Note naming conventions

[Johnny3143]

Hello, I wanted to ask a question about certain names of notes. I’m a beginner and I can read Bass clef well, but I often hear others saying things about “high F” “High C”, and I was wondering what these all meant. Or sometimes I see something like “start playing or tuning to C#”. And whenever these names are mentioned I just get confused. It seems to be something that is just learned, the names of specific notes, as I’ve never had these names explicitly explained to me. If someone could explain what all these notes are on the bass clef I’d appreciate it!

[Richard III]

Common question in other forums. Also one to likely get you into treble.

[davewerden]

That's a good question, actually, and we DO get confusing in how we talk. I'm especially guilty because I can never remember what a C2 is vs a C3 for example.

So in concert-pitch bass clef, this is how *I* talk about it:

I use the "absolute" word "low" to cover notes starting at 2nd line Bb and going down nearly an octave. When I say "low F" I mean the F just under the bass clef staff.

The next Bb (below the 2nd ledger line under that staff) begins the "pedal" range.

I use the "absolute" word "high" to cover the Bb an octave above the bass clef and the notes above it. So I would say a "high F" to mean the one above "high Bb."

I use the "relative" word "upper" as a convenience. For example, we have 2 F's between the range I designate as low and high, one on the 4th line and one on top of the 2nd ledger line above the staff. So I might refer to the latter as your "upper F".

That may not be a comprehensive list of my personal terms!

The last variation of Arban's Carnival of Venice, in my words, goes down to a low F, and concludes on the upper Eb. The flashy ending note many people play I call high Eb.

[Johnny3143]

Thanks for the explanation! It seems like one of those things I’ll just have to get a feeling for over time depending on who I’m playing with

[Magikarp]

Treble clef brits are even more fun.

Double pedals are the ones where there is a bottom note above - Double pedal D / E
Pedal E to F below
Bottom E to F below (bottom C being the note described as middle C on a piano score)
Middle E to F below
Top E to F below

Notes above top E deemed “super notes”. Like so many things, needlessly overused in order to impress the hard of thinking or bereft of taste.

Opinion is bitterly divided over whether top E should be renamed super E.

[Richard III]

I live in a treble world. Everything relates to the staff. Above the staff is high whatever and then doubles etc. Below the staff is the named note. Anything below F# is a pedal. Simple but even with that trumpet players so like to brag that it all get's screwy when talking about double and triple this or that.

[carbogast]

If there were a “lingua franca” for note naming, it would have to be the naming convention for the 88 key piano keyboard. One need only remember that C on the ledger line between the bass and treble staff, also known as “middle C”, is C4. Well, there is one other thing to remember... the order of names starts with C, not A. The order is: “C D E F G A B”.

Alternatively, most players can play a 4 octave set of B flats. Those notes are Bb1 to Bb4; not too hard to remember as a reference, and still only two things to remember.

I see this notation frequently because I work with a tuner and tone generator as part of my daily routine and it uses this convention.

[blastoff99]

What a great question!

I like carbogast's solution of identifying the four Bb most can play as a way to name which particular Bb is being played.

Back in the deep dim recesses of my brain I thought I knew that Yamaha and (somebody) refer to middle C as C3 rather than C4. Maybe this just applies to keyboards/MIDI applications, but still. The wikipedia article on Scientific Pitch Notation includes perhaps more info than the OP wants, but also does have a diagram of a piano keyboard with the C0 - C8 zones identified.

[carbogast]

The latest (Fall 2020) ITEA Journal has a pitch notation guide on page 10, using yet another scheme. It uses superscripts, which makes it difficult to show exactly; where you see a number in the mapping below, assume it's a superscript. Here is the mapping from the piano scheme:

C0 - B0 : CCC - BBB
C1 - B1 : CC - BB
C2 - B2 : C - B
C3 - B3 : c - b
C4 - B4 : c1 - b1
C5 - B5 : c2 - b2

[Magikarp]

The latest (Fall 2020) ITEA Journal has a pitch notation guide on page 10, using yet another scheme. It uses superscripts, which makes it difficult to show exactly; where you see a number in the mapping below, assume it's a superscript. Here is the mapping from the piano scheme:

C0 - B0 : CCC - BBB
C1 - B1 : CC - BB
C2 - B2 : C - B
C3 - B3 : c - b
C4 - B4 : c1 - b1
C5 - B5 : c2 - b2

The problem is that’s completely meaningless to us treblers. Everyone knows what pedal C, or it’s BC Bb equivalent is. Therefore it’s easy to extrapolate.

[tbonesullivan]

Yeah, it gets confusing, not least because if you ask a Trombone player what a "high F" is, that is likely not to be the same "high f" that a Tuba player is referring to, but that also depends on what kind of tuba they are playing.

Add into that transposing instruments and everything gets confused.

[TheJH]

For me it's the following:
'Pedal' refers to everything from pedal (or fundamental/1st harmonic) concert Bb/tc C down.
'Low [note]' refers to everything inbetween 2nd partial concert Bb and pedal Bb.
'Middle [note]' or 'normal/[nothing]' refers to everything inbetween tuning concert Bb and 'low' Bb.
'High [note]' is for everything inbetween tuning concert Bb and the Bb an octave above that (8th partial iirc?).
'Top [note]' refers to anything from that 8th partial concert Bb upwards.

[dsurkin]

I really like the precision of scientific notation - middle C is C4. The tuning note for a euphonium is Bb3 and for Bb trumpet is Bb4. That flashy ending note for "Carnival in Venice" is Eb5 for euphonium and Eb6 for cornet.

I acknowledge that this is not common terminology - high, upper, middle, low, and pedal are more descriptive terms - but they can lead to imprecision. After all, elementary school my top note was high F - F4 - yet by college that was just F, since I could reach D5 (in warmup only!) by then.