Note Values & Rests
A note's shape says how long it lasts. Whole, half, quarter, eighth β each one is half the last, and a dot adds half again.
Builds on: 1.1 The Staff & Clefs
Halving all the way down
The staff shows which note; the noteβs shape shows how long. The system is a family of halvings. A whole note (a hollow oval, no stem) lasts four beats in the most common meter. A half note (hollow, with a stem) lasts two. A quarter note (filled, with a stem) lasts one beat β the pulse you tap your foot to. An eighth note adds a flag to the stem and lasts half a beat; a sixteenth adds a second flag and lasts a quarter of a beat. When several eighths or sixteenths sit side by side, their flags are joined into beams β same length, tidier page.
Dots and ties: values in between
Halving only gives powers of two, so two devices fill the gaps. A dot after a note adds half its value: a dotted half is 2 + 1 = 3 beats, a dotted quarter is 1 + Β½ = 1Β½ beats, a dotted eighth is ΒΎ of a beat. A tie β a curved line joining two notes of the same pitch β glues them into one sound lasting the sum: a quarter tied to an eighth is also 1Β½ beats. Ties are how a note crosses a bar line, which a single note is not allowed to do.
Rests: silence with a length
Every value has a matching rest, and rests count exactly like notes: a whole rest hangs below the fourth line (4 beats), a half rest sits on the third line (2), a quarter rest is the zigzag squiggle (1), an eighth rest a slanted stroke with one flag (Β½), a sixteenth with two flags (ΒΌ). Silence is part of the rhythm, not a gap in it β a bar of 4/4 must add up to four beats whether they are sounded or not.
Reading rhythm is adding fractions on the fly: a dotted quarter (1Β½) plus an eighth (Β½) makes 2; two sixteenths and an eighth make one beat. Musicians do this by counting: β1 e & aβ splits each beat into four sixteenths, so a note on the β&β lands halfway through the beat. The lab writes those syllables under the grid.
A quarter note has no fixed length in seconds β it lasts one beat, and the tempo says how fast beats go. At 60 BPM a beat is one second; at 120 BPM half a second, so a whole note lasts two seconds. The next lesson makes tempo precise.
The lab is a one-bar sequencer: sixteen slots, one for each sixteenth. Place note values, hear the bar loop, and watch the beats add up (or fail to).
πΌ Lab β Rhythm Sequencer
One bar of 4/4 as sixteen sixteenth-note slots. Pick a value, click a slot to place it (it takes up the right number of slots), click a note to remove it, then press βΆ to hear the bar loop with the metronome.
- Fill the bar with four quarters, then replace the third with two eighths β same length, twice the notes.
- Place a dotted half note: it swallows twelve slots, leaving room for exactly one quarter.
- Try a note on the β&β of beat 2 with nothing on the beat itself β that is syncopation, a taste of Unit 6.
Work it by hand β 0 / 3
No multiple choice here: compute the value and type it. Suffixes like 2.5k or 20m are understood; answers within Β±2% count.