The Keyboard and the Grand Staff
The piano keyboard is arranged in a repeating pattern of white and black keys. Each group contains seven white keys (C D E F G A B) and five black keys arranged in groups of two and three. The pattern repeats across the full 88-key range. Recognizing the groups of two and three black keys is the fastest way to find any white key by sight.
Black keys are named as sharps or flats relative to adjacent white keys: the black key between C and D is C♯ (C-sharp) or D♭ (D-flat), depending on context. Two notes that share the same physical key but different spellings are called enharmonic equivalents.
The grand staff combines a treble staff and a bass staff joined by a brace. Middle C (C4) sits on one ledger line below the treble staff and one ledger line above the bass staff — it bridges the two staves. Pianists typically read treble with the right hand and bass with the left, though the assignments can shift. Understanding the grand staff as a unified picture of the keyboard is fundamental to reading piano music.