Stackapella Open the app

Unit 3 · Reading time

Dotted notes

Learn how a dot makes a note half as long again, read a waltz in threes, a long-short pattern and a tie, then a four-bar line in time, read cold. Free.

Sing this lesson

Free in the app: sing one lesson of each course with no account; a free account opens the course unit by unit.

More in Reading time

Dotted notes

A dot makes a note half as long again. A dotted minim is three beats, a whole bar of a waltz.

Dotted minim. Three beats

In threes. Count 1, 2, 3

A tie. A curve joining two of the same note: sing it once and hold through

What you sing

  1. A waltz in threes: names faint.
  2. A dotted crotchet, then a short note: long, short. No names.
  3. Ode to Joy's second line: you know how it goes; read its long-short.

Challenge: A line in time

Four bars with long, short and quick notes, a long-short, and a rest. Look, count in, then read it in time. Hear it first is there if you need it; the top score is for reading it cold.

Find do. Then the longest notes

Spot the rests. They count too

Keep going. A slip? Catch the next beat

What you sing

  1. First its middle two bars, to warm up: names faint.
  2. The whole line, in time, no names.

Singing safely

Sing at an easy volume, in the middle of your range. Stop if anything tightens, scratches or hurts, and rest your voice.

Free tools by Stackapella

All of these are free, and so is every course.

Stackapella teaches you to sing harmony one part at a time, right in your browser.

Stackapella recording the alto part of Amazing Grace: each note is a bar with its name, and the one being sung says A little low, go up. Stackapella recording the alto part of Amazing Grace: each note is a bar with its name, and the one being sung says A little low, go up. Stackapella recording the alto part of Amazing Grace: each note is a bar with its name, and the one being sung says A little low, go up. Stackapella recording the alto part of Amazing Grace: each note is a bar with its name, and the one being sung says A little low, go up.
  • A guide sings your partHear your line over the others, slow it down, then take your turn.
  • Your notes light upEach note shows where you landed, and a hint when to go up or down.
  • Record every part yourselfStack your takes in time until you're the whole choir.
Start the beginner course Open the app How Stackapella works

More free tools

No account, no ads. Each one keeps working offline once you've opened it.

See all 17 tools