How to read music - Tim Hansen

如何读音乐 - Tim Hansen

翻译人员: Catherine Gu 校对人员: Geoff Chen

看电影或戏剧时，

我们知道演员

大概是看剧本知道台词，

剧本基本上告诉演员

说什么

和何时说。

When we watch a film or a play,

we know that the actors

一段乐谱和剧本的作用

完全相同。

probably learned their lines from a script,

很基本地讲，

which essentially tells them what to say and when to say it.

乐谱告诉演奏者演奏什么

和什么时候演奏。

A piece of written music operates on exactly the same principle.

从美学的角度来讲，

In a very basic sense,

比方说，贝多芬和

it tells a performer what to play and when to play it.

Justin Bieber 完全不同，

但两位创作者都用了

同样的基本构架来创作音乐：

Aesthetically speaking, there's a world of difference

音符。

between, say, Beethoven and Justin Bieber,

尽管结果

会听起来相当复杂，

但音符背后的逻辑

but both artists have used

the same building blocks to create their music:

实际上是非常简单的。

我们来看一下

notes.

音乐符号的基本元素

And although the end result can sound quite complicated,

和它们是如何互动 来创作音乐作品的。

the logic behind musical notes is actually pretty straightforward.

音符写在五条平行线上

Let's take a look

at the foundational elements to music notation

横贯整页。

and how they interact to create a work of art.

这五条线叫谱线，

谱线在两个轴之间：

Music is written on five parallel lines that go across the page.

上下

和左右。

These five lines are called a staff,

上下轴告诉演奏者

and a staff operates on two axes:

音高

或弹哪那个音符，

左右轴告诉演奏者

up and down

and left to right.

音符的节奏

The up-and-down axis tells the performer

或何时弹。

the pitch of the note or what note to play,

让我们从音高开始。

为帮我们搞清楚， 我们打算用钢琴来说明，

and the left-to-right axis

但这个系统用差不多

tells the performer the rhythm of the note

你能想到的任何乐器都适用。

or when to play it.

根据西方的音乐传统，

Let's start with pitch.

To help us out, we're going to use a piano,

音高是按前七个

字母来命名的。

but this system works for pretty much any instrument you can think of.

A,

B,

C,

D,

E,

F,

In the Western music tradition,

和G。

pitches are named after the first seven letters of the alphabet,

此后，就循环：

A，

B，

C，

D，

E，

A, B, C,

F，

G，

A，

B，

D, E, F, and G.

C，

D，

E，

F，

G，

等等。

但这些音高是怎样取名的呢？

After that, the cycle repeats itself:

例如，如果弹 F，

A, B, C, D, E, F, G,

A, B, C, D, E, F, G,

接着再弹一个 F，

and so on.

这个 F 用钢琴弹得高点儿或低点儿，

But how do these pitches get their names?

你会注意到他们听上去比较相似，

比方说 B。

Well, for example, if you played an F

再看五线谱，

and then played another F

每条线和两条线之间的空间

higher or lower on the piano,

you'd notice that they sound pretty similar

代表一个音高。

compared to, say, a B.

如果我们在其中的一条线上

Going back to the staff,

或空间里放上一个音符，

every line and every space between two lines

我们在告诉演奏者弹哪个音高。

represents a separate pitch.

五线谱上音符放的位置越高，

这个音就越高。

If we put a note on one of these lines or one of these spaces,

但显然有很多很多的音，

we're telling a performer to play that pitch.

远不止这几条线 和空间带给我们的几个音。

The higher up on the staff a note is placed,

例如，三角钢琴可以弹

the higher the pitch.

88 个不同的音。

But there are obviously many, many more pitches

因此我们怎么样把这 88 个音符 压缩到五线谱上呢？

than the nine that these lines and spaces gives us.

我们用叫谱号的东西。

A grand piano, for example,

can play 88 separate notes.

谱号的样子看起来怪怪的，

放在五线谱的开始，

So how do we condense 88 notes onto a single staff?

作用类似于一个参考点，

告诉你某条线或空间

We use something called a clef,

对应你乐器上的某个音符。

a weird-looking figure placed at the beginning of the staff,

如果我们想弹不在五线谱上的音符，

which acts like a reference point,

有点像作弊，额外多划了点儿线，

telling you that a particular line or space

叫加线

corresponds to a specific note on your instrument.

加的音符写在加线上。

If we want to play notes that aren't on the staff,

如果我们非得画这么多加线，

we kind of cheat and draw extra little lines

导致线混乱了，

我们需要换成不同的谱号。

called ledger lines

and place the notes on them.

至于让演奏者何时弹这些音符，

If we have to draw so many ledger lines that it gets confusing,

两个要素控制这一点：

then we need to change to a different clef.

节拍

和节奏。

音乐的节拍

As for telling a performer when to play the notes,

单独有点乏味。

two main elements control this:

听起来像这样：

the beat and the rhythm.

The beat of a piece of music is,

注意节拍不变，

只是相当快乐地前进着。

by itself, kind of boring.

可以慢点儿，

It sounds like this.

(Ticking)

或快点儿，

Notice that it doesn't change,

或你想弹成什么样，真的。

it just plugs along quite happily.

关键是就像钟表上的秒针

It can go slow

把一分钟分成六十秒，

or fast

每秒之间的时间长短是一样的，

or whatever you like, really.

The point is that just like the second hand on a clock

节拍把音乐分成

小的时间间隔

divides one minute into sixty seconds,

都是等长的

with each second just as long as every other second,

节拍。

以一个稳定的节拍为基础，

the beat divides a piece of music

我们可以开始把节奏加到音高上，

into little fragments of time that are all the same length:

那才是音乐真正开始。

beats.

这是个四分音符。

With a steady beat as a foundation,

它是最基本的节奏单位，

we can add rhythm to our pitches,

值一拍。

and that's when music really starts to happen.

这是个半分音符，值两拍。

This is a quarter note.

这个全音符值四拍，

It's the most basic unit of rhythm,

这些小家伙是八分音符，

and it's worth one beat.

每一个值半拍。

This is a half note, and it's worth two beats.

“好极了” 你说，“那是什么意思？”

This whole note here is worth four beats,

你可能注意到了

横贯五线谱长度的东西，

and these little guys are eighth notes,

有些短线把它分成小部分。

worth half a beat each.

"Great," you say, "what does that mean?"

这些是小节线，

我们把每一部分作为一个小节。

You might have noticed that across the length of a staff,

音乐之初，

there are little lines dividing it into small sections.

就在谱号之后，

是叫做拍号的东西，

These are bar lines

and we refer to each section as a bar.

告诉演奏者每一小节有几拍。

At the beginning of a piece of music,

这个说的是每小节两拍，

just after the clef,

is something called the time signature,

这个说的是有三拍，

这个四拍，

which tells a performer how many beats are in each bar.

等等。

底部的数字告诉我们什么音符

This says there are two beats in each bar,

将被用作这个节拍的基本单位。

this says there are three,

1 对应一个全音符，

this one four, and so on.

2 对应一个半音符，

The bottom number tells us what kind of note

4 对应一个四分音符，

is to be used as the basic unit for the beat.

8 对应一个 1/8 音符，

等等。

因此这里这个拍号

One corresponds to a whole note,

告诉我们每小节有四个四分音符，

two to a half note,

four to a quarter note,

1，

2，

and eight to an eighth note, and so on.

3，

4；

1，

2，

3，

So this time signature here

4，

等等。

但像我前面说的那样，

tells us that there are four quarter notes in each bar,

如果我们只按这个节拍，

有点儿令人乏味，

one, two, three, four;

所以我们用一些不同节奏的

one, two, three, four,

四分音符来代替。

and so on.

注意尽管每小结的

But like I said before,

if we just stick to the beat,

音符数量已改变，

it gets kind of boring,

但每小节的节拍总数没变。

so we'll replace some quarter notes with different rhythms.

因此我们的音乐创作听上去怎么样？

Notice that even though the number of notes

in each bar has changed,

the total number of beats in each bar hasn't.

听上去还可以，但可能有点简单，是吧？

So, what does our musical creation sound like?

让我们加上另一种乐器

有它自己的音高和节奏。

(Music)

现在它听上去像音乐了。

Eh, sounds okay, but maybe a bit thin, right?

当然，这需要一些练习

Let's add another instrument with its own pitch and rhythm.

来习惯快速读它

在乐器上演奏我们看到的东西，

Now it's sounding like music.

但是，花点时间和耐心，

你会是下一个贝多芬

Sure, it takes some practice to get used to reading it quickly

或

Justin Bieber。

and playing what we see on our instrument,

but, with a bit of time and patience,

you could be the next Beethoven

or Justin Bieber.