Have you ever seen music written like this?

[Peterhamm]

I found a whole envelope full of em and they seem to be on old linen paper. Funnily enough I know the song but it’s usually passed on by ear. Kinda more of a traditional song  

[Stephen Fine]

I've done things vaguely like this for students who don't read notes,  but never like this. I wonder why their instincts was to go down instead of across.  And writing out the numbers instead of using the numerals.  Weird.  Pretty though.  And legible enough. 

[Altgeiger]

In addition to what I said when you posted this on Facebook, it's an illustration of why anything we think we know about the most ancient written music is suspect to me: the earliest notation was intended as a jog to the memory, not a way of communicating a new tune. Imagine what you'd come up with if you were a scholar trying to reconstruct the tune "Red River Valley" from this! But if you know the tune, it's easy to understand.

[Violadamore]

On 8/4/2026 at 1:21 AM, Peterhamm said:

I found a whole envelope full of em and they seem to be on old linen paper. Funnily enough I know the song but it’s usually passed on by ear. Kinda more of a traditional song  

Since no one else has really responded, it's a form of violin or fiddle tablature, commonly called a "tab".  They are written for first position, and show you which finger to use, rather than the note you play.  More usually, they look like this:

and are read like this:

 

Tabs are more common for guitar and mandolin, and are used by many stage performers.  

There's a guy I play alongside occasionally, who worked for decades in Nashville, and who has a stack of written-out tabs similar to what you found.  

For reference, here's an example of a conventional guitar tab for "Red River Valley", https://www.flatpick.com/v/vspfiles/downloadables/FGM_Lesson_Sept_2020.pdf  .  

 

[Peterhamm]

2 hours ago, Violadamore said:

Since no one else has really responded, it's a form of violin or fiddle tablature, commonly called a "tab".  They are written for first position, and show you which finger to use, rather than the note you play.  More usually, they look like this:

and are read like this:

 

Tabs are more common for guitar and mandolin, and are used by many stage performers.  

There's a guy I play alongside occasionally, who worked for decades in Nashville, and who has a stack of written-out tabs similar to what you found.  

For reference, here's an example of a conventional guitar tab for "Red River Valley", https://www.flatpick.com/v/vspfiles/downloadables/FGM_Lesson_Sept_2020.pdf  .  

 

Thats fascinating. Thank you