven letters

Western music uses seven letter names for the natural notes: A B C D E F G. After G the series starts again from A. There is no H. This series of seven names is the musical alphabet.

Music books usually start the series from C: C D E F G A B. The reason is that the C major scale uses only the natural notes. This course does the same.

Solfège names

Italian, French, Spanish and other languages name the same notes with solfège names:

The seven natural notes: letter names and solfège names.
LetterCDEFGAB
SolfègeDoReMiFaSolLaSi

These are fixed names: Do always means C. On this site the English pages use letters and the Italian pages use solfège names.

The octave

When the alphabet starts again, the new note has the same name and sounds “the same, but higher”. That distance is an octave. The higher note vibrates exactly twice as fast as the lower one.

You can hear it on your bass right now. The open A string is A1, at 55 Hz. The A an octave higher, at the 12th fret, is A2, at 110 Hz.

Bass neck, frets 0–12The A string, frets 0–12, natural notes only: A 0, B 2, C 3, D 5, E 7, F 8, G 10, A 12. The two As, at fret 0 and fret 12, are an octave apart.A0123456789101112ABCDEFGA
The A string, frets 0–12, natural notes only: A 0, B 2, C 3, D 5, E 7, F 8, G 10, A 12. The two As, at fret 0 and fret 12, are an octave apart.

Numbering the octaves

Because the same names come back in every octave, you sometimes need to say which A you mean. Scientific pitch notation adds a number to the name:

  • the octave number changes at C: B3 is followed by C4;
  • middle C is C4;
  • A4 = 440 Hz is the standard tuning reference, called concert pitch;
  • the open E string of the bass is E1.

One name, several meanings

A letter name can mean different things depending on the context: a note, a chord, a scale or a key. “C” can be the note C, the C chord, the C major scale or the key of C. The lessons that introduce chords, scales and keys make the meaning clear each time.

What a note is made of

Every note has four qualities:

  • pitch: how high or low it is;
  • duration: how long it lasts;
  • loudness;
  • timbre: its tone colour.

Theory deals mostly with pitch and duration. This module is about pitch; duration is the subject of Module 2.

Try it

On the A string, play A (open), then A at fret 12. Listen: they are “the same note”, an octave apart. Then say the seven letter names going up from A, and then going down.

New terms

Tools

  • Bass Map: Arpeggios, circle of fifths, natural harmonics, modes and scales on the bass neck, in any key.