In music notation, all 12 notes are laid out in the chromatic scale pattern. So it’s pretty easy to pick apart. The only thing is … this pattern looks different than how we’re used to seeing it on a piano keyboard. You see, on a piano, the chromatic scale is laid out from left to right—with lower sounding notes on the left, and higher sounding notes on the right.

We already know this arrangement makes sense when you actually play the instrument … so that your left hand hits the lower notes, while your right hand hits the higher notes. But can you imagine using a keyboard to illustrate something like a melody or song? On paper, this would be hard. Because with all the different notes moving up and down at different speeds, you’d have to show not only which notes to play (pitch), but also how long to play them (duration).

So to work around this problem, musicians came up with a clever way of illustrating both pitch and duration in music notation. The idea behind it is simple. Instead of showing pitch from left to right (like on a keyboard), music notation turns everything on its head—so that low notes are at the bottom … while high notes are at the top.

In this way, duration (or time) can also be shown—moving from left to right. So together, pitch and duration form a simple cross … with pitch moving up and down, and duration moving from left to right.

Seriously … this is all music notation is: a basic keyboard pattern turned on its side. And personally, if I’d known about this when I first learned notation, life would have been so much easier! In fact, it’s so easy, it makes me want to cry. But before we go ahead and start playing melodies, let’s look a little closer at how music notation is designed … starting with the “grand staff.”