The layout
Letter piano sheets are written for one fixed keyboard map. The 36 white keys, C2 through C7, map to the characters 1234567890, then qwertyuiop, asdfghjkl and zxcvbnm, left to right. Holding Shift gives the black key immediately to the right: ! (Shift+1) is C♯2, T is C♯4, L is C♯6. White keys that have no black key above them (E and B) play nothing with Shift. The number row goes by key position, so Shift+8 plays C♯3 on any keyboard layout, even where that key types another symbol. Middle C is t, marked with a dot.
This page opens with all 61 keys visible and each key labelled with its character, so you can check a sheet against the keyboard as you play.
Playing a sheet
Read the sheet left to right and press each character. Letters in square brackets are a chord: for [tu] press t and u together. Many computer keyboards drop keys once four or more are held down, so a big chord may lose a note; press it on the screen or use a MIDI keyboard instead. Keep Space held down as a sustain pedal to join notes together.
A sheet that looks too high or too low is often written for another octave: move the layout with the − and + buttons.
The box below the keyboard also works as a proofreader for sheets in this layout. Anything that doesn’t map to a key comes out crossed out, so typos jump out at once: a capital R or U, for example, can’t be right, because B and E have no black key above them. Once a sheet reads cleanly, the same box turns it into a guided lesson. For ready-made examples in these characters, open Ode to Joy or Canon in D.
Record and share
Press Record before you start: recording begins with your first note. Listen back while the keys light up, then save it as a MIDI file for GarageBand or MuseScore, or as a WAV file. For the two-row layout that most music software uses, go back to the virtual piano.