Real recorded cello notes on a piano keyboard: click, touch or type, and the cello answers. The cello is often called the instrument closest to the human voice: its range covers the voices of a men's and a women's choir. Free, nothing to install, with note names, your computer keyboard and a metronome.
Recorded notes, the cello's own range, and the keyboard you already know.
Every key plays a recording of a real cello: 34 notes from C2 to C5, each key pitched from the nearest one. The cello is bowed string instrument: four strings tuned in fifths - C, G, D and A - an octave below the viola, played with a bow while the player sits with the instrument between the knees, resting on its endpin.
The keyboard covers C2 to E5, where the recordings sound natural; a real cello plays C2 to about C6. Use the octave arrows to move, and More keys on a wide screen.
Stay in the lower half of the keyboard and play slowly: the cello is at its warmest between the low C and the A above middle C. The note sounds as long as you hold the key, like a bow or a breath.
Famous cello music: Bach, Cello Suite No. 1 (Prelude); Saint-Saëns, The Swan; Elgar, Cello Concerto; Dvořák, Cello Concerto. Pick out a melody by ear on the keyboard above.
Click or touch a key. The first note starts the sound; the cello recordings for the visible keys load in the background.
A S D F G H J K L play the white keys, W E T Y U O P the black ones (Q and Z on AZERTY). Z and X move an octave (W and X on AZERTY).
Set Labels to C D E or Do Ré Mi to see every note name, or to Keys to see your own keyboard letters.
Turn on the metronome and play along. Then try the same melody on the violin or the piano.
| Type | Sampled cello, playable on this page, free |
|---|---|
| Family | Strings - bowed string instrument |
| Samples | 34 recorded notes, C2 to C5 |
| Range here | C2 to E5 |
| Real range | C2 to about C6 |
| Notation | Bass clef (tenor and treble clef up high) |
| Controls | Labels, octave arrows, More keys and a metronome |
| Computer keyboard | Ableton layout by key position - QWERTY, AZERTY, QWERTZ |
| Credits | Cello samples from tonejs-instruments by Nicholas Brosowsky, CC BY 3.0 - see credits |
| Requirements | Any modern browser with Web Audio - Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari |
Most online instruments are a synthesiser with a picture on top. This one plays recordings of a real cello, so the attack, the tone and the decay are the instrument's own. The cello is often called the instrument closest to the human voice: its range covers the voices of a men's and a women's choir.
The cello appeared in Italy in the 16th century as the bass of the violin family. Bach's six Suites for solo cello, written around 1720, were almost forgotten until Pablo Casals recorded them in the 1930s.
A real cello is written in bass clef (tenor and treble clef up high). The keyboard here plays the sounding notes, so a melody you find by ear is the melody you hear. To go further, the free sheet music and chord pages work with any instrument you can read music on.
Yes. Every key plays a recording of a real cello - 34 notes from C2 to C5 - pitched to the nearest key. The recordings come from the tonejs-instruments library, under a Creative Commons licence.
Yes. The middle row of letters plays the white keys and the row above it the black keys, by key position, so it works the same on QWERTY, AZERTY and QWERTZ keyboards. Set Labels to Keys to see the letters on the keys.
A cello plays C2 to about C6. On this page the keyboard goes from C2 to E5, where the recordings sound natural.
Bach, Cello Suite No. 1 (Prelude); Saint-Saëns, The Swan; Elgar, Cello Concerto; Dvořák, Cello Concerto.
Yes, free with no account and nothing to install. It runs in any modern browser, on a computer, a tablet or a phone.
The cello on this page is free, with no account. GOONS Studio adds a sampled piano, drum machines, synths and a sequencer in the browser - free for 7 days, no card required.
Free on this page, no account. Play the violin →