Lesson 8: Ties and Slurs

Reading sheet music is like reading a foreign language. There are rules and patterns that must be followed for the music to sound pleasing to the ear and so the musician can interpret the music correctly in order to perform it.

Before we get to the music, we must first know how to write it correctly, understand the notes, and know how to organize it.

To learn about how to correctly label a note, head to: http://nomusicbflat.blogspot.com/2012/09/what-is-c4.html

To learn about clefs, head to:
http://nomusicbflat.blogspot.com/2012/12/lesson-2-staffs-clefs-and-lines-oh-my.html

To learn about the major scale and whole and half steps, head to:
http://nomusicbflat.blogspot.com/2013/01/lesson-3-major-and-minor-scale.html

To learn about key signatures, head to:
http://nomusicbflat.blogspot.com/2013/01/lesson-4-key-signatures.html

To learn about notes and their rhythms in simple meter, head to:
http://nomusicbflat.blogspot.com/2013/01/lesson-5-notes-and-rhythm-part-i.html

To learn about simple time signatures, head to:
http://nomusicbflat.blogspot.com/2013/01/lesson-6-simple-time-signatures.html

To learn about rests in simple time, head to:
http://nomusicbflat.blogspot.com/2013/01/lesson-7-rests.html


Now we will learn about ties and slurs.

Ties are the addition of the lengths of two or more notes with the same pitch. Two tied quarter notes would be equal to one half note.

Q: Why not just write a half note instead of tying two quarter notes?
A: In situations where a composer wants to write a half note, but cannot write it because it violates music-writing rules, such as crossing a bar (a bar is a line that divides two measures), tying two quarter notes sounds like a half note, but doesn't violate any of the writing rules.

This is what a tie looks like in musical form:

A slur is a tie between two or more notes with different pitch. 

Slurs add a different texture to the timbre(quality of the sound) of the music. Instead of each note sounding separately, slurs sustain the sound through 2 or more notes without spacing. *



*this sound is much more noticeable when heard in an wind instrument (any instrument that needs exhaled breath to make sound. ex: trumpet, clarinet, tuba....)

This concludes our lesson for today.