The reading courseLesson 8 of 13 · Level 4
4ths and 5ths
Read leaps of a 4th and a 5th by their shape, and count sixteenth notes.
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A 4th from a line to a space, a 5th from line to line, and a beat of sixteenths.
Wider leaps read by shape too. A 4th spans four letters, C up to F: from a line to a space, or a space to a line, with two notes left out between. A 5th spans five letters, C up to G: from a line to the line after next, or a space to the space after next.
In a five-finger position a 5th is thumb to little finger, the whole hand, and a 4th one finger short of it. Read the first note, see the shape, and let the hand open to it without naming the second.
A sixteenth note is a quarter of a beat: two flags, or two beams joining them, usually in fours. Count them 1 e and a, the four sixteenths of each beat, and keep the beat steady under them.
The guides that go further: How to read intervals by their shape and How to read rhythm: note values, rests, dots and ties.
Pieces this lesson opens
Pieces in the library that read as ready once you know everything up to this lesson, and didn't before it.
- Study for the Fifth FingerHeinrich Germerlevel 4
- The Virtuoso Pianist, No. 6Charles-Louis Hanonlevel 3
- Invention No. 13 in A minor, BWV 784Johann Sebastian Bachlevel 4