Messages with the tag: music

Posts relating to music but not directly to NoteCard or our other products.

December 13, 2016

NoteCard 3.4.5.1

Categories: Announcements — Tags: , ,

It’s been a little while since our last NoteCard release, if you were keeping track, but today marks the end of the NoteCard 3.3 era. Will any of us ever know again the heady excitement and limitless optimism of that special time?

NoteCard 3.4 brings a new “input instrument” (an on-screen control for entering notes as though on an actual musical instrument) to both the Free and the Paid modes of operation. The instrument we’ve added is a 19-fret variant on our Fretboard instrument, which until now came with either 7 frets, for novices, or 12 frets, which is appropriate for intermediate players, giving them a full octave range on each string. From a fingering point of view, venturing even further up the neck to the 13th fret and beyond simply repeats the pattern of notes from 12 frets lower. This fact makes it much easier to learn how to play high up the neck by ear or by a memorized finger pattern.

It does not help as much with reading, however, so some NoteCard users have requested a further-extended Fretboard. The new 19-fret version covers the entire effective range of an ordinary acoustic guitar (electrics typically go to 24 frets or so). With more notes, of course, comes a longer learning curve. NoteCard can teach you the narrow range of the 7-fret guitar in a mere 14 stages (or “quiz levels”), while the 12-fret guitar takes 23 stages to master. The new 19-fret guitar takes fully 35 stages, so we think it may be of interest mainly to advanced, ambitious, audacious or addle-pated musicians. Those who do take it on, however, will soon find that their ability to read music on all parts of the guitar is improving greatly.

N.B. If you already own NoteCard and have automatic updates turned on, you will receive this update whle using the program, and don’t need to download it here.

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November 16, 2011

The Neapolitan

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

All good things must come to an end. So must all long and arduous ordeals, and it’s a good thing. Today’s question is the one that completes our new music theory quiz for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com, and frankly it’s kind of a tough one. But if you don’t know the answer, what better way to hone your intuition than by forging blindly into:

Ice-cream is not the answer

To a classical musician, who or what is ‘The Neapolitan’?

  1. A celebrated composer, Domenico Scarlatti, born in Naples
  2. A concert hall in Vienna where Mozart’s greatest works were introduced
  3. A distinctive-sounding chord, the ‘Neapolitan sixth’
  4. An opera of Gioachino Rossini, his last, tragically incomplete

Answer

November 13, 2011

Rhythm fascination

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

Today we come to the second-last question in the music theory quiz we’re putting together for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. Looking at the meter — the rhythmic pulse — of some common musical forms, we ask:

Who’s got the time?

Which of the following musical forms typically uses six-eight rhythm?

  1. A Baroque minuet
  2. A Celtic jig
  3. A Scott Joplin piano rag
  4. A Sousa march

Answer

November 9, 2011

Guido

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

Today’s question is the eighth of the 10-question music theory quiz that’s currently under construction for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. We cast our minds back to the Italian city-state of Arezzo just about a millennium ago, and ask:

What did Guido do?

Guido d’Arezzo was an 11th-century Benedictine monk who is celebrated for an important contribution to the history of music. What did he do?

  1. Invented the clarinet
  2. Revolutionized musical notation
  3. Was the first to combine voice and instruments in the same work
  4. Wrote the melody that became the song Greensleeves

Answer

The microtone

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

Today’s question is the seventh in a 10-question music theory quiz for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. If you have a taste for slightly out-of-the-way musical jargon, you may already know the answer to:

What is a microtone?

Which of the following definitions most accurately captures the meaning of the word ‘microtone’?

  1. A separation of pitch smaller than a semitone
  2. A short musical work stating a single melodic idea
  3. A sound too brief or too quiet to register fully with an audience
  4. A special microphone for recording tones

Answer

November 6, 2011

An instrument for Erik

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

Carrying on today with question 6 of what will ultimately be a 10-question music theory quiz for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com, we look at a delightful and enigmatic French composer, and ask:

What do you play Satie on?

The French composer Erik Satie (1866-1925) is well-known for the humorous and eccentric style of many of his compositions, which are chiefly for which instrument?

  1. Glockenspiel
  2. Piano
  3. Violin
  4. Voice

Answer

November 4, 2011

The concertmaster

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

We finish the week half-way through our 10-question music theory quiz, now in preparation for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. Unlike some of the more technical questions in this quiz, today’s should fall within the general knowledge of many non-musicians, as we enquire about:

The concertmaster’s instrument

In every symphony orchestra there is one musician, second in rank only to the conductor, known as the concertmaster (or, in England, the leader). The concertmaster rank always belongs to the orchestra’s principal player of a particular instrument. Which one?

  1. Clarinet
  2. Oboe
  3. Piano
  4. Violin

Answer

November 2, 2011

The beautiful tongue

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

Question 4 in our developing TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com music theory quiz concerns the use of the Italian language for expression markings and other musical terms. Fats Waller’s arrangement of the jazz standard Stardust is said to feature the tongue-in-cheek instruction tempo di sturb de neighbors, but our tone is a little more serious as we discuss:

Dying away

The Italian language has given us a widely-used lexicon for indicating expression in music. For example, the usual terms for ‘soft’ and ‘loud’ are the Italian words piano and forte. Sometimes Italian offers almost too much choice. The directions espirando, morendo and perdendosi all roughly mean ‘dying away’ — slowing down and fading out. Three of the words below also mean ‘dying away’. Which one is the exception?

  1. Calando
  2. Incalzando
  3. Mancando
  4. Smorzando

Answer

November 1, 2011

The grandest staff

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

After yesterday’s excursion to the 1950s and Big Blue, now we’re back to facing the music quiz that’s currently in preparation for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. Today’s question, the third in the set, also includes a little physics. Specifically, we want to know:

How many lines can you hear?

An ordinary 5-line musical staff covers a musical interval of one octave and two notes (counting from its bottom line to the space just above, inclusive). How many lines would be required if the staff were to cover the entire range of human hearing (roughly 20 through 20,000 vibrations per second)?

  1. 36
  2. 54
  3. 80
  4. 128

Answer

October 31, 2011

Good old Bach

Categories: Fun — Tags: , , ,

Today we continue with the second question of our slowly ripening music quiz for TriviaPark.com, which is starting to look as though it will come out on the challenging side, particularly if you don’t happen to be some kind of music student. Don’t worry, however, because…

We’ve got your Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), the composer one generally means when speaking of ‘Bach’ without qualification, was but the most outstanding member of an exceptionally musical family. Indeed, several of the other Bachs retain some renown as composers to this day. All four listed here are in that category. Three are J.S. Bach’s own sons. The fourth was a grandson. Which?

  1. Johann Christian Bach
  2. Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach
  3. Wilhelm Friedemann Bach
  4. Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst Bach

Answer

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