Another Newbie Question

[vwebster]

In class we're working with intervals in the key of G. But, I guess it's the topics of intervals that had been puzzling me. They seemed like exercises in nuttiness at first, but then my instructor mentioned that she doesn't really see the notes on the page as f a c for instance, but rather note placement.  

Is this why "learning" intervals are important?

For instance, I came home and looked at my hymnal and noticed that if I thought about it like that, the notes didn't seem nearly as intimidating.

I don't mean to keep asking little technical questions, but this can be frustrating at times, and it gets important to me to know why I need to learn it or how will it help my playing 5 years from now.

For those of you that read sheet music, are you really thinking note names on the page, or rather locations. I'm not sure if this question is making sense. As a beginner sheet music, as I move into ledger lines, I get frustrated trying to figure out what a note name is rather than where I'm moving to in relation to the previous notes I hit.

If you ignore this question, I'll understand.

[BBoy]

Not at all a "newbie" question, actually it is a very good question.

Recognizing intervals is ESSENTIAL if you are going to read music at all.

For instance, the interval of unaltered triads built on the root is always a third, right? So it is unnecessary to read all the notes, just the bottom one. One leger line below the staff in the treble cleff is C, so if I see thirds built on that I know that is a CEG chord.

Different internals also have different sounds. For instance, fourth intervals (often called "quartals") have a certain sound characteristic that enables them to be played as stacked or block chords.

It can get kinda confusing, but just continue to ask questions and play around with the keyboard. GOD will show you some awesome things.

Hope this helps some.

Be Blessed . . .

BBoy