NoteCard

Thank you for taking the time to read about NoteCard, a Windows program that will turn you into a fluent note-reader. After a short period of brief regular sessions with NoteCard, you will be able to recognize and name the musical notes without conscious effort or the risk of error, just as you are able to recognize the letters of the alphabet now.

NoteCard comes in two versions, Free and Paid. You don’t have to decide immediately which one is right for you. The features of the Paid version can be enabled at will during a 10-day evaluation period. Whenever you buy NoteCard, whether before or after downloading, during the evaluation period or after it has elapsed, you will be fully protected by our unconditional 30-day money-back guarantee.

The important benefits of developing note-reading skill

We believe there are important payoffs to mastering this vital skill early in your musical career. One of the biggest is getting rid of an annoying distraction: the need to laboriously decipher notation when you are trying at the same time both to cope with technical challenges and to express musical feelings. A secure grasp of note-reading builds confidence, encourages the development of sight-reading, and helps make the most of other investments in music, such as lessons.

Developing a new skill invariably begins with a phase in which one’s full and active attention is needed — even to do it badly! Fortunately, one quickly progresses to a transitional period during which the task demands less and less of the conscious mind. Given time and persistence, this gives way in turn to a final state in which the skill is fully internalized — ‘automatic’ — and can be kept up with a minimum of ongoing effort. The entire focus of NoteCard, key to every feature and every detail, is to get users to that third stage of mastery as quickly as possible.

The entire focus of NoteCard is on helping users
quickly attain the third stage of mastery.

Obviously people can learn to read music without the help of NoteCard. That includes you too (and your kids). It will probably just take quite a bit of extra time that you could have spent on exploring new music, or developing your tone. If you are paying for music lessons, you will have to devote lesson time week after week to reviewing the notes rather than finding out what to do with them.

With NoteCard, in contrast, you can learn the notes on your own time, under the patient tutelage of the computer, and much more efficiently than by other means, including both physical and ordinary software-based flashcards. When you consider that the Paid version of NoteCard costs a good deal less than a single private music lesson at typical U.S. rates — and the Free version is even less than that! — we hope you will at least give NoteCard a try to see how well it works for you.

How NoteCard works

Using NoteCard is a simple three-step process. In Step 1, which is required only in your first NoteCard session (though available at any time), you tell NoteCard:

• Which on-screen input instrument you want to use to ‘play’ notes in NoteCard.
• Which range of notes (and the corresponding musical clef) you would like to work with.
• Whether to practise with sharps and flats — the musical notations that indicate a tone raised or lowered by a half-step.

For a full discussion of the NoteCard quiz options, including some recommendations for which options to choose in given learning situations, please see the quiz setup page in our online help reference.

Step 2 of using NoteCard is called Study Mode. NoteCard divides up the notes you have to learn into groups called ‘levels’, each with just two or three notes. In Study Mode, NoteCard shows you the notes at your current level, and gives you a chance to get to know them. You’ll learn the names of the notes, how to produce them on the input instrument, and where they appear on the staff — the familiar stack of five lines on which musical notes are written.

NoteCard shows you a series of randomly-selected notes from amongst all those you have studied, and asks you to identify them.

When you’re ready, press the green Start quiz button, launching Step 3, Quiz Mode. Now NoteCard shows you a series of randomly-selected notes from amongst all those you have studied, and asks you to identify them using your chosen input instrument. If you score well, identifying the notes accurately and swiftly, NoteCard may suggest after a quiz or two that you move up to the next level, adding its notes to your growing repertoire.

The rest of your NoteCard session will consist of Step 2 and Step 3 in alternation. After studying the current level’s notes (Step 2), you test your prowess in Quiz Mode (Step 3), following which you are returned to Study Mode (i.e. Step 2 again). There you can spend some more time reviewing your notes, or you can move to the next level and learn more, or you can skip studying and immediately begin another quiz. It’s up to you — NoteCard makes suggestions, but you are in complete control.

In the partial screen image above, the user Felix is studying at level 4 (out of 16 levels on the piano input instrument). Felix scored 73.9 in his last quiz — not bad, but he will be hoping to do even better in the next round, which will begin as soon as he clicks Start quiz. Note: Some features depicted in the image are available only in NoteCard’s Paid version.

NoteCard, especially in the Paid version, has many features beyond those described in the three steps, but this outline of operation is all you really need to know to get started.