Hi, I've been approached by a neighbour who's asked " Is there an easy way of learning to read music?" It turns out that he's learning to play the pipes and he is going to have a teacher. I think he's keen to get going and there's a bit of the wanting to run before he can walk syndrome. He has been sent away with a book and a Canter but is finding it to get going and the issue I think is with the understanding of the musical notation.... So apart from writing all the note names and note lengths out for him (which I can do) I suggested a basic theory book. He's not offended or going to feel patronised if it's one aimed at children. He has no prior knowledge of music at all so needs absolute basics.

I've done a search of musicroom.com and come up with this book:

More details here

And wondered if anyone knew it or had any better suggestions....

thanks in anticipation.

Maybe the ABRSM AB Guide to Music Theory might be of use. It is aimed at both adults and children alike and is very clear and easy to understand. It depends how far he wants to take music theory. There are many websites out there that could teach him the notes and some basic theory so it might be a good idea to check some of these out. Merely searching for "music theory" in Google brings up many results, it's just a case of sieving through them and finding what right for him.

Hope this helps

I know nothing about the pipes, in fact I'm not even sure whether you mean bagpipes, pan pipes or some other sort of pipes I assume they use notation rather than tab or something else...

Your neighbour might find one of the online sites helpful, eg 8notes.com There is probably much more theory there than he needs to learn at the moment, but perhaps you could tell him which lessons are the most important.

It's an American site so they talk about half-notes etc instead of minims etc but perhaps you could write him out the English equivalents. Not ideal I know, but it might help to get him going until he can get to somewhere like Banks and have a browse around to see what suits him.

Dawn - that book that you posted - I gave a couple as Christmas pressies a few years ago, and I seem to remember that I thought they were rather ok. We didn't actually work through them in lessons, they were for the pupil to explore at home, so I can't say I have actually USED them - bit definitely looked promising.

A rather simple book:
http://www.musicroom.com/se/ID_No/017967/details.html

Thankyou all for your comments.



Is that very basic H-C?? I get the feeling that even grade 1 might be too much and too advanced for this guy.

Skylark: Yes bagpipes (I asked the same question ) - but without the bag for now

Yeh, it is very basic, has things in it like spelling words with letters, ie, cabbage etc, its aimed at children mainly.

Yes, but it does cover the Grade One requirements. I am thinking about going back to this series for teaching because they are very reasonably priced. Another very basic pre-Grade One which is not too colourful are the Lelia Fletcher theory papers.

Thankyou all I've passed the recommendations on. I think he fancies thesimplicity of a children's book actually . His plan is now to go into Banks and ask for help and then browse what's available. I've started him of with the note names and a couple of ways of remembering them. e.g. FACE/SPACE etc... And Ive told him that once he gets started he can come back to me with any particular problems he has (BUT I know nothing about pipes!!!) - had a go on the Chanter today though Very differnt to clarinet/flute etc.