Estimated reading time 3 minutes
Table of Contents
Introduction
Do you have basic sight singing down, but want more than seven notes? This post shows you how to sing sharps. Read more to learn about sight singing chromatic shape notes.
In the last shape note post, we sang the first half of the chorus from You’re a Grand Old Flag. In this post, we will sing the second half of the chorus.
This article uses musical terms. For definitions, see the Glossary at the end of the post.
The Sharps-Exercise for Sight Singing Chromatic Shape Notes
Mobile users: for best results reading the music, tilt your screen 90o to the right.
C Moveable Do Chromatic Shape Notes:
Sing the solfege syllables above each line as you sight sing the chromatic shape notes. The sing-along song will help get the sound of the sharps in your ear.
Notice that Do gets turned into Dee by adding a sharp sign (the hashtag) before the wedge-shaped note. Then, the wedge-shaped note turns back into Do by adding a natural sign.
By extension, any note can turn into a sharp syllable when the sharp sign gets placed before the note:
- Do turns into Dee
- Re turns into Ree
- Fa turns into Fee
- Sol turns into See
- La turns into Lee
Likewise, any sharp can turn back to the usual syllable by adding a natural sign.
If you need a tutorial on shape notes read:
For a rhythmic syllables review:
The sharps-exercise above starts with Do on the note C. Since Do is moveable to any note as the starting point, the chromatic scale can begin on any note.
Therefore, the key of G major has Do starting on the note G while G# has the solfege syllable Dee. You can see this happening in the example You’re a Grand Old Flag.
Sight Singing Chromatic Shape Notes: You’re a Grand Old Flag
You’re a Grand Old Flag:
- First, sing the rhythmic syllables above the notes in the score. Then, sing the solfege syllables below the notes. Make sure you breathe at the breath mark.
- On the track, listen to the distance between the notes as this helps develop good melodic tuning skills. I have chosen the tuning for the sound tracks that will help improve your melodic pitch.
- The song tracks use synthetic voices rather than actual voices. Research has shown that this will help with the ability to identify and produce absolute pitch information. For more information, read Why Use a Synth Voice Instead of Real Voices.
- After you have tried sight singing the chromatic shape notes, you can sing all of the chorus from You’re a Grand Old Flag. The video provides the words (the women in the left speaker have the melody).
You're a Grand Old Flag Video
Sight Singing Chromatic Shape Notes: Quiz
- When ready, try singing the quiz. Again, first sing the Kodaly rhythmic syllables, then sight sing the chromatic shape notes.
- This quiz has harder intervals than past quizzes. If needed, go back to the sharps-exercise and You’re a Grand Old Flag until you can sing the intervals solidly. Then, try the quiz again.
Concluding Thoughts for Sight Singing Chromatic Shape Notes
- Developing the skill to sight sing chromatic shape notes will greatly expand the types of melodies you can read. Shape notes and Kodaly rhythmic syllables have been statistically proven to aid in reading notes and rhythms respectively.
- They remain important multisensory teaching tools for music teachers and can help any student. However, ADD, LD, ASD, and special needs singers will particularly need both shape notes and the rhythmic syllables as entry points for reading music. In the next shape note post we will deal with flat note solfege syllables.
© 2021 Geoffrey Keith
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Glossary
Once Sheet Music is All Digital, Why Not Always Colour-Code Notes?
“Once sheet music is all digital, why not always colour-code notes?” Since most sheet music can now come in digital format, will there be any good reason not to color code the notes all the time? I’ve long advocated using color coding for helping special needs students to learn music from sheet music. However, the opening suggestion (by a person on social media) goes one step further. It proposes making a permanent change to how people read sheet music. Click to find out the arguments for and against adopting universal color coded music notation. Estimated reading time 2 minutes.
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How to Use Color Coded Note Head Extenders for LD and Special Needs Rhythm Learning
Have you ever had students who don’t hold their notes long enough? This remains a very common problem with all students, not just with ADD, LD, and special needs students. Read more to find out how color coded note head extenders can help your students to read rhythm better. Estimated reading time 2 minutes.
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What’s the Difference Between Practice and Play on an Instrument?
Have you ever wondered what’s the difference between practicing and playing? Practicing will be a important part of your growth as a musician. According to the “New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians,” studies have found that the best pianists and violinists needed 10,000 hours of practice to master their instruments. Not that you need 10,000 hours to start playing decently, but the master musicians do show us the importance of practicing. So, do practicing and playing get the same results? Read more to learn, “What's the difference between practice and play on an instrument?” Estimated reading time 2 minutes.
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Improvising vs Composing Music
Do you get confused about the ways improvisation and composition differ? Would you like to be better at both? Then, you’ve found the right post. Click to learn about improvising vs composing music. Estimated reading time 4 minutes.
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