Guide
Using Read the Staff
Read the Staff is a small set of focused tools for practicing music reading. They're organised into a Practice Library by skill — pick a skill, pick a lesson, and start. Here's how input works and what each tool does.
Start in the library
The Practice Library is the front door. Activities are grouped by the skills that build reading fluency — note reading, rhythm, patterns & shapes, looking ahead, keeping going, and keyboard feel. Each skill is a sequence of lessons: a suggested order, but nothing is locked or auto-advanced, so jump in wherever you like. The reading tracks also offer a Standard / Challenge / Advanced level that turns the whole track up. You can also open the Sight-Reading or Rhythm tool directly to free-play any setup.
Getting sound & input
The reading tools listen for what you play; the rhythm tool listens for taps.
- Computer keyboard. The middle row plays notes (a GarageBand-style mapping). Press Z / X to shift down / up an octave, and hold Space as a sustain pedal. In the Rhythm trainer, Space is your tap.
- MIDI keyboard. Plug in before or after loading — the status reads “MIDI · connected” when it's found. No setup needed. (The Keyboard Feel activities need MIDI — the on-screen piano is hidden so you find the keys by feel.)
- On-screen piano. Tap or click the keys; slide across them to glissando, and press several at once for a chord.
- Audio. A sampled grand piano loads in the background; the first key press starts the audio engine. Per-tool levels live in the mixer (Overall / Instrument / Metronome).
On iPad & iPhone
The on-screen keyboard and computer-keyboard input work in Safari. MIDI does not, though — Apple has never shipped the Web MIDI API in Safari, and every iOS/iPadOS browser is required to use Safari's engine, so none of them support it. To use a hardware MIDI keyboard on iPad, open the site in a Web-MIDI-enabling browser app such as MIDIWeb, which adds MIDI support that web apps can see. Install it, then open this page inside it.
The tools
- Read & play notes (the Sight-Reading trainer) — a stream of notes and chords laid out as real sheet music. Play the highlighted note (or chord) and it advances. Everything is configurable: staff (treble / bass / grand), key, what's generated (single notes, landmarks, melodies, recurring motifs, triads, sevenths, progressions, bass + chord), note range across the whole piano (A0–C8), density, inversions, meter (4/4 or 3/4), and temporary key / accidental / staff changes drawn as real notation.
- Tap rhythms (the Rhythm trainer) — read rhythm notation and tap it in time, scored on timing accuracy. Count-in, metronome, adjustable tempo and note values (whole through sixteenths, dotted, triplets, syncopation), one or two hands, with fade-able count labels (“1 e + a”). It plays through once, then stops in a review.
- Read a passage — a short piece you prepare, then play through once in time, then review. Hear it first if you like, and a gentle look-ahead guide leads your eye down the line. Treble, bass, or hands-together grand staff.
- Recognition quizzes — read the staff and pick the answer, no playing required: is the next note higher, lower, or the same; name the major key from its key signature.
Hints & difficulty
- Hints that fade. Early lessons name the upcoming notes (or whisper the name); lower the help as you improve, down to no hints at all — the real test.
- Look-ahead guide. A read-marker leads the cursor so you practice reading past your hands. (A stricter “fade-ahead”, which fogs out notes beyond the next bar, is still available as a legacy option.)
- Strict chords. Require every chord note to be held together — the sustain pedal lets you build it one note at a time.
- Presets & share links. Save a configuration to reuse, or copy a link that carries every setting (handy for teachers assigning practice).
Practice Room, Focus & looks
Practice Room keeps every setting in a side rail so you can tune the drill. Focus hides the chrome for a calm, full-screen session — open the keyboard or mixer from the small icon buttons; leave Focus to change other settings. Both come in two looks, Daylight and Candlelight.