Note

In music, the term note has two primary meanings:

  1. A sign used in musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a sound;
  2. A pitched sound itself.

Notes are the "atoms" of much Western music: discretizations of musical phenomena that facilitate performance, comprehension, and analysis.

The term "note" can be used in both generic and specific senses: one might say either "the piece 'Happy Birthday to You' begins with two notes having the same pitch," or "the piece begins with two repetitions of the same note." In the former case, one uses "note" to refer to a specific musical event; in the latter, one uses the term to refer to a class of events sharing the same pitch.

Read more about Note:  Note Name, Written Notes, Note Frequency (hertz), History of Note Names

Famous quotes containing the word note:

    The note of the white-throated sparrow, a very inspiriting but almost wiry sound, was first heard in the morning, and with this all the woods rang. This was the prevailing bird in the northern part of Maine. The forest generally was alive with them at this season, and they were proportionally numerous and musical about Bangor. They evidently breed in that State.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    For do but note a wild and wanton herd
    Or race of youthful and unhandled colts
    Fetching mad bounds, bellowing and neighing loud,
    Which is the hot condition of their blood;
    If they but hear perchance a trumpet sound,
    Or any air of music touch their ears,
    You shall perceive them make a mutual stand,
    Their savage eyes turned to a modest gaze
    By the sweet power of music.
    William Shake{peare (1564–1616)

    His ear is so sensitively attuned to the bugle note of history that he is often deaf to the more raucous clamour of contemporary life.
    Aneurin Bevan (1897–1960)