Reading Sheet Music for Harmonics

[AlphaMale]

It confuses me.
First people say I need to understand the overtone series, if anyone can teach me it or tell me why I need to know it, it would help.
Second I have a chart for the fretboard but it confuses me. It is for playing natural harmonics and it shows notes on each fret. So when I read the sheet music I wonder do I play the for the harmonic or do I play the harmonic on the fret of the note?

[AlphaMale]

bump

[The_Orlonater]

Well, you could probably read most of the harmonics in Treble Clef. A few of them will have some ledger lines. Anyway, here's a link that tells them what pitch they are and such. They can help you transcribe them into treble clef, http://www.cyberfretbass.com/techniq...ural/page6.php.

Hope this helps!

[Evan_S._Brown]

when writing harmonics for stringed instruments in an orchestra the composer has two options, writing the actual pitch value or writing what note you press down on.

Most compositions i've played in have the harmonic written on the note that you press down on, but you can have both as well, i've played where the actual harmonic pitch is written in lighter ink above the actual note you press down on

[cowsgomoo]

I prefer to notate the pitch you hear, with a little 'o' above the note head... it makes sense to me because a score usually gives instructions about what the music should sound like, and usually leaves it up to the reader to decide things like where on the fingerboard you should play

and given that the same harmonic pitch can be played at more than one place on the fingerboard, I think this is a justifiable thing to do

if you're writing TAB or a notation/TAB hybrid, then I can see how 'instructions on where your fingers go' type notation would make sense, but i'm not into TAB

I prefer to use leger lines than treble clef or octave markings... I think bass players generally prefer it up to about 4 lines

[JimmyM]

I prefer not to write them at all.