From Neumes To Notes: A Brief History Of Western Music Notation

Music notation is really useful, and most musicians are so used to it we don't give it a second thought anymore, but, like, it's kinda weird, right? It's a bunch of dots and lines and somehow those represent sounds, and the way they're shaped and how we arrange them can let us communicate some incredibly complicated musical ideas. Which is awesome, but why these shapes? How did we get here? And why do older manuscripts look so weird, with their square notes and only four lines?

Huge thanks to our gold-level Patreon supporters:

Ron Jones
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And thanks as well to Henry Reich, José N., Logan Jones, Jdominioni, Jody, Eugene Bulkin, and Yan Han! Your support helps make 12tone even better!

Also, thanks to Jareth Arnold and Inés Dawson for proofreading the script to make sure this all makes sense hopefully!

[buehner]

Had some high school students visit the music library where I work yesterday, after seeing a real medieval music manuscript they were super interested in how notes went from squiggles to common practice. Being able to send this video to their orchestra conductor to share with them was perfection itself. Thank you!!

[kathrynmullen]

This video is amazing! Teaching students in Ireland about Salve Regina as it is on their music course and this helps explain neumes to them so well. Younger kids love the pictures

[LoverofLiszt]

3:34 - That´s wrong/a mistake. A dot lengthens a note by half it´s value, not a quarter.

[BlobVanDam]

Another great video, and an interesting bit of music history. Bonus points for the Journey reference too. :D

[sophiaperez]

I think it's amazing that before notes were even being used, people were able to make beautiful music just by looking at some lines or dots above syllables in a word.

[whataboutthis...]

Exciting to learn of the pneumes & "heightened neumes!" I play guitar, sing & cover songs, uploading to YT channels. They're songs I've known & liked but never played & sang, or at least not perfectly. By "perfectly, " I mean as near to the original as I can reasonably perform them, including getting the notes & timing down.

To remind myself to shift my voice up or down as I sing a note to match the original, I've been writing mostly short, horizontal marks above the lyrics, keeping their height above the lyrics consistent with other marks above other lyrics for the same note.

I have markings also, for holding a note extra long and more. I evolved to employing the use of those to help me keep my voice aligned; and it's helped me. To learn some of this is a similar practice to "heightened neumes, " is validating! Thank You for the interesting history. 😊👍🖒

[Anita-pjjx]

I'm watching this video for a research project because apparently my band teacher likes to read them so he's making us do this for homework. This really helped, thanks 👍

[lilycalico]

THANK YOU! I'm going to write a paper on this (I'm not gonna plagiarize!) and the sources you put in the description are SUPER helpful! :D

[margaretx]

This is absolutely brilliant. I've just finished a course on the history of musical notation which took weeks
but you summed it all up so beautifully. Would you consider doing something on white mensural notation??

[frankkauffman]

Always love your videos, but thank Byrdle for helping me find this one.

[LocaCrazyFolle]

I imagine this is great recap for someone who already knows the history of music. For anybody else it’s actually quiteconfusing.

[MisterFunnyboy]

I just failed a one question quiz, because I answered 9th century for "Which century was musical notation first developed?" Apparently, my professor thinks it's the 10th century.

[richardwagon]

Exactly how many random youtube videos about music theory and history can I watch before I actually sit down and practice my piano today?

[hazelstorer]

I was kinda hoping for a Christmas themed video like you did with the Halloween one. But i'm still loving the videos!

[nikozalive]

don't know how to end a video? BAM gummy bears

i love it

[miguelacevedo]

great vid. please zoom in the camera closer to the page. everything looks so small

[NMranchhand]

Pretty darn good, but skips a bit when we jump to the use of C and F without explaining how letters came into it.

[TheLivingHeiromartyr]

Good stuff! Small comment; they had accidentals in perotin's time.

[Nathan-wmyb]

In the video you said that there was links to papers going more in depth in the description, but there isn't. Do you still have those links?

[DrSmithopuss]

Small question, (sort of irrelevant) how come in the intro you're right handed but in the main video you're left? love the videos! sort of addicted at the minute :D