In music, a note head is the elliptical part of a note

Note

In music, the term note has two primary meanings:#A sign used in musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a sound;#A pitched sound itself....

. Noteheads may be coloured completely black or white, indicating the note value

Note value

In music notation, a note value indicates the relative duration of a note, using the color or shape of the note head, the presence or absence of a stem, and the presence or absence of flags/beams/hooks/tails....

 (i.e., rhythmic duration). In a whole note

Whole note

thumb|right|250px|Figure 1. A whole note and a whole rest.In music, a whole note or semibreve is a note represented by a hollow oval note head, like a half note , and no note stem . Its length is equal to four beats in 4/4 time...

, the note head is the only component of the note. Shorter note values attach a stem

Stem (music)

Stems can refer to two things in music, relating to music notation and production.-Notation:Stems are the lines which extend from the notehead. Stems may point up or down. Different-facing stems indicate the voice for polyphonic music written on the same staff...

 to the note head, and possibly beam

Beam (music)

A beam in musical notation is a thick line frequently used to connect multiple consecutive eighth notes , or notes of shorter value , and occasionally rests...

s or flags. The longer double whole note

Double whole note

In music, a double whole note or breve is a note lasting twice as long as a whole note...

 can be written with vertical lines surrounding it, two attached note heads, or a rectangular note head.

History

Note heads ultimately derive from the neume

Neume

A neume is the basic element of Western and Eastern systems of musical notation prior to the invention of five-line staff notation. The word is a Middle English corruption of the ultimately Ancient Greek word for breath ....

s used to notate Gregorian chant

Gregorian chant

Gregorian chant is the central tradition of Western plainchant, a form of monophonic liturgical music within Western Christianity that accompanied the celebration of Mass and other ritual services...

. The punctum, seen at right, is the simplest of the shapes and most clearly anticipates the modern note head. When placed on a clef

Clef

A clef is a musical symbol used to indicate the pitch of written notes. Placed on one of the lines at the beginning of the staff, it indicates the name and pitch of the notes on that line. This line serves as a reference point by which the names of the notes on any other line or space of the staff...

, the position of a note head indicated the relative frequency of a note. The development of different colors of note heads, and the use of it to indicate rhythmic values, was the use of white mensural notation

Mensural notation

Mensural notation is the musical notation system which was used in European music from the later part of the 13th century until about 1600."Mensural" refers to the ability of this system to notate complex rhythms with great exactness and flexibility...

, adopted around 1450.

Franco of Cologne

Franco of Cologne

Franco of Cologne was a German music theorist and possibly composer. He was one of the most influential theorists of the late Medieval era, and was the first to propose an idea which was to transform musical notation permanently: that the duration of any note should be determined by its...

, ancient composer and music theorist, codified a system of rhythm notation. He explained this system in his work, Ars Cantus Mensurabilis, (which means “The Art of Measurable Music”) circa 1280. In this system, the relative duration of notes was indicated by the note shapes. The note heads were rectangles, squares, or diamonds depending on the note length. This system was expanded during the Ars Nova

Ars nova

Ars nova refers to a musical style which flourished in France and the Burgundian Low Countries in the Late Middle Ages: more particularly, in the period between the preparation of the Roman de Fauvel and the death of the composer Guillaume de Machaut in 1377...

 period.

Shortly before the Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

, scribes began to write the notes of the Franconian and Ars Nova style with open note heads. During the Renaissance, composers added shorter note durations that used filled-in note heads. Near the end of the 16th century, the square or diamond-shaped notes changed to the round note heads that are used today.