Work out your intervals like a Pro!(Part 1)
In all our years of teaching experience, intervals are one of the most difficult topics for our ABRSM music theory exam students to understand. However, intervals are actually quite simple if you can understand the rules and patterns behind them. Regardless of how confusing they seem, they are logical and predictable, even though there are a few different ways to identify them.
In this first part, you will learn the basics of intervals. You will learn what intervals are, and the easiest methods to identify them.
What is an interval?
Before we talk about how to identify and notate intervals in your ABRSM music theory exams, it’s important to define what an interval is. In music theory, intervals are distances, specifically the distance between two notes that are next to each other (a melodic interval) or on top of one another (a harmonic interval). While single notes are the smallest unit of music we can identify and describe, intervals are the next biggest unit. They allow us to start thinking about the relationships between notes.
How big or small an interval is can be seen visually on sheet music, as well as understood using the numbers we use to describe them. As we illustrate and explain each of the methods we use with our students, hopefully you will build a complete understanding of how to identify intervals, whether it is for an ABRSM online music theory exam or analysing pieces that you’re going to perform.
The smallest intervals on the piano
The two intervals we’ll talk about here are the smallest intervals that exist on a keyboard or piano. These intervals are the semitone and tone. One semitone is the distance between one key and the next key up. (It doesn’t matter what colour the key is.)
If you start from a note and go up one semitone, and then go up one more semitone, the distance between your starting note and ending note will be a tone. A tone is two semitones. You can also tell this because a semitone is half of a tone, just like a semicircle is half of a circle.
Intervals by letters
Along with the next method we will discuss, this method is the simplest method for finding out the number of an interval. Note that this method, along with the next one, does not give you the type of an interval, only its number, so you will have to combine it with other methods to get the full name of an interval.
In the graphic, you can see our two notes. To find out the number of this interval, work out the two notes you’re dealing with, and then count every letter in between those two letters, including the starting and ending notes. Our two notes here are D and B, and all the letters we need to count between those two are D, E, F, G, A and B. This will give us the number of our interval, which in this case is a 6th, because there are six letters.
As stated before, this only gives us the number of an interval, and not whether it is minor, major, perfect, diminished or augmented.
Intervals by lines and spaces
One of the simplest ways to identify intervals in your ABRSM online music theory exams is to look at the vertical distance between the notes on the music. As long as you can tell whether a note is on a line or in a space, you will be able to figure out the number of the interval. However, please be aware that this does not tell you the type of interval, only the number – so you will have to use this method with the following method we will discuss.
We hope this blog has been useful in helping you identify simple intervals for your ABRSM Grade 1 and Grade 2 online music theory exams. In part 2, we will discuss the more complex interval types that are found in Grades 3, 4 and 5 exams, and how to recognise them.
See you in part 2!
Until next time!
🎵 Ashbea Music 🎵
P.S. If you need any more resources for learning how to recognise and practice intervals, here are some links to products that we use in our online music theory lessons with our students!
